Charter Opposes SCOTUS Review of Minnesota VoIP Case

“That decision does not conflict with the decisions of any other court,” is “consistent with the views of the FCC,” doesn’t “implicate any issue of national importance,” and is “a straightforward application of the plain terms of the 1996 Act,” the company said. The operator disagreed the decision conflicts with the Vermont Supreme Court's 2013 opinion that some but not all state regulation of information services is pre-empted, as argued by the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission in its petition for writ of certiorari (see 1905010191). The decision doesn't frustrate universal service programs, the MVPD responded to NARUC's June 3 amicus brief. “As the FCC has held and the Tenth Circuit has recognized, designation as an Eligible Telecommunications Carrier turns on whether the provider offers any service on a common carrier basis," Charter said. "Provisioning interconnected VoIP services (irrespective of how they are classified) generally still involves wholesale telecommunications services upstream from the consumer-facing offering, such as those relating to network access and interconnection, meaning that VoIP providers or their affiliates can be common carriers for reasons other than their consumer-facing voice services.” The Voice on the Net Coalition, supporting Charter, expects a cert decision by the first week of October, Executive Director Glenn Richards told us Friday.