White House Key Force in Shaping Budget Deal's Spectrum Provisions

“The administration was trying to find some savings,” Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., told us Tuesday when asked about the source of the provisions. “And then they turned to the committees up here when our guys didn’t want to go along with what the administration was trying to do because they basically wanted to take Congress out of the equation for the foreseeable future, and that’s not something that’s acceptable to us. Where it ended up was a place where we think we can live with that and we think it does get us in a position at least now to start looking at legislation later on this year that will complement what’s already been done.”

“I think it was administration,” said Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Calif., co-chair of the Congressional Spectrum Caucus, in an interview. “I’m sure it was. I’m sure our committee got involved with it but we’ve been discussing it for so long, and I think the administration has been working on it, too.”

Matsui is one of the several lawmakers who want Congress to add flexibility to the Spectrum Relocation Fund, as the budget deal included, and bipartisan legislation has been in drafting stages in both chambers (see 1510260044). That measure was coming together in part due to what Capitol Hill staffers told us was administration pressure.

The White House defended and touted the provisions in the deal when asked about its negotiating role.

"The administration has been transparent in our desire to facilitate more efficient spectrum usage and telecommunications investment by Federal agencies, as well as to make more Federal spectrum available for commercial applications such as mobile broadband," an administration official emailed us Tuesday. "In fact, spectrum provisions included in the budget agreement were originally proposed in the President’s FY 2016 Budget. The provisions are expected to enable productive use of balances in the Spectrum Relocation Fund for planning, research, and other activities that are conservatively expected to increase the value of future auctions or sharing arrangements of Federal spectrum by billions of dollars as well as support the President’s goal of making available an additional 500 megahertz of Federal and non-Federal spectrum for commercial use by 2020."

Hill Leaders Accepting

The bipartisan deal, which would raise the debt ceiling and spending caps, is the result of intense negotiations between the top leaders of the Senate and House caucuses and the White House. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., both urged support for it during news briefings after senators’ Tuesday party caucus lunches. The Congressional Budget Office released its assessment of the measure, describing the changes in direct spending due to the spectrum title. The Senate and House Commerce committees have held hearings on spectrum policy recently and eyed legislation to free up more spectrum, which the budget bill would do in an auction of federally held spectrum and in setting up reports on future auctions. The House is expected to vote on the deal Wednesday and the Senate in a matter of days.

Administration pressure for the proposals has been “kicking around for a while,” Thune said in the interview. “The administration wanted to do it without going through Congress. And so there was some discussion, as you know, during the highway bill. And we successfully knocked that back. But what they’re proposing to do here is something we can probably accept and I’m guessing that E&C on the House side is probably in the same place.”

“As always, committee members and staff work closely with leadership to advance policies that promote jobs, innovation, and economic growth,” a GOP aide to the House Commerce Committee told us. “The spectrum provisions in this deal certainly meet those metrics and will go great lengths toward bringing additional spectrum -- an increasingly valuable and scarce resource -- to meet the needs of American consumers.” Not all players at the committee level were involved in these senior negotiations. A spokesman for Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Bill Nelson, D-Fla., affirmed Nelson’s office wasn't involved. Negotiations were “mainly” between retiring House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., the Nelson spokesman said. Senate Communications Subcommittee Chairman Roger Wicker, R-Miss., wasn't immediately familiar with the spectrum provisions in the deal, he told us Tuesday, saying he planned to learn about them at the GOP lunch he was entering.

“The committee is in most cases, we’re OK with the direction they’re headed,” Thune said. “We obviously want to make sure that in the future, that this is where the two studies are going to hopefully give us 50 MHz in ‘22 and another 50 and ‘24. But this does at least get us started filling the pipeline, which is something we’ve been talking about.” He was referring to statutory deadlines in the 2020s that the legislation includes.

Next Steps

Thune has every intention of still trying to advance his own spectrum legislation, he told us. A GOP aide to the committee said there could be fixes more helpful in the shorter term, such as in wireless siting issues.

“I think we’re going to have a spectrum bill here that we can unveil in the next few weeks,” Thune said. “So this is kind of the first step, I guess you’d say, in that.” The budget deal “certainly kind of tees it up,” he said.

CTIA President Meredith Baker sees the budget provisions as “an important first step” in freeing up spectrum “by directing the auction of 30 MHz of spectrum below 3 GHz and requiring the FCC and NTIA to identify an additional 100 MHz of spectrum that can be made available for commercial use,” she said. “In addition, important process and research reforms were included that will improve federal spectrum management.” Baker called it “disappointing that we were not able to do more now to meet Americans’ demands for 5G and the Internet of Things.” Wireless Broadband Coalition Executive Director David Taylor called the provisions “a positive step” in freeing up spectrum.

“Of critical importance, congressional leaders rejected proposals to micromanage the FCC or designate specific bands for auction,” said Public Knowledge Government Affairs Counsel Phillip Berenbroick. “As we have proven time and again, spectrum policy works best when Congress tells the agencies what to do but lets the expert agencies figure out how to get it done.”

“Nothing which mentions or contemplates LPTV or TV translators” is envisioned, emailed the LPTV Spectrum Rights Coalition. “However, when you consider that by extending the FCC's auction authority from 2023 to 2025, any auction of LPTV or TV translator spectrum will have hard time happening before then. Too bad for the TV white space and unlicensed users. Now they will never see a lot of spectrum left for what they need.”

Thune had initially framed his goals for legislation as freeing up spectrum to help create a pipeline, which would be addressed by the budget deal's provisions. He had told us in past weeks he saw that bigger package coming together by year's end or early next year. He was skeptical about holding another spectrum policy hearing, speaking Tuesday: “Well, we could. Although I’m not sure it’s necessary because we’ve had several already and I think we’ve gotten the best ideas and we’re trying to distill those and kind of amalgamate them into a bill that we think would attract broad bipartisan support.”

“I’m supportive of it,” Matsui told us of the budget deal’s spectrum provisions. “Of course I want a little more, but that’s fine. ... We’re looking at all the details of this here, but I’m glad that spectrum was included in there.”