After Trump Win, GOP Urges FCC's Wheeler to Stop Trying In the wake of a Trump election win, GOP leaders are urging FCC boss Tom Wheeler to stand down and avoid passing any new regulations. The agency is poised to vote on a number of key and controversial agenda items this week, including Wheeler's long-standing and often troubled attempt to bring competition and more openness to the clunky old cable box. Given the plan would kill $21 billion in rental fees, the cable industry has fought the effort tooth and nail.

The chairs of the House Energy & Commerce Committee and Communications Subcommittee have officially asked FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler to avoid trying to implement these or any other "controversial" efforts in his final months in office. "I strongly urge the FCC to avoid directing its attention and resources in the coming months to complex, partisan, or otherwise controversial items that the new Congress and new Administration will have an interest in reviewing,” Senator John Thune (R-SD) wrote Tuesday in a letter to Wheeler. “Any action taken by the FCC following November 8, 2016, will receive particular scrutiny,” the GOP lawmaker proclaimed. The GOP has consistently tried to punish Wheeler with a series of public hearings shaming the FCC boss for doing things like passing net neutrality rules, reclassifying ISPs as common carriers, highlighting a lack of competition in the market, and implementing a higher 25 Mbps standard definition for broadband. While Trump has been ambiguous at best on most of his technology policies, he has consistently opposed net neutrality, suggesting these rules could be at risk. His hiring of Senator Marsha Blackburn (a key AT&T ally) and Jeffrey Eisenach (a think tanker with ties to telecom providers) to spearhead some telecom transition issues has Wall Street and other analysts believing that a Trump Presidency will be significantly more lenient on major broadband providers. It's also broadly believed that the GOP will finally make good on its longstanding goal of rewriting of the Communications Act now that it controls both parties of Congress and the Presidency. The GOP has long made it abundantly clear that this rewrite will involve significantly reducing the FCC's funding and authority when it comes to crafting and enforcing broadband consumer protections. Update: The FCC just issued a press announcement stating it's : The FCC just issued a press announcement stating it's deleting a large number of items from the agency's scheduled meeting this week, strongly suggesting Wheeler was willing to shelve these proposals at GOP request.







News Jump WISPs Get CBRS Range As Great As Six Miles At 100 Mbps Speeds; Windstream Officially Exits Bankruptcy; + more news Charter Relaunches Free 60-day Internet And Wi-Fi Offer; NCTA: FCC Should Stick With 25/3 Speed Threshold; + more news Comcast Shuts Off Internet for Subs Who Were Sold Service Illegally; AT&T, Verizon Team To Stop T-Mobile 5G; + more news California Defends Its Net Neutrality Law; AT&T's Traffic Up 20% Despite Data Traffic Actually Being Down; + more news Are The Comcast-Charter X1 Talks Dead In The Water?; AT&T May Offer Phone Plans With Ads For Discounts; + more news Europe's Top Court: Net Neutrality Rules Bar Zero Rating; ViacomCBS To Rebrand CBS All Access As Paramount+; + more news Verizon To Buy Reseller TracFone For $7B; 5G Not The Competitive Threat To Cable Many Thought It Would Be; + more news MS.Wants Records From AT&T On $300M Project; Google Fiber Outages In Austin, Houston, Other Texan Cities; + more news States With The Biggest Decreases In Speed; AT&T Hopes You'll Forget Its Fight Against Accurate Maps; + more news AT&T's CEO Has A Familiar $olution To US Broadband Woes; EarthLink Files Suit Against Charter; + more news ---------------------- this week last week most discussed

Most recommended from 111 comments

Chubbysumo

join:2009-12-01

Duluth, MN ·Charter

Ubee E31U2V1

(Software) pfSense

Netgear WNR3500L

50 recommendations Chubbysumo Member fuck these crooked old men go wheeler, go! pass this shit now, tell these crooked old men that "want to review"(IE: stop any competition) to fuck off. We should too. Write to both the FCC and your congresspeople and tell them we want these, and that their "review" is nothing more than an effort of the cable lobby to stop competition.

davidc502

join:2002-03-06

Mount Juliet, TN 1 edit 35 recommendations davidc502 Member GOP is arleady gearing up for corporations to run amok This is a clear sign of what's to come... The GOP will do anything to make sure there is little regulation for many of the huge corporations, and are signaling intentions before Trump's even in office.



Folk... You better go ahead and prepare for higher prices, less choice, and poor service than what you already have today. It may take a few years, but things are going to go down hill (From a customer/people position) when it comes to the telecom and environmental industries.

wavelength

CyberSec Pro

join:2015-05-22

Raleigh, NC 20 recommendations wavelength Member On this note If Trump really wants to "drain the swamp", how about appointing some actual engineers to the FCC?



We have let former lobbyists run the FCC for far too long.



I am not holding my breath though.

cb14

join:2013-02-04

Miami Beach, FL 13 recommendations cb14 Member What did you expect?? Catastrophic choices have catastrophic consequences.

This is the first light trilling before a 9.0 magnitude earthquake.

But there is an up side. Soon you will be able to travel to Russia without visa.

Anon86d2e

@suddenlink.net 8 recommendations Anon86d2e Anon Wheeler on his way out needs to go for it all, and also ban capping and zero rating. Once its enacted on some of the stuff would be hard for whoever is in there to go against what the people wanted and was already acted on. Could maybe even cause riots in the streets for some stuff and not even them in office like seeing stuff like that on their watch if they are the cause of it. Also whatever money it would cost to walk back on the stuff would be the cause of the ones in office,not on wheeler and that would look bad on them, so they would also be thinking about what they are costing the taxpayers and the ones that elect them. So that also might give them second thoughts.



So Wheeler do the stuff you already started and also ban caps and overages and zero rating before you leave office and say screw you to the republicans in office.



P.S. Before people think I am for the republicans or democrats in office,forget that,I'm my own person and make up my own mind on who I agree with and don't. As far as president this time,I would not of voted for either one of them Trump or Clinton. As for Wheeler I think he is the best commissioner there ever was. zod5000

join:2003-10-21

Victoria, BC 8 recommendations zod5000 Member Yes, stop trying to help the cable industry.... The cable industry is completely intent on pricing itself out of the market and destroying itself. Why do we want to stop them for their own short sightedness? lol.

WHT

join:2010-03-26

Rosston, TX 7 recommendations WHT Member On the Other Hand For small (500 to 50,000 subscribers) WISP operators, this gives a leg up over incumbent big providers. Some of us can already deliver 100 Mbps in an urban and even rural footprint for under $50 per month. Papageno

join:2011-01-26

Portland, OR 5 recommendations Papageno Member The pigs will be feeding at the trough... ...for the next couple of years (probably 4, maybe even 6 or 8). Anti-competitive mergers greenlit, caps and below-the-line fees galore, draconian new anti-piracy initiatives (end of common carrier legal protection) etc.



I honestly think Trump is the dog that caught up with the garbage truck here (I really don't think he expected to win and just did this to fluff his brand) and has no idea what to do now. He's not a details guy so he'll let Pence and the GOP run the show, so I hope you're fine with shittier and more expensive service for everything, and even less recourse when things go wrong, bozos who thought he was going to make your life better (he can't wave a magic wand and take us back to the 1960's/70's, or even the 1980's--it's just not going to happen). XJakeX

join:2005-03-05

Coventry, RI 3 recommendations XJakeX Member Don't count Wheeler out yet Here's my theory: The Trump presidency is I think very much a work in process. It's impossible to predict with any surety what he will do. But I believe the man is going through a catharsis. And I am hoping its similar to the one Wheeler went through. His career at the FCC was formerly all pro business, but for the last two years, he has turned pro consumer.



In like fashion, Trump's whole life has been devoted to making money and taking advantage of laws, lack of regulations, and tax codes to maximize those dollars. I think he now realizes how dramatically the system currently favors business over the consumer, and is ready to make changes to right that imbalance.



On the campaign trail he talked about getting rid of regulations to let businesses grow, yet his appointment of Steve Bannon as chief adviser points in the exact opposite direction. Bannon is a strong supporter of the original Tea Party platform, and he knows that too little regulation in certain industries is what is stifling competition and concentrating too much power in the hands of too few corporations. Trump hates the media with a passion. He will deny the AT&T- Time Warner merger simply because CNN is involved. He may even breakup Comcast-NBC marriage. And that media hate will extend much further.



Getting back to Wheeler, hopefully, over the last two years, Trump has come to understand what Net Neutrality really means (in 2014 he didn't have clue). If not, Bannon will fix that very quickly. The mainstream TV media they both hate is controlled by 5 mega corporations. The same 5 making billions producing most of the TV content funneled through the cablecos and telcos. The same cable and tel cos that are loosing TV subscribers at an ever increasing pace to streamed content that is viewed over broadband ----- provided mainly by those same cable and telcos, the ones that Wheeler is trying to regulate in a more consumer friendly manner. I'm thinking Wheeler may be asked to stay on. If not, he'll be replaced by an equally consumer oriented commissioner.



Yes, Trump's appointment of Marsha Blackburn and Jeffery Eisenach might lead you to discount my theory, but with Bannon at the top of the food chain in the white house, I think they will tow the line or not last very long. It's going to be an interesting 4 years that might see a whole reshaping of the Republican party, or its destruction and replacement by something new.