The FCC's draft NPRM that would kick off the agency's efforts to reestablish net neutrality rules largely mirrored the commission's 2015 order, according to our analysis of the draft. Commissioners will consider the item during an October open meeting that will include a full commission for the first time under Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel despite a potential government shutdown (see 2309270056). Meanwhile, FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington said the FCC’s net neutrality push is not about protecting free speech but about protecting some tech companies.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has jurisdiction to review in a case on whether East St. Louis and other Illinois cities are entitled to franchise fees from streaming TV providers (case 22-2905), Netflix and other streamers said Tuesday. The appellees responded to a concern Judge Frank Easterbrook raised at oral argument earlier this month (see 2309120039). Easterbrook said there might not be diversity jurisdiction because Warner Media Direct is owned by AT&T Capital Services, which is based in Illinois where the complaint was first filed. The appellees conceded that’s the case and said they “withdraw any contention that diversity jurisdiction independently exists under Section 1332(a)” of the 2005 Class Action Fairness Act. They amended their jurisdictional statement to show how the court can act without needing to establish diversity jurisdiction. "The federal courts have subject-matter jurisdiction over this action under the" Fairness Act "because this putative class action involves minimally diverse parties, at least 100 class members, and an amount in controversy exceeding $5,000,000,” the streamers said. A local controversy exception in Section 1332(d)(4) "provides no basis to 'decline to exercise' jurisdiction for two independent reasons,” they said. No defendant is a citizen of the state where the action was first filed, under the meaning of Section 1332(d)(10), said the appellees: WarnerMedia Direct "is a citizen only of New York (its principal place of business) and Delaware (under whose laws it is organized)." Another reason the local controversy exception doesn't apply is that there have been many other class actions by different groups of cities asserting similar factual allegations against multiple defendants around the U.S., said the streamers: The 7th Circuit declined to apply the exception in a similar situation last year in Schutte v. Ciox Health.

A looming federal government shutdown could hinder work on important broadband and satellite regulatory initiatives, said FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and NTIA Administrator Alan Davidson during a Wednesday Axios event. The chances Congress will include language in a continuing resolution to restore at least parts of the FCC's spectrum auction authorities continued to dim Wednesday, but officials and lobbyists we spoke with don't believe those efforts are completely dead. The Senate and House made progress into Wednesday afternoon on their respective continuing resolution proposals to prevent a shutdown that would otherwise occur this weekend, but major differences between the two measures continued to stoke widespread apprehension on Capitol Hill.

The U.S. urged the Supreme Court of the United States to reject importer PrimeSource Building Products' petition for a writ of certiorari in a case on the expansion of Section 232 duties onto "derivative" products, telling the high court that PrimeSource's separation of powers claims fall flat. While the importer said the case can give the court a chance to reconsider its approach to nondelegation, the government argued that, under the principle of stare decisis, the petitioner must identify a "special justification" for revisiting established law, which it has failed to do here (PrimeSource Building Products v. U.S., Sup. Ct. # 23-69).

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued its mandate Sept. 22 in Royal Brush Manufacturing v. U.S. The appellate court ruled in July that CBP violated importer Royal Brush's due process rights during an Enforce and Protect Act investigation by not providing the company with access to business confidential information (see 2307270038). The ruling has raised questions on how CBP would respond and how it will conduct its antidumping and countervailing duty evasion investigations in the future. Royal Brush counsel Steven Gordon emailed that the U.S. hasn't petitioned for a rehearing and that he doesn't expect an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court (Royal Brush Manufacturing v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 22-1226).

Interest is still high in both the House and Senate in including a temporary restoration of the FCC’s auction authority in a continuing resolution to extend federal appropriations past the end of FY 2023 Sept. 30 (see 2309190001), but some on and off Capitol Hill now believe attaching the narrower 5G Spectrum Authority Licensing Enforcement Act (S-2787) is a more viable option for breaking the mandate logjam. Lobbyists believe the chances S-2787 will appear in a Senate-side CR improved considerably after the chamber passed the measure Thursday via unanimous consent.

The Commerce Department last week released the final version of its guardrails for recipients of Chips Act funding, measures it said will prevent its semiconductor industry grants from being used to benefit certain “foreign countries of concern,” including China.

The House Financial Services Committee this week advanced a bill that would make USDA a permanent member of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. The Agricultural Security Risk Review Act, which passed the committee with bipartisan support, would address an “overdue” oversight in making the agency a formal part of all CFIUS reviews, Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer, R-Mo., said during a Sept. 20 committee markup. “While CFIUS is indeed a committee, it benefits from expertise and particular member agencies with relevant expertise,” he said. “Agriculture is too important to go neglected.”

The FCC voted Thursday to streamline satellite applications, provide spectrum for commercial space launches, limit robocaller access to phone numbers, and target a robocalling enterprise with a $116 million forfeiture. Commissioner-designate Anna Gomez didn’t attend the agency's open meeting, which is expected to be the last one with FCC’s current 2-2 makeup. FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel declined to say what the agency’s path might be once she has a Democratic majority, “We had four members of the agency here today” and there will be “five in the not-too-distant future, so I would recommend you stay tuned,” Rosenworcel said during a news conference. The agency also approved an order updating the 5G Fund for Rural America (see 2309210035).

The narrow targeting of Maryland’s so-called tax on digital ad revenue may suggest it’s primarily a punishment that federal courts are permitted to review under the U.S. Tax Injunction Act (TIA), 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Julius Richardson said at oral argument Wednesday. The 4th Circuit is reviewing an appeal by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce of the March 2022 decision by the U.S. District Court in Baltimore to dismiss the Chamber’s challenge of the tax, plus the district court’s December dismissal of the Chamber’s challenge to the tax’s pass-through ban (case 22-2275). The 4th Circuit should remand all counts back to district court, argued the Chamber’s attorney Michael Kimberly of McDermott Will.