Biden Administration Makes It Clear Broadband Consumer Protection Has Never Been Much Of A Priority

Earlier this month we noted how a successful, often homophobic smear campaign scuttled the nomination of popular reformer Gigi Sohn to the FCC. The GOP and telecom sector, as usual, worked in close collaboration to spread all manner of lies about Sohn, including claims she was an unhinged radical that hated Hispanics, cops, puppies, and freedom.

But there was no shortage of blame to be had on the Democratic side as well.

Unlike the shock and awe Khan nomination and promotion, the Biden administration waited nine months to even nominate Sohn, giving industry ample runway to create its ultimately successful campaign. Maria Cantwell buckled to repeated GOP requests for unnecessary show hearings, used to push false claims about Sohn that the industry had seeded in the press via various nonprofits. Chuck Schumer failed to whip up votes. Senators Masto, Kelly, and Manchin all buckled to industry fear campaigns, preventing a swift 51 vote Senate confirmation.

And nobody in the Biden administration thought it was particularly important to provide any meaningful public messaging support as Sohn faced down a relentless, industry smear campaign, alone. The entire process from beginning to end was a hot, incompetent mess.

And from every indication, there’s also no real evidence that the Biden administration had a plan B in the wake of Sohn’s nomination falling apart. Weeks after the fact and the White House still hasn’t pulled Sohn’s name from consideration or proposed a replacement candidate:

In a note to financial types, former top FCC official Blair Levin, now a media analyst, said a growing list of people apparently interested in the open seat suggests  it would be a fair assumption that the White House did not have a plan B. “It may be sometime before it selects a new nominee, further delaying the moment when the Democrats obtain an FCC majority,” Levin said.

Given this was the industry’s entire goal, I’m sure they’re pleased.

AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, and News Corporation want to keep the nation’s top telecom and media regulator gridlocked at 2-2 commissioners, so it can’t take action on any issues deemed too controversial to industry, whether that’s restoring net neutrality, forcing broadband providers to be more transparent about pricing, or restoring media consolidation limits stripped away during the Trump era.

Whoever is chosen to replace Sohn will surely be more friendly to industry in a bid to avoid a repeat. Assuming that person is even seated, it won’t be until much later this year, at which point they’ll have very little time to implement any real reform before the next presidential election. The policies that will be prioritized probably won’t be the controversial or popular ones, like net neutrality.

I’m not sure who has been giving Biden broadband policy advice of late, but it’s pretty clear that for all of the administration’s talk about “antitrust reform” (which has included some great work on “right to repair”), a functioning FCC with a voting majority and competent broadband consumer protection has never actually been much of a priority.

Yes, the Biden administration has done good work on pushing for an infrastructure bill that will soon throw $45 billion at industry to address the digital divide. But most of that money will be going, as usual, to entrenched local monopolies that helped create the divide in the first place through relentless efforts to crush competition and stifle nearly all competent oversight.

And without a voting majority, the agency will have a steeper uphill climb when it comes to basic things like shoring up broadband mapping, or holding big ISPs accountable should they provide false broadband coverage data to the FCC. The current FCC says all the right things about that pesky “digital divide,” but its leaders are generally terrified to even mention that telecom monopolies exist, much less propose any meaningful strategy to undermine their power.

It seems clear that Biden’s advisors don’t really think the FCC’s role as consumer watchdog is important (they’ve shoveled a lot of the heavy lifting to the NTIA), or didn’t think fighting over the FCC’s consumer protection authority was worthwhile. And given the current DC myopic policy focus on Big Tech, having a functioning media and telecom regulator willing and able to hold the nation’s hugely unpopular telecom monopolies accountable has easily just… fallen to the cutting room floor.

There’s a reason that Americans pay some of the most expensive prices for mediocre broadband in the developed world. There’s a reason that 83 million Americans live under a broadband monopoly. And it’s in no small part thanks to a feckless, captured FCC, and politicians who don’t have the backbone to stand up to major campaign contributors bone-grafted to our intelligence gathering apparatus.