While state efforts to regulate AI are mushrooming, the Trump administration's plans to use FCC preemption powers to stop those efforts are unlikely to succeed, Phoenix Center President Larry Spiwak said in a paper last week. The administration's AI Action Plan, issued in July, directs the commission to evaluate whether state AI regulations interfere with its Communications Act obligations (see 2507230050). That presumably implies that the FCC should use its Section 253 and 332 authority to preempt those state laws, Spiwak said. But such efforts aren't likely to bear fruit, given the plain language of the Communications Act and recent case law, he argued. Instead, twisting the Communications Act for state AI law preemption "may open a Pandora’s Box of unintended consequences, perversely leading to a vast expansion of the FCC’s powers beyond its limited statutory constraints." Political efforts should focus instead on enacting federal legislation that would give that preemption authority, he added.

The Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a right-of-center policy institute, urged the FCC to broaden its foreign-ownership reporting requirements “to cover all applicants for licenses, permits, and other authorizations.” That expansion would streamline efforts to block China and other foreign adversaries “from accessing the nation’s telecommunications network, while preventing states, entities, and individuals from circumventing reporting requirements,” said a filing submitted last month and posted Thursday in docket 25-166.

The People’s Lobby and People’s Action are circulating a virtual petition calling on AT&T to end its contract with the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. With $30.7 billion in revenue in Q3, AT&T doesn’t need the contracts, the groups said. The petition had logged more than 1,300 online signatures as of Thursday afternoon, with a goal of 1,600.

GCI Liberty was “provisionally” awarded over $140 million in BEAD grants from the Alaska Broadband Office and remains committed to helping close the digital divide in the state, CEO Ron Duncan said Wednesday as the carrier announced Q3 results. The company exited the video business during the quarter, “completing our transition to a pure-play broadband connectivity provider.” GCI sees continuing opportunity in its wireless business and is addressing its cost base, he added.

A study by cybersecurity company NordVPN found that Americans have “a surprisingly optimistic outlook about their digital privacy despite concerning rates of personal information leakage.” According to the survey, released Tuesday, 52% of respondents believe their personal data hasn't been compromised, but nearly as many, 46%, have never verified whether it has.

States might struggle to meet BEAD deadlines, given workforce issues that range from lack of skilled telecom workers to training requirements, Pew's Broadband Access Initiative said in a report last week. It's tough to accurately calculate workforce needs to support BEAD, since it overlaps with programs like the Rural Deployment Opportunity Fund and Capital Projects Fund, Pew said, noting that workers needed for deployments can move back and forth among those programs. With issues such as insufficient federal data, ISP hiring trends and a reliance on subcontractors, it "creates uncertainty about the health and size of the available workforce."

The further NPRM on robocalls and caller ID that the FCC adopted at its October meeting (see 2510280024) could "significantly reduce" certain compliance burdens on companies that call and text consumers, Eversheds Sutherland wrote last week. However, because of the U.S. Supreme Court's 2024 McLaughlin Chiropractic decision, companies can't rely exclusively on FCC orders to provide guidance and precedent, the firm said. That means that despite the FCC proposing to amend and streamline rules, companies should still expect a wave of Telephone Consumer Protection Act litigation in coming years as plaintiffs challenge long-standing rules, it added. McLaughin held that district courts aren't bound to a federal agency's interpretation of a statute in civil enforcement proceedings.

The FCC has asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to stay Consumers’ Research’s legal challenge to the USF because of the federal shutdown, said a motion filed Friday in docket 25-60535. The request for stay is unopposed, it said. The agency wants the court to stay the case until 14 days after the shutdown ends and extend all deadlines to the date the stay is lifted. The next filing deadline in the case is currently Nov. 10. The reduction in the FCC and DOJ workforces caused by the shutdown “has effectively eliminated the ability of counsel who have worked on and are familiar with this case to handle the litigation while the lapse in appropriations continues,” the filing said.

The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has rejected arguments from providers of incarcerated people's communications services (IPCS) that it's required to transfer a case challenging the FCC’s 2024 IPCS to the 5th Circuit, said an opinion Friday. “We see no basis for concluding that we must transfer the petitions,” the ruling said. “And, at least for now, we have no request to exercise our discretion to transfer the petitions. We also see no reason to do so on our own at this time.” On Tuesday, the FCC approved an IPCS order on rate caps that it has said will render moot provider challenges to the 2024 order (see 2510280045).

Several public interest groups are seeking to intervene in Consumers' Research’s 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals challenge to the constitutionality of the USF, according to court filings. Motions to intervene have been filed by the Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband Coalition and jointly by the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, the National Digital Inclusion Alliance and the Center for Media Justice. Consumers’ Research is expected to oppose the motions to intervene, though such motions from the same groups have been granted in previous cases that Consumers’ Research brought against the USF, the filings said.