Thursday’s U.S. Supreme Court decision limiting the scope of environmental reviews could ease permitting for infrastructure projects, including broadband buildout, said advocacy groups and policy analysts.
FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez said at a listening session and panel discussion hosted Wednesday by Free Press that she doesn’t expect the agency to “liberally” use a good-cause exception to notice-and-comment rules or delegated authority when it takes action on the “Delete” docket. “I am hopeful that, in fact, a lot of these rules will come up to vote,” she said at the Los Angeles event, which was part of her “First Amendment Tour” (see 2504240064).
A U.S Supreme Court decision Thursday requiring judicial deference to agency environmental reviews of infrastructure projects could have implications for broadband deployment, drawing attention from FCC Chairman Brendan Carr. “For too long, America’s infrastructure builds have been held back by reams of red tape,” wrote Carr in a post on X about Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County, Colorado. “But today, the Supreme Court helps to correct course -- eliminating needless environmental hoops. As the FCC works to unleash more infrastructure builds, permitting reforms like this are key.”
NPR and three public radio stations filed a lawsuit Tuesday that asks the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to block a White House executive order cutting funding for NPR and PBS (see 2505020044).
A U.S. Supreme Court opinion late Thursday preventing fired independent commissioners from resuming their work is a strong indication that the high court will allow President Donald Trump to remove FCC and FTC commissioners from the minority party, academics and attorneys said in interviews Friday.
Industry attorneys expect USF reform and think BEAD efforts will soon speed up, they said in a webinar Thursday hosted by Incompas CEO Chip Pickering. The panel also discussed convergence between wired and wireless broadband and the movement of power away from the FCC in the wake of recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings against agency authority. “From Incompas’ perspective ... we think a lot will shift to Congress, to the administration and to the states,” said Pickering.
Charter Communications wants to purchase fellow MVPD Cox Communications for $34.5 billion, the companies said in a joint news release and conference call Friday.
Broadcasters are poised to execute a rush of mergers and acquisitions if the FCC relaxes ownership rules, but uncertainty about markets, the direction regulators may take and the future of broadcast networks could influence deal-making, broadcast brokers said in interviews this week. The agency's failure to relax ownership rules could spur a wave of bankruptcies, they said. “The industry is crying out for some relief, and it really deserves some relief, because we can't compete with the giant companies that we're forced to compete with now,” Media Services Group co-founder George Reed said. Tideline Partners Managing Partner Gregory Guy said “2025 is the most fundamentally important year for broadcasters in decades.”
The FCC said in a release Wednesday that it has saved more than $567 million via cuts to contracts in an internal effort coordinated with the Department of Government Efficiency, but experts said those numbers may be misleading.
An ATSC 3.0 tuner mandate and a set date for the switch to the new standard are necessary for TV broadcasting to survive and compete with streaming, said Sinclair, Scripps, Gray and others in comments filed in response to NAB’s 3.0 petition in docket 16-142 by Wednesday’s deadline. The Consumer Technology Association, public interest organizations and multichannel video programming distributor (MVPD) groups disagreed, arguing that a mandatory transition would increase costs for consumers and MVPDs, all to provide broadcasters with a new revenue stream.