Rounds Gets Defense Officials' Backing for Hill Delay on 3.1-3.45 GHz Band
Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., got backing from Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley Tuesday in his quest to delay congressional action on repurposing parts of the 3.1-3.45 GHz band for commercial use until after a DOD study of its systems on the frequency. The military officials told Rounds during an Armed Services Committee hearing that doing so before that analysis is final would jeopardize national security. Rounds has been holding up Senate leaders’ bid to pass a House-cleared renewal of the FCC’s spectrum auction authority through May 19 (HR-1108), which led to the mandate lapsing earlier this month (see 2303090074), because he’s concerned about lawmakers reaching a deal on a spectrum package that would address the lower 3 GHz band.
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The impasse over the statute’s reauthorization continued Tuesday, with Rounds telling us there have been “no discussions anyplace yet” this week on allowing HR-1108 or his rival bill for renewal ending Sept. 30 (S-650) to pass the Senate via unanimous consent. Rounds and Senate leaders canceled out dueling UC floor bids on the measures just before the remit’s expiration. “I’ve continued to offer to a couple of my colleagues that if there’s an interest in it, I would still make an extension to Sept. 30 or later,” he said: “So far, it doesn’t seem to be of real concern to them, and apparently they weren’t planning on using any auction authority at this point, apparently.”
“I’m very frustrated” about the lack of Senate action on HR-1108 due to the importance of the FCC’s auction authority, said House Communications Subcommittee ranking member Doris Matsui, D-Calif. “I don’t think people really realize how serious this is. I think the administration has to get involved in this thing and say ‘hey, we just can’t let one department hold this up.’ National security is really very important, but a lot of this is not about national security. It’s about” DOD staking a claim of “ownership” of the spectrum its systems currently use.
Auctioning 3.1-3.45 GHz band spectrum before the DOD’s analysis is complete “would be devastating … and it would take us somewhere north of 20 years to try to recover from a loss of that spectrum,” Austin said during the Senate Armed Services hearing in response to a question from Rounds. “Parts of that spectrum are vital to our national defense and the protection of the homeland.” It’s “not something that you can fix overnight once you break it,” he said.
“I firmly believe that we should wait” to act on 3.1-3.45 GHz until the DOD study concludes, Milley said. “This is a measure twice, cut once sort of thing. We don’t want to vacate” parts of the frequency “because of the severe national security implications.” Spectrum sharing “is obviously a goal for everybody,” but it’s dependent on “how you share and the technical capability to do that,” he said: “That’s what the study should tell us. We want to make a fully informed decision.”
Milley said he and Austin will make recommendations to President Joe Biden on repurposing the 3.1-3.45 GHz band “when the time comes.” Milley insisted any recommendations he makes to Biden be “independent, best military advice.” Milley said he “always” informs Austin ahead of time “if I disagree” on a policy matter. A memo from the DOD Joint Staff office that circulated last week indicated Milley disagreed with Austin's signing a letter with Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo endorsing the 3.1-3.45 GHz language in the scuttled December proposal before the FCC authority’s expiration earlier this month (see 2303080081).
The hearing gave Austin “the opportunity to correct any misinformation that was out there” about his position on repurposing the 3.1-3.45 GHz band that observers could infer meant “he doesn’t think this is an important item,” Rounds told us. “The other important piece of this is that Gen. Milley definitely has to be able to give his professional military advice with regard to what the final outcome of this study is. That’s a big part of this because he’s wearing the uniform, others are just wearing a suit and they represent the administration.”