The White House executive order asserting control over executive branch agencies (see 2502280048) looks “dramatic” but “changes little,” said a blog post Monday from American Enterprise Institute nonresident Senior Fellow Mark Jamison, a former member of President Donald Trump’s transition team. “Independent agencies have long been subject to political influence, and their supposed autonomy is more myth than reality,” Jamison wrote. “For decades, presidents and lawmakers have found ways to steer their agendas.” The order “can be seen as simply formalizing what has already been happening.” Critics “are reacting to an idealized version of regulatory independence that doesn’t exist in practice,” he said. “The real issue isn’t whether presidents exert influence over these agencies -- it’s that agency leaders have often ceded their independence voluntarily, undermining confidence in regulatory neutrality.”

President Donald Trump signed off Saturday on a continuing resolution that extends current federal funding levels for the FCC, NTIA and other agencies through Sept. 30. The Senate voted 54-46 Friday night to approve the House-passed CR, as expected (see 2503140069).

The public remains ignorant about GPS' importance and the need for a supplement to it, the Resilient Navigation and Timing Foundation blogged Friday. Pointing to a NextNav survey, RNTF said the fact that a minority of respondents found most arguments for GPS backup "very convincing" -- even though the questions seemed designed to elicit that response -- shows that the foundation's public education efforts need to be more successful.

The FCC’s investigation of iHeartMedia over payola (see 2502240070) was sparked by requests made to Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., by “musicians and band members,” she told FCC Chairman Brendan Carr on Friday's episode of her podcast, Unmuted With Marsha. “In Tennessee, we've got a lot of people that play in bands and spend a lot of time on the road,” said Blackburn, who, in part, represents country music center Nashville. She responded to the request by sending a letter to Carr, who, in turn, sent one to iHeart. “A radio station can't secretly exchange free performances from musicians or bands in exchange for better airplay on the radio,” Carr said. “And the evidence we've seen suggests that in fact, that has been happening significantly.” Blackburn said, “To some of the band members for the big-name musicians, expenses is one thing, but payment for the show is another.”

Two FCC facilities are listed among government real estate leases marked for termination by the Department of Government Efficiency, according to the DOGE website. The FCC didn’t respond to requests for comment on the listings, but the leases appear to be Enforcement Bureau field offices in Dallas and Cerritos, California. An internal General Services Administration planning document said those leases would be canceled Sept. 30, according to an Associated Press report. DOGE lists the termination of the Cerritos lease as saving $142,637 a year and the Dallas lease as saving $60,630 a year. The FCC didn’t respond to questions about whether the canceled leases would influence Enforcement Bureau field coverage or involve a reduction in personnel. After then-Chairman Tom Wheeler cut several EB field offices in 2015, FCC Republicans -- including former Chairman Ajit Pai -- voiced their opposition (see 1507160036).

The Senate voted 62-38 at our deadline Friday afternoon to invoke cloture on a House-passed continuing resolution (HR-1968), which would extend current federal funding levels for the FCC, NTIA and other federal agencies through Sept. 30 (see 2503100060). The vote came after many hours of uncertainty about whether enough Democrats would back clearing the procedural hurdle. The chamber appeared likely to pass HR-1868 Friday evening, averting a shutdown, which would otherwise begin for some agencies when an existing CR, passed in December, was set to expire late that night (see 2412230024).

NAB touted a broadcaster alternative to GPS in meetings at the FCC on the draft notice of inquiry scheduled for a vote March 27 (see 2503060061). Deployment of a broadcast positioning system (BPS) as an alternative to GPS is mentioned in the NOI. NAB representatives met with aides to Chairman Brendan Carr and Commissioner Anna Gomez. “NAB described its progress since it began developing BPS in 2020, following President [Donald] Trump’s Executive Order on Strengthening National Resilience Through Responsible Use of Positioning, Navigation, and Timing Services,” said a filing Thursday in docket 25-110. Since, “NAB has conducted a number of tests and has launched BPS signals on-air in four television markets. NAB described these deployments and our work with various government agencies to test and refine the system.”

BEAD reforms would occur as funding is about to be disbursed and could impose additional deployment delays, Keller & Heckman communications lawyer Sean Stokes wrote Thursday. Making BEAD changes, either by Commerce or via pending legislation (see 2503050067), now "raises thorny questions on whether some of the new rules can and should be applied mid-way through the award selection process, and after the application windows have closed," Stokes said. It's unclear if providers that haven't participated in BEAD based on the existing rules would have any recourse to participate under the new rules, he said. Also unclear is how further BEAD delays will affect state broadband maps and if NTIA will let states revise eligible locations to account for new deployments that have taken place in the meantime, he said.

The FCC has created an internal, multi-bureau national security taskforce “to promote America’s national security and counter foreign adversaries, particularly the threats posed by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Chinese Communist Party (CCP),” said FCC Chairman Brendan Carr in a news release Thursday. Called the Council for National Security, the group will include members from eight bureaus and FCC offices. Carr’s national security counsel, Adam Chan, will lead the group, the release said. It didn't specify which bureaus and offices will be involved, and the agency didn’t immediately respond to questions about the group's makeup or whether it will hold public meetings.

Law firm Perkins Coie sued the U.S. government over a White House executive order aimed at the firm, and the lawsuit names the FCC and Chairman Brendan Carr as defendants, along with a host of agencies and agency leaders. A federal judge reportedly temporarily blocked the executive order in a ruling Wednesday. No order was yet visible in the docket Wednesday evening. The order, which accuses Perkins Coie of “undermining democratic elections” and committing racial discrimination through its diversity policies, limits the firm’s attorneys from accessing federal buildings and requires federal contractors to disclose relationships with it, among other things. It targets the firm over its past representation of former Secretary of State and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and its work with George Soros. “The Order is an affront to the Constitution and our adversarial system of justice,” said the lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. “Its plain purpose is to bully those who advocate points of view that the President perceives as adverse to the views of his Administration.”