Lawyers for the Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband Coalition and the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society said Wednesday that groups defending the USF had a good day last week, as the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argument in the Consumers' Research case (see 2503260061). They spoke during a SHLB webinar.
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).
Provider DQE Communications on Friday urged the FCC to look closely at whether E-rate services should be subject to the USF contribution factor. DQE filed in docket 25-133, the FCC’s “Delete, Delete, Delete” docket. “In a paradoxical loop that only a bureaucrat would love: The Federal government uses USF funds to provide heavy discounts for E-Rate services, then levies a 36.6% tax against those same schools and libraries, all in the name of funding USF so it can be used in part to provide the subsidies to the schools that have been overcharged,” the provider said. The FCC should “act to eliminate this ridiculous Catch-22 situation by exempting all E-Rate services from the USF levy.”
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).
Trent McCotter, the lawyer for Consumers’ Research, faced tough questions during lengthy oral arguments Wednesday at the U.S. Supreme Court on the group’s challenge of the USF contribution factor and the USF in general. Sarah Harris, acting U.S. solicitor general, vigorously defended the USF on behalf of the government. Paul Clement of Clement & Murphy, a high-profile conservative appellate lawyer, represented industry defenders of the USF.
On the eve of a key U.S. Supreme Court case concerning the USF's future, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said questions remain about the program's survival. How USF is paid for has to change, Carr told a Free State Foundation conference Tuesday. He also said he supports President Donald Trump's dismissal of Democratic commissioners at the FTC.
Opponents of T-Mobile’s proposed buy of wireless assets from UScellular met with FCC staff to explain their concerns. The groups at the meeting were the Rural Wireless Association, EchoStar, Communications Workers of America, Public Knowledge, New America’s Open Technology Institute, the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society and the Computer & Communications Industry Association. They met with staff from the Wireless Bureau and the offices of Economics and Analytics and General Counsel, according to a filing posted Friday in docket 24-286.
Gigabit Fiber, a Dallas-based ISP, appeared to call on the FCC to scrap the USF in response to the commission’s “Delete Delete Delete” notice (see 2503140049). “The current USF system is outdated, economically burdensome, and unconstitutional,” the company said in a filing posted Wednesday in docket 25-133. “It has a storied history of waste, fraud and abuse and is a tax and spend fix to a problem that no longer exists. Some of this legal framework dates to the era of the Pony Express, telegraph lines and subsidized railroads.” Gigabit Fiber said it imposes USF fees on some of its services and then doesn’t know what happens to the money. “We assume the money finds its way to the US Treasury and then in turn some is used to fund dubious programs with the balance lost to waste, fraud and abuse.”