Sens. John Thune, R-S.D., and Ron Wyden, D-Ore., introduced a bill Thursday to quadruple the duty-free de minimis level for U.S. imports to $800, from $200. The de minimis is the threshold on which goods are able to enter the U.S. duty-free. Both lawmakers tried but failed to advance the Low Value Shipment Regulatory Modernization Act last Congress. The measure would be a particular boost to small businesses and the digital trade world, both lawmakers said in statements. “Current import policies on low-value shipments are outdated and need to be modernized for the benefit of American consumers and for small businesses, which increasingly use the Internet to access global markets,” Thune said. “Goods shipped to American consumers should be treated the same way as goods carried on a plane to the United States by American travelers.” In recent years, Congress raised the de minimis to $800 for most circumstances where U.S. citizens are returning from abroad. The increased level would take effect in 2016. The bill also calls on the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to try to raise de minimis levels in trade negotiations. Many lawmakers on Capitol Hill support that goal, as do industry representatives.
Privacy "is an American issue,” Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said in an interview with the nonprofit FreedomWorks on why his Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA), co-sponsored by Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, should be passed. Privacy needs to be protected, Leahy said when asked why ECPA reform was needed. When an email was sent in 1986, the email lasted only for a few weeks due to a shortage of memory, he said. Now with the technological advances such as the cloud, emails last forever, Leahy said. “Law enforcement shouldn’t be able to just take something because it has been sitting there for weeks.” Law enforcement “shouldn’t be able to just walk into the cloud and take something,” just like how they can’t walk into your house and take something without a warrant, he said. There's overwhelming support from the public to pass this legislation, Lee said. “Most of our colleagues understand this resonates with voters,” he said. “What keeps us ultimately safe is our privacy,” Leahy said. If we “give up our privacy, we change as a country,” he said. The right of privacy remains the same even though technology changes, he said.
The executive and legislative branches have no compelling reason not to halt the bulk collection of phone metadata, done under Patriot Act Section 215, said Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board Chairman David Medinein in a Lawfare blog post Friday. “Last month, the National Research Council (NRC) of the National Academy of Sciences released a report in which it determined that ‘[t]here is no software technique that will fully substitute for bulk collection’ of signals intelligence and, finding more drawbacks than benefits to having phone companies instead of the government hold call records, recommended focusing instead on use controls of collected information to address privacy concerns of people who are not the targets of surveillance,” Medine said. “The NRC’s conclusion about the relative merits of aggregated data pooling generally should not deter the President from terminating the 215 telephony metadata program on his own or Congress from passing the USA FREEDOM Act.” The USA Freedom Act was surveillance overhaul legislation that stalled in the Senate last fall.
Senate Homeland Security ranking member Tom Carper, D-Del., introduced the Cyber Threat Sharing Act (S-456) Wednesday. The bill largely mirrors the White House’s January Department of Homeland Security-centric (DHS) cybersecurity information sharing proposal (see 1501130059), though Carper’s office said it also includes input from privacy advocates and the private sector. “We must all work together to find a legislative solution that will address our cybersecurity needs while upholding the civil liberties we all cherish,” Carper said in a news release. Carper, Senate Homeland Security Chairman Ron Johnson, R-Wis., and other committee members sought stakeholder input in late January on possible information sharing legislation (see 1501280060). Carper’s introduction of S-456 came two days before President Barack Obama is expected to announce an executive action that would focus on private sector information sharing at DHS.
The House Commerce Committee signed off on the FCC Consolidated Reporting Act (HR-734) Thursday by voice vote. “This good government legislation reduces the reporting workload and increases efficiency at the FCC by consolidating eight separate congressionally mandated reports on the communications industry into a single comprehensive report,” Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., said in his opening statement Wednesday. “This streamlined report will give us important information about competition among technology platforms and the deployment of communications technologies to unserved communities.” House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., Communications Subcommittee ranking member Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., and Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., backed the bill. Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., introduced the Senate companion (S-253) last month. The House passed the bill last Congress but it never advanced in the Senate.
All Senate Commerce Committee Democrats will sit on the Communications Subcommittee, ranking member Bill Nelson, D-Fla., said in a news release Thursday. There are 10 Democratic members besides Nelson. He released the subcommittee rosters in full for the first time this Congress. Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, leads Democrats for that subcommittee. The Consumer Protection and Data Security Subcommittee will have six members, including ranking member Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., a leadership choice Nelson announced last month. Other Democratic members of that subcommittee are Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Ed Markey of Massachusetts, Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Tom Udall of New Mexico.
“Serious questions remain about the wisdom” of transitioning the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) functions, said Senate Judiciary Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., in a CircleID blog post Wednesday. “Our committees have been conducting oversight of ICANN and we will continue to closely examine the processes of the United States government and ICANN as these transition discussions continue.” Goodlatte and Hatch said they're encouraged by NTIA Administrator Larry Strickling’s repeated statements that the transition doesn’t have “hard and fast deadlines.” If the Obama administration "is determined to give up oversight of ICANN and the IANA contract, permanent improvements to ICANN's accountability and transparency are critical to building public and congressional trust for any proposed transition,” they said. “Any consideration of such a transition must be done carefully and in close coordination with Congress, rather than in a unilateral way.” Reps. Mike Doyle, D-Pa., and John Shimkus argued Wednesday about the merits of Shimkus’ Domain Openness Through Continued Oversight Matters Act (HR-805) (see 1502110014). DOTCOM would require GAO to study the transition proposal for up to one year before approval by NTIA (see 1502100049).
House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., said his recently reintroduced Innovation Act (HR-9) is a necessary “updated and modernized statute” for patent reform, in an opening statement Thursday at a House Judiciary IP Subcommittee hearing on recent patent-related cases at the Supreme Court. “Many of the provisions in the Innovation Act do not necessarily lend themselves to being solved by case law, but by actual law -- congressional legislation,” Goodlatte said. The Patent and Trademark Office shouldn’t “simply be in the business of granting patents and leaving the mess created for the courts and Congress to fix, but rather focus on strengthening the requirements for patent eligibility to reduce the overall number of weak or overly broad patents from entering the system,” he said. HR-9 addresses the “patent trolls, which continue to burden businesses across the country with abusive patent litigation,” said subcommittee ranking member Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., in an opening statement. “A smartphone can contain hundreds of patents -- on everything from touch-screen technology to cameras to GPS mapping,” he said “There is also a patent for that. And worse, we are finding there is a patent troll for that too.” Several groups expressed support for HR-9 upon its introduction, including CEA, NAB and NCTA (see 1502050036).
Eight tech associations, including CEA, sent a letter to congressional leaders Thursday, calling for passage of Trade Promotion Authority. Others signing the letter were BSA/The Software Alliance, the Computer & Communications Industry Association, the Information Technology Industry Council, the Internet Association, the Semiconductor Industry Association, the Silicon Valley Leadership Group and TechNet. “We need a gold standard framework for global trade that is reflective of today’s digital economy and the growing importance of the technology and Internet sectors,” the said. That requires TPA’s passage, it said. The Internet Association has pushed for copyright limitations and exceptions within TPA, which some believe could be a nonstarter for Senate Judiciary Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah (see 1501290054 and 1501300038). In their letter, the eight tech groups said that "when it comes to writing the rules for the future, we cannot be idle." The global economy "is quickly and inevitably moving forward, so we cannot let our trade priorities and our economy remain in the 20th century," they said. Any gold standard framework for global trade needs to be "reflective of today’s digital economy and the growing importance of the technology and Internet sectors," they said. "The first step for accomplishing this is to pass an updated TPA bill that recognizes the realities of the 21st century economy and provides guidance to negotiators on achieving this modern trade framework. The second step is to evaluate each trade deal on its individual merits and whether it reflects America's trade priorities. We urge Congress to swiftly pass updated TPA legislation to support the almost 40 million American jobs supported by trade and ensure that our trade policy is ready for the 21st century."
Bicameral municipal broadband legislation is on the way. Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., and House Commerce Committee Vice Chairwoman Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., are preparing to introduce legislation on municipal broadband, likely following Capitol Hill’s recess next week, industry officials told us. The White House and FCC have outlined intentions to pre-empt state laws restricting municipal networks, and stakeholders in North Carolina and Tennessee have petitioned the FCC to pre-empt their state laws. The FCC will consider those petitions at its Feb. 26 meeting. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., has led an effort on Capitol Hill with his own bill, proposing that Congress pre-empt those restrictive state laws (see 1501220042). Tillis and Blackburn are both former state lawmakers and have slammed the idea of federal pre-emption in the past. Blackburn introduced a provision that passed the House last Congress that would have stopped the FCC from pre-empting those state laws, but the measure never advanced in the Senate. A different telecommunications industry lobbyist not familiar with the Blackburn-Tillis bill told us he suspects any new legislation would be along the same lines as what Blackburn introduced in the last Congress. Spokespeople for Tillis and Blackburn didn’t comment in response to multiple inquiries over the past week about possible pending legislation.