The FCC Tuesday paused the unofficial 180-day shot clock on its review of T-Mobile buying Sprint. The FCC cited a “substantially revised" and more complex network engineering model T-Mobile submitted Sept. 5 and a business model T-Mobile executives described on Aug. 29 but didn't disclose until Sept. 5. T-Mobile has also promised additional economic modeling it has yet to file, said a letter from Wireless Bureau Chief Donald Stockdale and David Lawrence, director of the task force reviewing the deal. "The clock will remain stopped until the Applicants have completed the record on which they intend to rely and a reasonable period of time has passed for staff and third-party review." The two companies released a joint statement. "We appreciate that the FCC is taking the time necessary to fully understand the merits," the companies said. "The additional review time is common to FCC merger reviews and we recently supplied a large amount of data to the FCC that they want sufficient time to assess. We are confident that this transaction is pro-competitive, good for the country and good for American consumers, and we look forward to continuing to work with the FCC as they evaluate our plans." The Wireless Bureau meanwhile asked for data from Verizon, as part of the agency’s ongoing analysis of the deal. The bureau said in a Monday letter in Tuesday's Daily Digest and docket 18-197 it may seek other information. AT&T officials said they were called in by the FCC to discuss the company’s “5G deployment plans” relative to the deal. The bureau also requested data from AT&T and from U.S. Cellular (see here and here). Also Tuesday, T-Mobile said it signed a multiyear, $3.5 billion contract with Ericsson to support the carrier's nationwide deployment of 5G. “Ericsson will provide T-Mobile with the latest 5G New Radio hardware and software compliant with 3GPP standards,” T-Mobile said. “The contract also encompasses Ericsson’s digital services solutions, including dynamic orchestration, business support systems (BSS) and Ericsson Cloud Core, enabling T-Mobile to rapidly launch innovative and groundbreaking 5G experiences.”

The FCC released updated data on deployment of fixed broadband and mobile broadband and voice services, as of June 30, 2017, said a public notice by the Wireline and Wireless bureaus Monday in docket 11-10. It cited industry Form 477 submissions, including revisions made as of June 14, 2018. A separate Wireline Bureau public notice announced the FCC's national broadband map, which currently focuses on fixed broadband, was updated to include June 2017 Form 477 data.

The most recent Technology Policy Institute annual Aspen, Colorado, event was held Aug. 19-21.

The FCC overstates broadband availability on tribal lands because it considers service available in a census block if a provider could serve at least one location, GAO reported Friday. "Overstatements of access limit FCC's and tribal stakeholders' abilities to target broadband funding to such areas." GAO recommend the FCC devise ways to collect and report accurate data on tribal broadband access, develop a process for obtaining tribal input on provider data, and obtain feedback from tribal stakeholders on the effectiveness of a 2012 agency statement to providers on tribal engagement. The FCC agreed.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute wasn't harmed by conditions on Charter Communications' buys of Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks, so it has no standing to challenge them, the FCC said in a docket 15-149 order Monday denying CEI's reconsideration petition (see 1803050023). It said that while all the conditions were requested by various entities, CEI never objected to those comments, nor did it file an opposition to the petitions to deny, so it can't raise arguments against the conditions now on recon. Oral argument is scheduled for Sept. 17 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit on CEI's petition for writ of mandamus (see 1807180027). The recon petition denial order moots CEI's petition for writ of mandamus, the FCC told the U.S. Court of Appeals in a letter (in Pacer, docket 17-1261) Monday, asking that the court dismiss the petition and cancel oral argument. The FCC said it talked with CEI counsel and that both sides agree oral argument isn't necessary. CEI emailed that it "demonstrated that the FCC imposed unlawful conditions on the Charter merger that would increase costs for consumers, who will have to foot the bill for an overreaching federal agency. Even though the FCC dismissed CEI’s petition, the FCC has no authority to micromanage the internet at the public’s expense and we are evaluating our options regarding appealing the FCC’s order."

The Public Safety Bureau approved limited waiver of emergency alert system and wireless emergency alert rules to let broadcasters and carriers take part in a test by the Puerto Rico Emergency Management Bureau. PREMB's simulation is scheduled for Wednesday, with a backup of Thursday. New rules allowing such joint tests kick in May 1. The exercise will "help educate and prepare the public and will help the PREMB to determine the readiness and effectiveness of Puerto Rico’s public warning system, plans, and infrastructure as it prepares for the peak of the 2018 hurricane season,” the FCC bureau said. “Given the disasters suffered by Puerto Rico during last year’s hurricanes and in preparation for this year’s peak hurricane season, we find waiver relief is warranted ... the proposed test would provide alert initiators and emergency managers information of immediate value to ongoing restoration and emergency preparedness efforts.”

New York Assemblymember Patricia Fahy (D) said Democratic lawmakers intended that their letter seeking to apply net neutrality rules to a Charter Communications successor also cover Charter itself in the case of a settlement (see 1809060038).

Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh again defended at his confirmation hearing Thursday night his dissent in the U.S. Court of Appeal for the D.C. Circuit's 2017 en banc affirmation of the now-rescinded 2015 net neutrality rules in USTelecom v. FCC amid criticism from Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn. She also queried Kavanaugh on his USTelecom dissent during an earlier confirmation session. He faced questions about his views on Chevron deference by courts to agency expertise and on tech-based privacy issues (see 1809050061 and 1809060048). Kavanaugh “went beyond the bounds” of USTelecom and FCC arguments, finding the First Amendment “protects ISPs' right to exercise editorial discretion,” Klobuchar said. Kavanaugh believes the First Amendment argument “seemed on point” for his dissent because it was a major factor in the Supreme Court's 1994 Turner Broadcasting and was in amicus briefs supporting USTelecom. Turner's First Amendment approach “seemed to apply very closely” and has been successfully applied to cases “in other contexts,” Kavanaugh said. “I pointed out” in the dissent that “if a company has market power under Turner then the government does have the authority to regulate, but if a company doesn't have market power,” Turner says that authority doesn't exist. “There's First Amendment rights of individuals to use the internet and express their own views,” Klobuchar said. “You basically said that the companies have those First Amendment rights,” which runs counter to policymakers' view “that unless you have some rules of the road in place, it's going to make it very hard for individuals and small businesses” to maintain internet access, she said. Demand Progress used Kavanaugh's dissent and his Senate Judiciary Committee testimony on the ruling in a Thursday night fundraising email. “Kavanaugh tried to block net neutrality when he was on the D.C. Circuit Court, but he was overruled by the other judges,” Demand Progress said. “On the Supreme Court, he and the other four right-wing justices would have the final word.” If two of the three Senate Republicans who joined Senate Democrats in May to pass a Congressional Review Act resolution of disapproval aimed at restoring the 2015 rules (see 1805160064) “join every Democrat in voting no on Kavanaugh, his nomination is finished,” Demand Progress said.

With the FCC set to vote on a major wireless infrastructure item Sept. 26, it saw much activity late in the week, based on filings in docket 17-79. Chairman Ajit Pai Wednesday circulated the draft declaratory ruling and order, crafted by Commissioner Brendan Carr (see 1809050029). CTIA fired back at a NATOA petition for reconsideration of a March infrastructure order (see 1806060039). That order was “a proper, lawful exercise of the Commission’s authority under the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act, was consistent with those statutes, and was solidly grounded in the factual record,” CTIA said: The FCC “addressed a serious and growing problem -- the long delays and costs resulting from the Commission’s and Tribal authorities’ prior implementations of NEPA and NHPA.” Sprint agreed, saying the order offers “much-needed relief from the unnecessary and ineffective regulatory burdens created by the prior regime.” NTCA agrees with Crown Castle complaints railroads can slow wireless deployment (see 1807050022). “Unfettered monopoly control of certain tracts of land by railroads may have made sense a century or more ago,” not now, NTCA said. Officials with NATOA, the National League of Cities, the Smart Communities Coalition and the U.S. Conference of Mayors said Carr contacted each before the pending order premiered "to provide the organizations with his understanding and intent of the Item,” the groups said.

Government should directly fund "infrastructure needs," not last-mile carriers, to promote rural broadband and close the digital divide, said Public Knowledge Thursday. It cited a new Broadband Connects America coalition of 18 groups that also include the Benton Foundation, Institute for Local Self-Reliance, National Hispanic Media Coalition and X Lab. "Rather than repeat the design" of the FCC high-cost USF program, "new funding should take advantage of the ability to divide the supply chain into different components such as towers, fiber, conduit, as well as services such as 911 and packet routing," said the coalition's principles. "Directing funding to shared infrastructure instead of particular carriers would allow federal and state governments to target dollars where needed to ensure efficient deployment of infrastructure that could serve multiple carriers -- rather than limiting funding to one carrier per community." It said the shift in focus "would reduce the cost of providing service to rural areas" for carriers and "is not meant to include funds that are directed towards specific users such as Lifeline, E-rate, or the Rural Health program." Other principles include "a combination of approaches that reflects the complexity" of rural broadband challenges and "restoring net neutrality."