Senate Democrats need to stop dragging their feet on FCC and FTC nominations

Senate Democrats promised to rein in Big Tech, restore net neutrality and reverse the damage done by Trump’s Ajit Pai. So far they’re failing.

When the Trump administration repealed net neutrality and the FCC’s ability to provide oversight for big telecom companies, Senate Democrats fought back with legislation. They held press conferences promising to reinstate the Title II rules and get the FCC back to working for the public. Senate Democrats and have also promised meaningful action to rein in the power of Big Tech companies like Amazon and Google, and to address privacy violations and algorithmic discrimination.

But so far, they’re failing. Both the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and Federal Trade Commission (FTC)––essential agencies for fulfilling Democrats’ promises––remain essentially kneecapped. This is largely because Senate Democrats, and particularly the Senate Commerce Committee, has allowed disingenuous complaints from telecom industry groups, and Republican lawmakers sympathetic to their interests, to result in disastrous delays in advancing essential tech policy goals. Americans are in desperate need of these consumer protection agencies as their dependence on affordable access to the open Internet has grown during the pandemic. Industry insiders have openly admitted that they are pushing for these delays because it benefits their bottom line, at the expense of the public. 

Gigi Sohn (FCC) and Alvaro Bedoya (FTC) are highly qualified nominees who will provide essential votes on nearly every tech and telecom issue that Senate Democrats have promised to deliver on. There is simply no excuse for Senate Democrats to allow this to continue. Get it done.

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