Senate Democrats Demand Lutnick Release BEAD Funding, Criticize 'Bureaucratic Delays'
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., Commerce Committee ranking member Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., and Communications Subcommittee ranking member Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., pressed the Trump administration Friday to immediately release the $42.5 billion Congress allocated to NTIA’s BEAD program. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in March began a “rigorous review” of BEAD aimed at revamping the program (see 2503050067). Meanwhile, National Lifeline Association Chairman David Dorwart marked the one-year anniversary of the formal lapse of the FCC’s affordable connectivity program (see 2405310070).
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Communications Daily is required reading for senior executives at top telecom corporations, law firms, lobbying organizations, associations and government agencies (including the FCC). Join them today!
“For six months, states have been waiting to break ground on scores of projects, held back only by the Commerce Department’s bureaucratic delays,” the Democratic senators said in a letter to Lutnick and President Donald Trump. “If states are forced to redo or rework their plans, they will not only miss this year’s construction season but next year’s as well, delaying broadband deployment by years.” Senate Public Works Committee Chair Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., and others have also voiced concerns that a revamp would delay rollout to some states (see 2505070049).
“We urge the Administration to move swiftly to approve state [BEAD] plans” and release the funding, the Democratic senators said. “These plans reflect local needs, technical realities, and the bipartisan intent of Congress. States are ready to put shovels in the ground and have been waiting for months to get started connecting communities and building networks that will support the industries of tomorrow. Additional delays and onerous changes to the program at this stage threaten to further stall urgently needed deployment and leave communities behind.”
States “must maintain the flexibility to choose the highest quality broadband options, rather than be forced by bureaucrats in Washington to funnel funds to Elon Musk’s Starlink, which lacks the scalability, reliability, and speed of fiber or other terrestrial broadband solutions,” the letter said. Former BEAD Director Evan Feinman warned in March that changes to the program could benefit Starlink and, by extension, Musk, who is CEO of parent company SpaceX (see 2503170045). The issue came up during Senate Commerce’s confirmation hearing that month for NTIA administrator nominee Arielle Roth (see 2503270065).
The National Lifeline Association's Dorwart argued that, like BEAD delays, the funding lapse of the FCC’s ACP has hindered connectivity efforts. It “left too many working class families, seniors and veterans without the means to connect to jobs, school, telehealth and family,” he said.
“With ACP ended, the FCC’s Lifeline program is the only federal program that provides support to those who need assistance to afford monthly internet access,” Dorwart said. Congressional Democrats have repeatedly invoked hopes of allocating additional funding to restart ACP in the year since its lapse, including by criticizing Republicans’ proposal in a budget reconciliation package to allocate future spectrum auction revenue entirely to offset an extension of the 2017 tax cuts (see 2505230070). Rep. Yvette Clarke, D-N.Y., unsuccessfully attempted to amend the House Commerce Committee’s portion of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (HR-1) to allocate 10% of spectrum sale proceeds from a proposed 600 MHz pipeline to pay for ACP (see 2505140062).
“But Lifeline needs an overhaul so that it can provide truly low-income households with meaningful discounts on retail broadband internet access plans that provide the kind of connectivity needed to thrive in today’s connected economy and society,” Dorwart said. His group “is working on legislative and regulatory fixes to make Lifeline an engine for economic growth in rural and other low-income communities, Medicaid savings through telehealth, and wage growth for hard working families and welcome other partners in this work.”