FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington expects an extension of the categories of equipment that can receive the cyber trust mark, a more empowered NTIA under the current administration, and an FCC “one-stop shop” for space company permitting, he said Wednesday at the Information Technology Industry Council’s Intersect 2025 summit. “I think the emphasis that you're going to see within the commission specifically is an emphasis on greatly streamlining the licensing procedure,” he said. The FCC is “internally working on” creating “some sort of a one-stop shop where we can consolidate the process of getting to space and creating an interface that's usable” for a wide variety of companies. He said it’s not clear if that one-stop shop would ultimately be part of the FCC, but the agency is taking on the job of “figuring it out.”

The federal Institute of Museum and Library Services, which the White House largely shuttered this week, played a key role in scaling up digital navigator programs around the U.S. in recent years, the National Digital Inclusion Alliance blogged Tuesday. The loss of the institute and the millions of grant dollars it directed "will drastically impact" libraries' ability to deliver such services as getting people online and teaching them digital skills -- particularly small and rural libraries, NDIA said.

Congress' overly complicated BEAD design has undermined support, Institute for Progress Senior Fellow Sam Marullo wrote this week. Marullo pointed to states having seven distinct planning documents needing federal approval and BEAD's 57 mapping processes -- one for each state and territory, plus a national one. However, BEAD "will be a clear success by 2030 -- unless changes disrupt the good work already underway," he said. Congress' approach -- no broadband deployment starts until all planning is done -- "makes sense on a flow chart, but it’s hard in the real world." A more agile BEAD might have started by immediately addressing known coverage gaps and refining maps as initial construction progressed, deploying more funding as better data revealed new gaps, he said.

The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has extended a temporary restraining order barring the federal government from enforcing a March 25 executive order targeting Jenner & Block, said an order Tuesday. That executive order revoked the firm’s security clearances and barred it from conducting business with the government. Tuesday’s court order extends the temporary restraining order until final judgment in the case. The White House has issued similar orders against Perkins Coie, WilmerHale and others (see 2503120049), and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has targeted Cooley and numerous other law firms over diversity programs (see 2503180055).

Consumers’ Research has filed another challenge to the legality of the FCC’s USF contribution factor, this time for Q2 of this year, at the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The group chose what's likely the friendliest circuit for an appeal; the U.S. Supreme Court is currently considering an appeal of a 5th Circuit en banc decision last summer, which found that the USF contribution factor is a "misbegotten tax.” Justices heard oral arguments in that case last week (see 2503260061).

The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents FCC staff, has sued President Donald Trump, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr and the leaders of numerous other federal agencies over Thursday’s executive order ending collective bargaining for many federal employees (see 2503280044). Under that order, federal agencies will cease recognizing NTEU as representatives for their employees and will stop the payroll deductions federal workers have requested to pay their union dues, “cutting off more than half of NTEU’s revenue stream,” the group said in the complaint, filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia (docket 1:25-cv-00935). The order eliminates union rights “for two-thirds of the entire federal workforce” and “is in direct conflict” with laws passed by Congress to facilitate collective bargaining for federal workers, NTEU said in a news release Monday. The national security exemptions to the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act cited in the order have never before been used to deny entire Cabinet-level agencies collective bargaining rights, “only discrete offices within agencies that clearly perform primarily security or intelligence work,” NTEU said. “NTEU-represented employees at FCC do not primarily perform security, investigative, or intelligence work,” it said. “They review and act on license applications for radio, enforce FCC rules regarding construction and operation of communications systems, and respond to consumer inquiries.” The FCC didn’t comment. NTEU has represented FCC employees since 1978. Their current collective bargaining agreement took effect in March 2023 and wasn’t set to expire until March 2030.

Bobby Barker’s retirement from the FCC was not pursuant to the Voluntary Early Retirement Authority policy (see 2503270063).

Consumers' Research Executive Director Will Hild expressed confidence after the U.S. Supreme Court heard the group’s challenge of the USF contribution factor in lengthy oral arguments Wednesday (see 2503260061).

There were no surprises during U.S. Supreme Court oral arguments Wednesday on the Consumers’ Research challenge to the constitutionality of the USF contribution factor, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said Thursday following the commission's open meeting. Most observers saw SCOTUS as unlikely to issue a ruling that would imperil the USF program (see 2503260061). “I got a high-level briefing from some of our team that attended it,” Carr said. “The read that I got is it went really well for the U.S. government’s position.” He added, “You never know when you’re reading tea leaves from an oral argument,” but “the net consensus was that it was good day” for the USF.

Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., and FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez defended the USF program during a Capitol Hill news conference Wednesday before the U.S. Supreme Court argument in FCC v. Consumers’ Research (see 2503260061).