Maryland senators will convene a workgroup to hash out differences with opponents to a state privacy bill, they said at a livestreamed Senate Finance Committee hearing Wednesday. SB-11 sponsor Sen. Susan Lee (D) said Maryland shouldn’t model a bill on Virginia’s law and can’t wait for a national law. TechNet Executive Director-Northeast Chris Gilrein said Virginia’s law is best in the absence of congressional action.

Dolby objects to LG’s “late-breaking request” for discovery in support of its motion for a 14-day temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction against Dolby, attorney William Michael of Paul Weiss wrote U.S. District Judge Paul Crotty of Manhattan Tuesday. LG alleges Dolby violated the Sherman Antitrust Act and unfair-competition laws by reneging on commitments Dolby made to ATSC to license its AC-4 audio codec patents for NextGenTV on fair, reasonable and nondiscriminatory terms (see 2201090001). With so many redactions in LG’s memorandum of law in support of its TRO/PI, it’s virtually impossible for the public to identify the allegedly harmful Dolby conduct that LG is asking the court to enjoin. Dolby’s response to LG’s TRO/PI motion is due Monday. “At no point before last Friday” did LG even raise the possibility of seeking discovery on its motion, said Michael. “Now, on the eve of Dolby filing its opposition,” LG “all of a sudden thinks discovery is necessary,” he said. “Perhaps in the intervening month” since LG filed for the TRO/PI, its “confidence in its motion has wavered,” he said. “Whatever the motivation behind its request, the Court should not even consider it at this stage.” LG “has never provided any details about the discovery it wants to take, on what timeline it would occur,” or why it waited until now “to even raise the topic,” he said. LG attorneys didn’t comment.

The FTC doesn’t have the authority to make competition rules, FTC Commissioner Noah Phillips said Tuesday during a U.S. Chamber of Commerce livestream. It wasn’t Congress’ intent to give unelected bureaucrats on the commission the power to pass rules that affect “virtually the entire economy,” which is “very much contemplated” in President Joe Biden’s executive order on competition, he said. “These are legislative judgments, and even if Congress wants to make a mistake, those are mistakes for Congress to make.”

A proposed Washington state data privacy commission got some support at a House Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday. The panel heard testimony on a comprehensive privacy bill before a possible vote at a Friday meeting. The question of enforcement continued to divide witnesses Tuesday. In Delaware, a House panel unanimously cleared a data broker bill based on Vermont’s law.

A proposed Washington state data privacy commission got some support at a House Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday. The panel heard testimony on a comprehensive privacy bill before a possible vote at a Friday meeting. The question of enforcement continued to divide witnesses Tuesday. In Delaware, a House panel unanimously cleared a data broker bill based on Vermont’s law.

Judges appeared sympathetic to the FCC Tuesday during oral argument on whether the agency overstepped in reallocating the 5.9 GHz band, with the lawyer for ITS America and the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials facing tough questions from a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. The FCC’s 2020 5.9 GHz order allocated 45 MHz of the band for Wi-Fi and 30 MHz for cellular vehicle-to-everything technology.

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act "directs the FCC to make sure that all households with women, infants, children, and breastfeeding mothers participating" in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children program and "all households with students participating [in] the free and reduced school lunch program are eligible for support from the Affordable Connectivity Program," emailed a spokesperson Monday. Last week, Commissioners Brendan Carr and Nathan Simington raised concerns about ACP enrollees not being required to include a Social Security number in their application to verify their identity (see 2201210082): "To be clear, these kinds of programs do not require social security numbers," the spokesperson said: The FCC "has made sure that every family participating in [ACP] provides identification like taxpayer identification numbers and driver's licenses. But this is about more than the law, it’s the right thing to do to make sure millions of people across the country are not left in digital darkness."

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit’s decision on 5.9 GHz may not be as straightforward as its ruling on 6 GHz, because the court will have to grapple with a novel issue -- whether the FCC ignored the Transportation Equity Act and the Department of Transportation’s role in encouraging intelligent transportation systems when it reallocated the band, experts said. The FCC’s 2020 5.9 GHz order allocated 45 MHz of the band for Wi-Fi and 30 MHz for cellular vehicle-to-everything technology.

Contrary to the Jan. 10 notice of supplemental authorities from Section 301 test case lawyers Akin Gump that two recent Court of International Trade decisions bolster their arguments that the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative violated the 1974 Trade Act and 1946 Administrative Procedure Act when it imposed the Lists 3 and 4A tariffs on Chinese imports (see 2201110004), “neither decision is ‘pertinent’ nor ‘significant’ to plaintiffs’ claims,” responded DOJ Thursday in docket 1:21-cv-52. Section 307 of the Trade Act “unambiguously supports that the word ‘modify’ permits an increase in tariffs,” as the government contends in the Section 301 case, said DOJ. “To imply a limitation permitting only a decrease in tariffs would be inconsistent” with Section 307, “and would require adding language that Congress omitted” in the statute, it said. The APA issues discussed in a second decision, Invenergy Renewables v. U.S., in which the court found USTR violated the statute by not addressing “significant comments” raised by the public, “are easily distinguishable from this case,” said DOJ. The significant comments the court determined were unaddressed in Invenergy “concerned the USTR’s authority to withdraw a previously-granted exclusion,” plus “other statutory considerations,” it said. In the Section 301 case, USTR “plainly addressed its statutory authority for issuing List 3 and List 4 and the objective of eliminating China’s unfair trade practices,” it said. Neither decision “constitutes persuasive authority that supports granting judgment for the plaintiffs,” said DOJ. Oral argument is scheduled for Feb. 1.

The Senate Judiciary Committee voted 16-6 Thursday to advance to the floor a bill that would ban Big Tech platforms from self-preferencing products (see 2201140049). Despite calls from tech companies and Republicans for a legislative hearing, Senate Antitrust Subcommittee Chair Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., told us she’s focused on getting the bill to the floor.