Arielle Roth, the NTIA Administrator, recently testified before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. Before the hearing, Roth provided a written statement covering a range of the activities currently being pursued at NTIA. This includes:

• The effort the NTIA is undertaking to help the FCC find 800 MHz of spectrum for public auction. This directive was mandated by the One Big Beautiful Bill. For those who might not be aware of the details of spectrum management, the FCC regulates spectrum used by the public, and NTIA oversees spectrum used by the government.
• How NTIA is working with the standards bodies that are developing the specifications for 6G. This includes a forum hosted in March that focused on the supply chain issues for U.S. companies building advanced robotics, which I assume must somehow involve 6G.
• Bragging about progress with universal broadband availability, stressing the role that satellite broadband plays in making broadband available everywhere. She is still touting how the BEAD Benefit of the Bargain rules lower costs to taxpayers. She said the average cost per BEAD location is $4,765. Illinois and California BEAD applications are still pending at NTIA, with the agency having the Illinois proposal for eight months.
• How NTIA is enhancing public safety through approval of FirstNet and how NTIA got AT&T to agree to take $2 billion less in funding.
• Finally, Roth talked about an initiative to reduce screen times for school students. It’s a topic I’m still trying to get my head around since I can’t see how NTIA, which is essentially the government’s IT department, has any role in this kind of issue.

There was one big item that was conspicuously missing from her written comments. NTIA is still deciding what to do with the $21 billion of BEAD nondeployment funds that are left after making grants for BEAD broadband infrastructure. This is by far the biggest dollar item sitting at the NTIA, and it’s curious that there was no mention of it in the written comments, since many members of Congress are highly interested in how and when this money will be used.

During her testimony, Roth said that BEAD nondeployment funds are still up in the air. To provide a little history on BEAD nondeployment funds:

• The original BEAD legislation, passed back in 2020, said that permissible uses of nondeployment funds included digital skills training, telehealth and remote learning access, cybersecurity education, digital navigator programs, or direct subsidies to low-income homes.
• Originally, twelve states were sure they would have money left over after infrastructure deployment, twelve were sure they would not, and the rest kept the door open to possibly having some nondeployment funding.
• NTIA completely rewrote the BEAD grant rules in its June 2025 BEAD Restructuring Notice. Those rules greatly reduced the amount of money that would be spent on infrastructure (greatly increasing the nondeployment funds). That Notice made it clear that NTIA intended to redefine the ways that nondeployment funds could be used. After that Notice, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick began referring to BEAD nondeployment funds as a “saving” for the taxpayer, implying that the funds would be eliminated or greatly curtailed.
• During the rest of 2025, as the country awaited the new rules related to nondeployment, a number of Senators, Representatives, and Governors from both parties pleaded with NTIA to release the funds.
• In December 2025, Executive Order 14365 directed Commerce to withhold nondeployment funds from any states with “onerous” AI regulations and also gave NTIA until March to announce its plans for releasing the nondeployment funds.
• In February 2026, Commerce Secretary Lutnick announced that Commerce had no plans to withhold nondeployment funds, and NTIA held two “listening sessions” to hear ideas on how to use the nondeployment funds.
• In March, NTIA slipped the date for making a decision on nondeployment until June 2026. Throughout 2026, both Secretary Lutnick and Administrator Roth have occasionally referred to nondeployment as a savings for taxpayers.
• During testimony in the House hearing, Roth said that she now expects the plans for BEAD nondeployment to be announced sometime this summer (which could be any time before September 21). Roth said that NTIA wants to get the guidance right and not rush through the process.

It’s anybody’s guess if nondeployment funds will ever be released. It’s now been 13 months since the NTIA changed the rules for nondeployment funds, and they are obviously in no hurry to see these funds ever get spent.