Senate Republicans Expect Anti-Ligado Language to Remain
Two top Senate Republicans told us they expect language aimed at hindering Ligado’s L-band plan rollout to make it into a conference version of the FY 2021 National Defense Authorization Act currently under negotiation. What it will ultimately look like remains uncertain. The House and Senate passed NDAA versions (HR-6395/S-4049) earlier this year that included anti-Ligado provisions (see 2007200052). Iridium, National Emergency Number Association and other critics of the proposal urged leaders of the Armed Services committees to push for all Ligado language from the two versions to be kept in a combined NDAA bill.
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Senate Armed Services Chairman Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., told us he’s confident a final NDAA will include anti-Ligado language at least equivalent to what the Senate passed in S-4049. The text would bar DOD from using its funding to comply with the Ligado order without further review by the defense secretary and the National Academies of Science and Engineering (see 2006110026). Inhofe and other NDAA conferees hope to have a final bill ready for December votes, though non-Ligado-related issues may hamper those plans.
Inhofe hasn’t given up on other means to force the FCC to reverse its Ligado plan approval. He will “continue to do what there is to do until something works,” including potentially filing his proposed Recognizing and Ensuring Taxpayer Access to Infrastructure Necessary (Retain) for GPS and Satellite Communications Act (see 2006220055). Ligado didn’t comment Monday.
“There will be some language” in an NDAA conference bill on the Ligado issue, “but I do not know which” bill’s language will ultimately make it in, said Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Roger Wicker, R-Miss. He has remained publicly neutral throughout Capitol Hill's debate on the matter. Several House Commerce Committee Republicans support FCC approval of the plan (see 2005190061). There are other opponents in both chambers (see 2005150061), including Senate Commerce ranking member Maria Cantwell, D-Wash.
“Your direct involvement” in favor of retaining the Ligado language from HR-6395 and S-4049 “is critical,” Iridium and other opponents wrote Inhofe, House Armed Services Chairman Adam Smith, D-Wash., and the committees’ ranking members. These five provisions from the two bills “provide the necessary flexibility to the DOD” to guard against the L-band plan’s potential effects on GPS systems, they said. A HR-6395 provision would bar DOD from using funding to “retrofit any [GPS] device or system, or network that uses” GPS “to mitigate interference” from Ligado’s planned “commercial terrestrial operations." The other would bar the Pentagon from signing, extending or renewing a contract “with an entity that engages in commercial terrestrial operations” on the L band unless the defense secretary certifies lack of interference to DOD GPS devices.