The leaders of the House and Senate Communications subcommittees said Thursday they're reviving the bicameral USF revamp working group, which had paused its work on legislative recommendations last year amid uncertainty following the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ ruling in the Consumers' Research lawsuit against the program’s funding mechanism (see 2407300053). The Supreme Court heard oral arguments for its review of the case in March (see 2503260061). Working group members had considered melding the FCC’s lapsed affordable connectivity program with USF’s Lifeline program and keeping the latter’s narrower eligibility rules (see 2404170066).
FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez said Thursday that during a two-week trip to California, she talked to Apple about its partnership with Globalstar to provide emergency satellite connectivity to iPhones. She also met with TV studio executives from ABC, NBC and Fox; entertainment-sector labor union representatives from the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of TV and Radio Artists and the Writer’s Guild of America, West; and space industry companies Planet, Astranis, Rocket Lab and K2 Space, as well as NASA’s Ames Research Center.
The FCC and DOJ on Thursday asked the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reject challenges to the FCC’s July order implementing the Martha Wright-Reed Act of 2022, which reduces call rates for people in prisons while establishing interim rate caps for video calls (see 2407180039). The government said the order addresses the monopoly power of incarcerated persons communications services (IPCS) providers to set calling rates.
SpaceX is taking another stab at obtaining FCC approval to operate in the 1.6/2.4 GHz bands, but it's unlikely the commission will act quickly, if at all, space spectrum experts told us.
Former FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington told broadcasters Thursday that Chairman Brendan Carr has chosen not to take steps to ease the ATSC 3.0 transition. Carr could have long ago had the agency issue guidance to speed the approval of ATSC 3.0 channel-sharing applications, even without a Republican majority, Simington said in a speech at the ATSC NextGen Broadcast Conference.
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.”
Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., continued Thursday to criticize panel Republicans’ proposed spectrum language for the chamber’s budget reconciliation package (see 2506060029). She argued during a Center for Strategic and International Studies event that the spectrum proposal would leave DOD and aviation stakeholders more vulnerable to China and other malicious actors. House Communications Subcommittee ranking member Doris Matsui of California and 30 other chamber Democrats also urged Senate leaders to jettison language from the reconciliation package that would require governments receiving funding from the $42.5 billion BEAD program to pause enforcing state-level AI rules.
The FCC’s revised foreign-sponsored content rules are in effect as of Tuesday, but broadcasters don’t need to comply with the requirements until Dec. 8, said a public notice in Wednesday's Daily Digest. “Only new leases and renewals of existing leases entered into on or after the compliance date must comply with the rule modifications,” it said. NAB has challenged the rules in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and oral argument was held in the case in April (see 2504070019.
Comments are due July 14 on a Further NPRM aimed at spurring greater use of the 37 GHz band, approved by FCC commissioners 4-0 in April (see 2504280032), said a notice for Thursday’s Federal Register. Replies are due July 28 in docket 24-243. Most parts of an accompanying order are effective July 14, said a second Federal Register notice. The FCC sought separate comments on the "Initial Regulatory Flexibility Analysis."
Technology company AltoNova asked the FCC to consider advances in spatial-intelligence technologies as it develops updated rules for wireless calls and texts to 911. “New geolocation technologies developed by the special-intelligence industry are poised to make transformative changes in horizontal and vertical location of indoor wireless 911 callers and texters,” said a filing this week in docket 07-114. Enhanced-911 location technologies “about to launch will help make the Commission’s longstanding goal of broad deployment of automated dispatchable location technically feasible.”