The implications of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision requiring judicial deference to agency environmental reviews of infrastructure projects remain unclear, experts said Wednesday, weeks after the ruling in Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County, Colorado. While the decision was unanimous, it had many twists and turns that make it difficult to know what its effect will be, panelists said during a Washington Legal Foundation webinar.
The FCC Media Bureau issued a public notice late Wednesday seeking comment on eliminating or modifying the national broadcast-ownership cap. The item sought comment about changing the cap, modifying the UHF discount and treating ownership of non-top-four affiliate stations differently under the rules. If the FCC “retains a national audience reach cap, should common ownership of stations that are not affiliated with major national broadcast networks (i.e., ABC, CBS, NBC, or FOX) be excluded from the cap?” the notice asked.
What the apparent collapse of a previously tight relationship between Elon Musk and President Donald Trump means for Musk's SpaceX is uncertain, space industry and FCC watchers told us. Some believe SpaceX will face a chillier reception from regulatory agencies, including for FCC proceedings that SpaceX is intensely interested in, such as the agency's probes into EchoStar's use of the 2 GHz band and its terrestrial 5G network buildout (see 2505130003). Others don't see the feud meaning much. The FCC and FAA -- which regulates SpaceX's launch operations -- didn't comment.
Amazon is now eyeing Monday to launch its second batch of 27 Kuiper satellites, it said this week. The launch had originally been planned for Friday (see 2505290004).
The Nebraska attorney general filed a lawsuit against online marketplace Temu on Thursday, alleging privacy and consumer protection violations. The state seeks to stop Temu from collecting, maintaining and using consumers' personally identifiable information (PII).
The FCC’s Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council (CSRIC) approved two final reports Thursday, including one on threats that AI poses to networks. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr told CSRIC members that AI has become a top focus for the agency, as it has for the rest of the Trump administration. The second report examines “Connecting Stalled 911 Calls Through Alternative Network Options.”
Communications Daily is tracking the lawsuits below involving appeals of FCC actions.
Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said Wednesday that he's standing pat on the spectrum legislative language he released last week as part of the panel's portion of the GOP's planned budget reconciliation package, despite ongoing objections from some Armed Services Committee Republicans who agreed to the deal. Meanwhile, House Commerce Committee Chairman Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., told us Tuesday that he's willing to accept the Senate Commerce proposal’s language exempting the 7.4-8.4 GHz band from potential sale.
The FCC released Monday a small-entity compliance guide on recent changes to wireless emergency alert rules (see 2502270042). “Participating wireless providers must support an alert originator’s selection of whether a WEA message will be presented silently, i.e., without triggering the common audio attention, the common vibration cadence, or both, in the mobile device presenting the WEA Alert Message,” the guide says. “If the alert originator indicates that a specific alert should not play the attention signal and should not cause the device to vibrate, then participating wireless providers should send those instructions to the device in an appropriate manner resulting in the device executing the instructions.”
Satellite broadband providers, especially Starlink and Amazon’s Kuiper service, are likely the big winners in the Commerce Department’s rewriting of the BEAD program rules, New Street’s Blair Levin told investors Monday. Smaller providers that use unlicensed spectrum to offer broadband also won, he said. Senate Democrats, meanwhile, slammed the revised rules that the Trump administration released Friday (see 2506060052).