Senate Appropriations Examines FCC Budget Through Lens of FCC Trajectory Under Pai
A Tuesday Senate Appropriations Financial Services Subcommittee hearing on the FCC FY 2018 budget focused largely on the direction of the commission under Chairman Ajit Pai, with subcommittee Republicans highlighting policy issues Pai championed. Democrats raised concerns with the future of 2015 net neutrality rules and Congress' rollback of ISP privacy rules. President Donald Trump's administration proposed last month that the FCC budget be cut by $18 million, to $322 million, after years of the agency maintaining $340 million in annual funding. The FCC's budget justification document noted a planned reduction of more than 100 employees (see 1705230041).
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
Pai emphasized the importance of making the commission fiscally responsible and said refraining from “regulatory overreach” will help achieve additional savings while spurring economic growth. Pai said that philosophy will inform his approach to priorities ranging from FCC process changes to improving broadband deployments. Commissioner Mike O'Rielly said he believes only the Wireline Bureau's USF work requires additional resources, noting his ongoing concerns about Universal Service Administrative Co. management of the programs. He urged “transformative plans” to overhaul the FCC's structure, citing Pai's formation of the Office of Economics and Data. But he raised concerns about the agency's planned headquarters move, saying he believes “several seasoned agency professionals will choose to leave” rather than relocate.
Commissioner Mignon Clyburn called the FCC's current situation “unprecedented,” noting the agency has the smallest number of employees in more than 30 years, requiring remaining staff to do more “with less.” She cited her ongoing concerns with the May net neutrality rollback NPRM, the need to improve the FCC National Broadband Map and the need for increased funding for the agency's spectrum auctions program.
Senate Appropriations ranking member Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., led other committee Democrats in highlighting concerns about the future of net neutrality in the face of the May NPRM, saying Pai is attempting to “gut” 2015 rules. The NPRM is “ill advised” given the comments on the proceeding that favor preserving the existing rules, Leahy said. The public wants the FCC to “preserve net neutrality,” he said. Senate Appropriations Financial Services ranking member Chris Coons, D-Del., mingled concerns about proposed staff cuts with his misgivings about the NPRM. Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., promised to follow up with Pai on net neutrality and said he was disappointed that Congress voted earlier this year to pass the Congressional Review Act measure ending FCC ISP privacy rules (see 1703280076 and 1704040059).
Chairman Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., praised Pai for his push for process changes, citing his pilot project to make draft agenda items public three weeks before commissioners' meetings (see 1702020051). “The more transparency we can get, the better,” she said. Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., sought assurances that the GOP-majority FCC was allowing for sufficient input from sole Democratic member Clyburn, citing his view that the commission under past Chairman Tom Wheeler was more contentious and less willing to factor in the viewpoints of the minority party. Clyburn said she feels included “most of the time,” while O'Rielly called Pai's leadership a “fresh breath of air.”
Capito and Sens. John Boozman, R-Ark., Jim Lankford, R-Okla., and Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., highlighted their concerns about USF programs that fund broadband deployments in rural areas. USF rural broadband investment issues were also the subject of a Senate Communications Subcommittee hearing Tuesday (see 1706200056). Inaccurate FCC data on nationwide broadband coverage “has caused [West Virginia] to be left behind” given the state's infrastructure deployment challenges, Manchin said. The FCC is well aware of the National Broadband Map's limitations and staff is working to improve data collection accuracy, Pai said. Clyburn agreed that the process for collecting Form 477 data on fixed broadband deployment “needs to be improved, including “more granular data.”