The Senate reconfirmed Democratic FTC Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter and approved Republican commission nominees Andrew Ferguson and Melissa Holyoak Thursday night on voice votes, setting the body up to soon return to a 3-2 Democratic majority. The commission hasn't had any Republican members since former Commissioner Christine Wilson departed in March 2023. Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., lifted his hold on Ferguson earlier Thursday after Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., voted for Hawley’s Radiation Exposure Compensation Reauthorization Act (S-3853). Ferguson, Virginia's solicitor general, is a former McConnell aide. The chamber also unanimously confirmed FCC inspector general nominee Fara Damelin, setting up the watchdog office to have its first permanent leader since Congress made it independent of the agency in 2018.

The FCC approved, 3-2, an order reinstating the collection of broadcaster workforce demographic data, with both Republican commissioners dissenting and issuing multipage statements. "We must get our arms around this issue,” said Commissioner Geoffrey Starks, who has long pushed for the policy. “As always with good government, we start with data. And data is most effective when it is available to everyone.” By requiring that the data is publicly posted in broadcaster online files, the order will create “a race and gender scorecard for each and every TV and radio broadcast station in the country,” and violate the Constitution, said Commissioner Brendan Carr in his dissent. The order isn't "a radical break outside of this agency’s authority," said Starks. “Reinstatement of the Form 395-B data collection in a publicly available manner is wholly consistent with the equal protection guarantee contained in the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution,” said the order. Collection of data in a publicly available format “remains the best approach” for accurately analyzing workforce trends in broadcasting, the order said. “We will summarily dismiss any petition filed by a third party based on Form 395-B employment data” and “will not use this data as a basis for conducting audits or inquiries,” the order said. Both Carr and Commissioner Nathan Simington said they wouldn’t have opposed an order that kept the data anonymized. If the data collection is purely to inform policy, why does the FCC need to publicly disclose it? Simington asked. “Because the public disclosure of attributable demographic employment data this Order implements predictably serves to increase pressure on broadcast licensees to engage in racially conscious hiring,” he said. Prior to the order's release, NAB President Curtis LeGeyt told us broadcasters “are committed to ensuring our newsrooms reflect the diversity of the communities we serve." Broadcasters "encourage the Commission to partner with us on this important work to truly move the ball forward, rather than to assume that reporting alone somehow meets the moment," LeGeyt said.

A California appeals court reversed a lower court’s decision to delay a state agency’s enforcement of California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA) regulations Friday.

The FCC has made “significant progress” in its handling of the affordable connectivity program during 2022, but “improvements were needed” in measuring and providing public transparency on grant recipients’ spending of program money, the Office of Inspector General said in a Jan. 22 memo to Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and other commissioners that publicly circulated Tuesday. Some congressional Republican leaders have raised concerns about the FCC’s handling of ACP amid a push to provide the program stopgap funding to keep it running through the end of this year. The Wireline Bureau said earlier this month it would freeze new enrollments Feb. 8 as part of the program's wind-down process.

The FCC is adopting, 3-2 along party lines today, an NPRM on circulation seeking comment on a requirement MVPDs refund subscribers affected by programming blackouts due to retransmission consent negotiations, a 10th-floor official tells us. Commissioners in December adopted, 4-0, a companion NPRM requiring MVPDs to notify the agency of blackouts due to failed retrans talks. Commissioner Nathan Simington expressed skepticism at the legal basis cited for the reporting requirement.