Tag Archives: FCC

Updating the FCC Definition of Broadband

There has been a lot of talk about how AI is putting stress on broadband networks, and many analysts are claiming that we need faster broadband speeds to accommodate growing AI traffic. I was particularly struck by a comment from NTCA – the Rural Broadband Association in a filing at the FCC earlier this year in the FCC docket looking at USF reform. NTCA wrote, “The burgeoning growth of [artificial intelligence] demands modern networks with upload speeds much closer to symmetrical to support the applications and devices that it supports.” The National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA) told the FCC in 2025 that the 20 Mbps upstream standard is far too low and should be increased to 100 Mbps.

The FCC definition of broadband of 100/25 Mbps was adopted in March 2024. However, Commissioner Rosenworcel had been pushing for the increase to 100/20 Mbps for several years before that. It had been clear to everybody but the Ajit Pai FCC that the 25/3 Mbps definition of broadband was obsolete when the FCC’s mapping in 2022 showed that 90% of homes already had access to 100 Mbps download speed.

All of this leads me to ask if the 100/20 Mbps definition is already obsolete. Recent data from OpenVault says that 43% of U.S. households now subscribe to speeds faster than 500 Mbps download and 70% of homes subscribe to speeds of 200 Mbps or faster. It’s hard to look at these statistics and think that 100/20 Mbps should be the standard.

Unfortunately, the definition of broadband has political and financial overtones. A higher definition of broadband would declare that certain technologies are not really acceptable broadband. If we buy the arguments from NTCA and NRECA, then satellite broadband and FWA cellular would no longer be considered broadband. A huge percentage of cable company networks still have upload speeds far below 100 Mbps, even though there are numerous technology fixes for them to upgrade to faster, and even symmetrical speeds.

In a perfect world, the definition of broadband would be increased regularly to reflect that reality of the marketplace. But that’s not going to happen with this FCC, and in fact, in 2025, Commission Carr asked if the 100/20 Mbps definition is too high.

What is the right definition of broadband?. The easiest starting point for looking at download speeds is to look at the historical evolution of the definition of broadband from 4/1 Mbps, to 25/3 Mbps, to 100/20 Mbps. I’ve shown the following chart before that just trends forward that historic growth trend. If the definition of download speed continues on the same growth curve as from 1996 to 2022 (when the definition should have been 100 Mbps), the following definition of broadband is projected.This suggests the minimum definition of download broadband for 2027 would be 250 Mbps. That doesn’t seem at all out of line considering the OpenVault numbers that say that 70% of U.S. homes already subscribe to speeds faster than 200 Mbps.

Setting a definition for upload speeds is harder. The traditional definition of upload was low because there wasn’t really any use for it in most homes. But that has all changed in the last decade, particularly after the pandemic. People need upload bandwidth for a lot of uses. Most of us now work in the cloud all day. Video calls are the norm – I haven’t been on a voice conference call in ages. People game online and create content. We connect to portals for education that need significant and steady upload bandwidth.

The recent OpenVault report for the end of the second quarter of 2026 says that the average U.S. home uploaded 58 gigabytes of data per month, with upload usage growing at a rate of 20% per year. I always have to remind myself that the average means there are a lot of homes that upload a lot more than 58 gigabytes per month. That usage is two-and-a-half times the upload usage at the end of the pandemic and is way higher than usage a decade ago. I don’t know if the definition of upload should be 100 Mbps, as NRECA suggests, but I know it should be significantly higher than 20 Mbps, particularly if the AI folks are right.

In that same filing in the USF docket, NTCA also reminded the FCC that it is required to meet Section 254 of the Communications Act, which requires rural areas to have “reasonable comparability” to broadband service in urban areas. There are few urban and suburban areas where people can’t buy gigabit and faster download speeds, with an increasing percentage of homes that can buy gigabit upload. To be realistic, any definition of broadband that is set is strictly relevant only to rural areas, because urban speeds already far exceed any speed definition the FCC could ever consider.

Retiring AT&T Copper in California

Regulatory fights between state and federal regulators sometimes get messy, and it’s been a while since we’ve seen anything as messy as AT&T’s attempt to retire and walk away from copper facilities in California.

AT&T asked the California Public Service Commission (CPUC) for the ability to start retiring copper telephone networks in March 2023. It wasn’t an unusual request since AT&T is in the process of retiring copper in every other state where it owns last-mile copper networks. The CPUC finally ruled on that petition in June 2024 and unanimously rejected AT&T’s request. The state said that AT&T couldn’t retire copper unless the company had a functional equivalent product available for every customer who loses a copper connection.

That’s something AT&T can’t promise. The only two possible replacements for copper are fiber or FWA broadband delivered using cellular spectrum. AT&T has an alternative for customers in most urban and suburban markets. The company has built a lot of fiber and announced in May 2026 that it was planning to invest $19 billion more on fiber construction in the state. Most urban customers should also be able to use FWA cellular broadband if they lose copper, with the caveat that too many customers on FWA in a neighborhood could overwhelm the cellular network.

AT&T’s big problem comes in rural areas, where there are large areas where AT&T doesn’t have enough cellular coverage to reach homes with cellular broadband. It’s not unusual in most rural counties for a cellular carrier to serve only half of the area in a county, or less. There have been reports all around the country about customers who have been stranded after losing copper with no affordable voice option. AT&T has argued at the FCC that they can walk away from copper as long as customers can buy voice from somebody else. It feels extreme to have to replace an AT&T telephone line, that range from $25 to $63 per month with Starlink satellite broadband priced at $130 per month.

In May of this year, AT&T tried again. The company sued California and asked the federal courts to allow it to ignore the CPUC ruling. At the same time, AT&T asked the FCC to allow the company to walk away from carrier of last resort obligations (COLR) in California. The COLR request is a slightly different question than asking to be able to tear down copper. COLR are rules that require AT&T to still connect copper to new customers, even if that means building new copper facilities.

AT&T also filed a separate petition with the FCC asking for permission to discontinue 60% of its wire centers in California, or about 360 wire centers. AT&T argued that these wire centers were not compliant with the FCC’s rules requiring AT&T to support Phone-Advanced, which is a digital home phone service that runs on AT&T’s cellular network and broadband internet instead of traditional copper landline wires. Phone-Advanced lets customers keep their home number and connect up to six devices—including standard phones, fax machines, and medical monitors.

This is where it starts to become a messy jurisdictional battle. As was expected, the CPUC and California Attorney General Rob Bonta quickly challenged and asked the courts to dismiss AT&T’s federal lawsuit, while also asking the FCC to override rulings from the CPUC. In June, the FCC approved AT&T’s petition to close 360 wire centers and to cut copper to roughly 184,000 residential and 15,000 business locations across the state, but it seems like that should be ineffective while the State is saying the opposite and the issues are in court.

It’s getting hard to understand who has the final say about retiring copper in California, and it’s starting to feel probable that there might be conflicting rulings between the CPUC and the FCC. This doesn’t seem like something that is going to easily resolve, which could mean that copper will stay alive in California longer than anywhere else.

Who Should Regulate Space?

Earlier this year, two ranking members of the House Science Committee sent a letter to the FCC that reminded the agency that it didn’t have any clear authority from Congress to regulate space safety, space traffic management, or other non-communication space issues. This letter was sent when it became clear that the FCC was considering sweeping changes to the regulation of satellite constellations.

Those same two members, Republican Brian Babin and Democrat Zoe Lofgren, sent another letter in July, asking the FCC to delay a vote on new satellite regulations. The FCC Commissioners went ahead and approved the new satellite rules in its July meeting.

The FCC has been addressing space issues for years. I’ve read the applications that SpaceX filed when it originally asked the FCC for the authority to launch its current satellite constellation. Those filings are full of specifications and descriptions of how Starlink can direct satellites to avoid collisions, and how the company will deorbit satellites when they are no longer needed. The new FCC regulations cover these same issues.

The letter from Congress raises an interesting question. If the FCC doesn’t regulate these issues, then what federal agency does? The answer to that question is unclear, and it looks like various agencies have some role in regulating satellites:

  • The Department of Commerce has developed the Traffic Coordination System for Space (TraCSS) that issues satellite collision warnings.
  • The Department of Defense and Space Command also tracks space objects.
  • The FAA coordinates with airplanes to avoid areas near rocket launches.
  • The FCC is clearly in charge of the spectrum issues used to communicate between satellites and Earth.

Congress hasn’t specifically given any agency the authority to regulate orbital debris mitigation and deorbiting rules. This is a relatively new issue due to the large number of satellites in orbit, and the much larger number of planned satellites coming over the next decade. When the FCC took on this role with early communication satellites, it didn’t have any Congressional mandate to do so, because Congress hadn’t given that specific authority to anybody. But nobody was very concerned about this issue a decade ago, when there were 4,200 objects in orbit, including only 1,400 operational satellites.

It appears that the FCC has taken on this role in the regulatory vacuum. The House Science Committee had sent letters to the FCC making the same points to Chairman Ajit Pai in 2020 and Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in 2022. That means that Congress has had years to debate the issue and decide who should regulate space safety. There have been discussions in Congress about assigning this role to the Department of Commerce, but no votes have been taken to do so.

Clearly somebody needs to regulate space safety. Scientists and space experts have been warning about the disaster that would ensue if there are major collisions of satellites that result in a cloud of debris. The satellite industry is growing to be a significant piece of the economy, and a major collision event could quickly cripple communications satellites for years.

I have to wonder if the FCC is the right place in the government to be tackling these issues today. Does the agency have enough space experts on staff to fully evaluate if satellite companies are taking the right precautions? Does any federal agency? There will be a lot of finger-pointing if a collision disaster happens, but it seems like the only place to point the finger would be Congress.

Slaughter and the FCC

Today’s blog muses a bit on the impact of the Supreme Court ruling in Trump vs Slaughter. The case arose when President Trump fired Rebecca Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya, the two Democratic Commissioners at the Federal Trade Commission, soon after he took office. The Congressional legislation that established the FTC said that Commissioners serve seven-year terms, and that a president can only fire a Commissioner “for inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office”. Slaughter sued, and won in District Court, and that ruling was upheld by a split decision at the Court of Appeals. However, when the split decision was appealed to the Supreme Court, the Court ruled that a president has the authority to fire regulators in independent agencies.

As soon as this was announced, there was press speculation that the President might also fire Commissioner Anna Gomez, the sole Democratic Commissioner at the FCC. It’s unlikely that the administration would currently fire Gomez. Firing Gomez would mean that the FCC wouldn’t have a quorum, which requires three Commissioners be present before the FCC can vote on any actions. The FCC currently only has three Commissioners – Chairman Carr, Republican Commissioner Olivia Trusty, and Commissioner Gomez. We know what it looks like to not have a quorum since this happened a number of times in the past. The most recent time was last year when Commissioners Geoffrey Starks and Nathan Simington both resigned from the FCC in June 2025. That left only Chairman Carr and Commissioner Gomez, and the FCC was unable to conduct business until Commissioner Trusty was approved by the Senate.

The FCC doesn’t shut down without a quorum. The agency continues with all of its normal functions, like reviewing and approving new communications devices or granting simple wireless licenses for things like microwave connections. But nothing can be done that requires a vote of the Commissioners, including starting new proceedings. The Congressional mandate that established the FCC also requires the composition of a full Commission must be bipartisan, with no more than two of the four Commissioners from a given party (not counting the party of the Chairman).

But the speculation about firing Commissioner Gomez ramped up last week when President Trump nominated a third Republican Commissioner. He chose Republican Danielle Thumann Severs, who is currently a senior counsel to Commission Carr, to fill one of the two open seats on the commission. The nomination was immediately sent to the Senate to start the confirmation process. If confirmed, she would serve the remaining three years on a seat with a 5-year term that began on July 1, 2024.

Thumann Severs currently advises Carr on matters before the Wireline Bureau, the Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau, and the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau. She had been an advisor to Carr’s office from March 2021 to July 2023 and worked at Crown Castle before rejoining the FCC in August 2024.

It will raise questions about the future of the FCC and other independent agencies if Commissioner Gomez is fired after Thumann Severs is seated. Will future Presidents immediately terminate Commissioners of the opposing party in all independent agencies upon taking office? I’ve been watching the FCC for decades. My observation has been that a new Commissioner to the FCC is rarely fully effective until they’ve been in the position for a year or two and get to know staff and get deep into the issues at the agency. Having a constantly revolving door in the future would not be efficient for getting anything done.

It’s also worth noting that FCC Commissioners have regularly reached bipartisan agreement on many issues. There is no policy reason to fire Commissioner Gomez, other than to eliminate her opposing opinions that are posted after votes. I suspect that if every new president routinely fires Commissioners of the opposing party, then every decision at future FCCs will become highly partisan. As much as the big ISPs love it when they get a Commission that sides with them on issues, they also put a high value on regulatory consistency, and the big players regulated by the FCC don’t want to see rules that yoyo with every change of administration.

The Spectrum Auction Winners

After a four-year hiatus, the FCC recently held a spectrum auction of 200 licenses for AWS-3 spectrum in the 1695-1710 MHz, 1755-1780 MHz, and 2155-2180 MHz bands. The last FCC auction was in 2022 for 2.5 GHz spectrum. The FCC lost the ability to hold spectrum auctions when its Congressional authority lapsed and was not renewed. This spectrum was touted by the FCC as being 5G-grade. The license areas included in the auction covered over 100 million people across 48 states and two US territories, and included major markets like New York, Chicago, Boston, Tampa, and Charlotte. The FCC announced before the auction that much of the proceeds will be used to continue to fund the rip-and-replace of Chinese electronics from Huawei and ZTE.

The winning bidders collectively bid more than $3.57 billion. The winners are as follows, from largest to smallest:

  • Verizon Wireless: $3,162,445,000 for 82 licenses in 82 markets
  • T-Mobile: $277,787,000 for 102 licenses in 102 markets
  • AT&T: $120,774,000 for 10 licenses in 10 markets
  • SpaceX: $8,490,200 for two licenses in two markets
  • Blue Ridge Wireless II LLC: $2,090,000 for one license in one market
  • Conundrum Wireless, LLC: $1,228,000 for two licenses in one market
  • Citizens Band License Company, LLC: $75,000 for one license in one market

Not surprisingly, 99.7% of the spectrum was claimed by the three big cellular carriers, with Verizon snagging 88.5% of the awards. Folks might be surprised to see SpaceX as the fourth-largest winner. The company is looking for spectrum to enhance its direct-to-cell mobile services. Analysts speculated that this auction was a trial run for the company to learn about the auction process since the company has already agreed to buy $2.6 billion in spectrum in the AWS-3, AWS-4, and H-blocks from EchoStar.

Verizon was using the auction to fill holes in its spectrum portfolio and spent almost $2 billion of its winning bids in New York, Chicago, and Boston. AT&T’s biggest focus was for Charlotte. T-Mobile dropped out of all of the expensive markets, but still won the most licenses spread across small metropolitan areas.

ike many actions by the federal government these days, there is also an interesting backstory to this auction. The spectrum that was included in this auction originally came from EchoStar (originally Dish Networks). Two companies, SNR Wireless and Northstar Wireless, originally purchased the spectrum in the 2014 AWS-3 auction for $3.3 billion. When the FCC learned that Dish was the secret backer of the two companies, the FCC voided the awards. The FCC ruled that when this spectrum was eventually reauctioned, that Dish would owe the FCC any shortfall if the new auction raises anything less than $2.9 billion.

Roger Entner of Recon Analytics says that EchoStar bid up the current auction to save itself from having to pay for any shortfall in the auction. EchoStar entered the recent auction with almost as many bid credits as Verizon. Entner claims that EchoStar was in the auction for no other purpose than bidding up the price, and in doing so, increased the proceeds of the auction from $2 billion to the final $3.57 billion. He says that EchoStar stayed in the auction until the auction reached the threshold where the company was off the hook for paying for the shortfall. In the next two rounds, the company dropped out of every market except for two licenses it got stuck with in Guam. The company is no longer in the cellular business, and Entner expects it will sell this spectrum at a discount to a local cellular provider or just ride out the build-out shot clock until the FCC is forced to reclaim the spectrum.

It’s going to be interesting to see if the three big carriers take any action against EchoStar for driving up the prices. I don’t have the slightest idea if EchoStar did anything illegal, but its bidding actions were certainly shady.

FCC Proposes New Permitting Rules

The FCC issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking titled Build America: Eliminating Barriers to Wireline Deployments. The stated purpose of the proposed new rules is “to cut red tape and excessive fees imposed by some state and local governments in the public rights-of-way for wireline deployments”. There are several important provisions in the new rules.

First, the FCC proposes a 120-day shot clock for local governments to approve a request for rights-of-way. If the local government doesn’t respond in that time frame, then the application is presumed to be approved. That may seem like a reasonable time frame when you first hear about. It doesn’t seem unreasonable to ask a local government to approve or reject a right-of-way request to build fiber on a single street or a small neighborhood. But consider if a fiber overbuilder requests rights-of-way for an entire city. Such requests are complicated. Such a request would include residential neighborhoods and business districts. A city would have to consider a lot of factors, like planned road relocations or rebuilds, other construction activity that is already occurring, and issues related to the condition of existing rights-of-ways that might already be overcrowded with other utilities.

The docket also proposes to limit fees to a reasonable approximation of the government’s actual, direct costs of managing the rights-of-way with respect to a particular application. This implies the FCC will only allow fees associated with establishing the original right-of-way and will not allow fees to cover some of the costs for managing the right-of-way over future years.

The FCC plans to establish safe harbor fees for rights-of-way. For those not familiar with that term, a safe harbor fee generally means a standard rate or affordable guideline. The problem with safe harbor rates is that they don’t recognize the difference between a right-of-way fee in a small rural town and one for the biggest metropolitan areas of a state.

The new rules will count in-kind compensation as part of any fee. Local governments often negotiate in-kind contributions with fiber builders. For example, they might grant a right-of-way and ask the fiber builder to provide a few free fibers to connect between government buildings. The FCC new rules will mandate that any such in-kind contribution be counted as part of the fee. That would mean putting a dollar value on the in-kind contribution and subtracting it from the fees. That may sound reasonable, but this is being done in the context where the local government has to prove its fees are cost-based while a fiber builder will not. I have many clients who have been handed inflated estimates from cable companies for providing short fiber routes.

Finally, the new rules will prohibit a local government from charging higher fees when the proposed infrastructure will support multiple purposes. An example would be a fiber route that is being built to bring fiber to a neighborhood and also serve a cell tower.

The most interesting thing about the docket to me is that FCC Chairman Carr said when he took the job that his philosophy was “light touch regulation”, meaning he didn’t foresee the FCC implementing a lot of new regulations. Instead, this and other FCC proceedings are adding a lot of new federal regulations. Many of the other FCC proceedings are similar to this one in that the FCC wants to wrest away any regulatory authority from states and localities and regulate everything at the federal level.

I’m sure that industry comments will include some horror stories from fiber builders about cities that have stonewalled new fiber construction or that charge a lot of fees. My guess is that these are the exception rather than the rule since most communities want more fiber and are willing to work with anybody willing to invest in their market.

Satellite Shorts July 2026

Accelerated Satellite Regulatory Approvals. The FCC announced that it will vote at its July 22 meeting to overhaul the regulatory process for satellite broadband. The proposed rules are in an order titled Space Modernization for the 21st Century. The proposed rules are to meet four specific goals: to improve the speed of processing applications for new satellites, to provide more predictability to applicants and licensees, to provide more flexibility for innovation, and to still meet the FCC’s responsibilities. It’s one of the longest FCC orders I can recall, at 296 pages.

The new rules would eliminate a lot of old regulations and replace them with new rules intended to speed up the paperwork process by applying “bright-line” criteria for approving new satellites. For those not familiar with that term, a bright-line regulation is one with a clear, objective rule or standard that leaves no room for subjective interpretation or exceptions, that is designed to create highly predictable outcome. A bright-line approval process would list specific requirements, and any applicant who meets those requirements would be approved. Perhaps I’m naïve, but I would expect that approving new satellites should include a thorough engineering review at the FCC. There should also be an opportunity for other satellite providers to note any problems with an application. I’m all for improving the processing time at regulatory agencies, but changing from today’s through review to a set of bright-line rules is going too far in the direction of simplification and assumes that satellite companies won’t propose any bad or unworkable ideas.

100,000 Satellites for Starlink? Perhaps this is a coincidence for the FCC wanting to simplify satellite applications, but Starlink filed an application to expand to 100,000 broadband satellites to its constellation, up from the 12,000 that will be in orbit at the end of this year and the 15,000 total that have been authorized by the FCC. The application includes a request to get access to new spectrum in the W and D bands between 92 and 275 GHz. The filing says that the new satellites will be the new Gen3 that will be capable of speeds up to several gigabits per second. Never one for modesty, the filing from Elon Musk says that SpaceX has a goal of handling the majority of the world’s internet traffic.

Rocket Lab Buys Iridium. In an $8 billion deal, Rocket Lab is acquiring the satellite company Iridium. Iridium currently operates a constellation of 66 satellites that provide a range of services that include phone and data services using the L-band spectrum, positioning services, and navigation and timing services. Rocket Labs is a launch service that hopes the deal will make the company into a full-service provider that both launches and operates satellites. The company hinted earlier this year that it was interested in developing its own constellation but said it’s not ready to announce specific plans and services until it acquires the needed spectrum.

NASA Warns About Launch Site Capacity. A report from the inspector general of NASA warns that the increasing number of space launches is posing problems for spaceports. The report warns that the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and the Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia are approaching operational capacity and will hit their limits between 2028 and 2029. The prediction is that the number of launches will grow from the current 109 annual launches to 268 per year by 2030, which will overstrain the launch facilities that were constructed years ago to support the Apollo program. The report warns that an investment of at least $1 billion is needed to future-proof the sites. The launch sites are controlled under the NASA budget, and the administration has proposed a 24% cut in NASA’s budget for the next fiscal year, which includes eliminating forty scientific programs.

Premium Fees from Starlink? A recent article in Futurism reports that SpaceX is charging some users a demand surcharge of $500 to $1,500 because their address is within a high-demand area. The article cites several customers who have been hit with the surcharge, and who complain that it’s nearly impossible to fight the issue through the company’s slim customer service process.

The article notes that the congestion charge was quietly reintroduced in 2024 at a one-time fee of $100 for high-congestion areas. PC Magazine reported in 2025 that the fees had been increased to as much as $1,000. As of last month, there are reports of surcharges of $1,500 in parts of Alaska.

Meanwhile, Starlink has increased prices. While it now offers usage-capped plans for $55 or $85 in selected areas, the price for normal unlimited Starlink broadband was increased from $120 to $130.

Broadband Shorts June 2026

Digital Equity Grant Lawsuit Update. In April, a D.C. federal judge declined to pause litigation over the Administration’s cancellation of the $2.75 billion Digital Equity grants aimed at increasing digital literacy and digital skill training. The suit was filed by the National Digital Inclusion Alliance. The Court found that the case covered distinct issues from the related Climate United Fund v. Citibank case and should proceed on its own merits. A month ago, the administration asked the Court to dismiss the case. However, a DOJ attorney told the Court last week that the government would withdraw from the case and let the grants proceed if all preferences for race are removed from the grant rules. This entire suit, from the beginning, has been about the title of the grant program and not about the substance of the program. This should hearten digital inclusion advocates since there is now a chance of seeing the promised grant funded after all. But before celebrating, its worth noting that the White House removed this grant from its proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year.

Lower Budget for the FCC. Like is happening with many federal agencies, the House Appropriations Subcommittee is recommending a lower budget than requested by the agency for the fiscal year 2027 that starts in October. The agency had requested a budget of $416 million, and Congress reduced that by 6% to $390.2 million. The Congressional appropriations bill also added some conditions to the appropriations:

  • The FCC will be prohibited from updating minimum service standards for fixed or mobile broadband without first evaluating any impact on affordability and consumer choice.
  • The FCC will be prohibited from enforcing the digital discrimination rules passed by the previous FCC.

Update on FCC Router Ban. The FCC expanded its ban on foreign-made WiFi routers to also include “consumer-grade portable or mobile MiFi Wi-Fi or hotspot devices for residential use” and “LTE/5G CPE devices for residential use”. That’s a gigantic issue for the large cellular carriers who have been selling FWA cellular broadband to roughly 1 million new households per quarter. As a reminder, the FCC router ban only applies to any new routers, and carriers and ISPs can continue to import any existing routers they already use today.

But this is quickly going to become a major issue for carriers. The cable industry asked the FCC in the first week of June to swap some components inside existing routers, which would mean these are not identical to routers that were used before the ban. The cable companies warn that without the ability to modify older models that the cable industry faces a huge router shortage in the near future. The Global Electronics Association (GEA) has continued to argue that the FCC’s policy is flawed because security vulnerabilities are not related to where a router was manufactured and is endemic to the technology. Th good news is that the FCC is reviewing, and has approved several new routers.

New Fiber Factories. Corning is partnering with NVIDIA to build three new fiber factories that will increase the company’s capacity by 50%. The factories will be located in North Carolina and Texas. The cited reason for the expansion was the increased demand for fiber for data centers, but this increases fiber availability for all other purposes. NVIDIA is making a $500 million investment in Corning as part of the deal, and the company has an option to buy an additional 15 million Corning shares. This is another example of companies in the AI space investing in each other.

Supreme Court Upholds FCC Fines. The Supreme Court voted 8 to 1 to uphold the FCC’s authority to issue fines against companies that it regulates. The original suit that asked to eliminate the FCC fine authority was brought by AT&T and Verizon, which were trying to avoid fines levied after the two companies sold customer location data. The two carriers had argued that the FCC was improper to fine them since the companies should have been given the option of requesting a jury trial. The two companies said they are considering not paying the fines as another test of FCC authority.

 Spectrum Auction Results. The FCC held the first spectrum auction in four years and auctioned AWS-3 spectrum that is valuable for cellular traffic. The FCC was worried when the spectrum raised only $95 million in the first few days. The One Big Beautiful Bill had ordered the FCC to resume spectrum auctions as a way to raise money to offset tax cuts in the bill. Congress assumed that all upcoming spectrum auctions would raise $85 billion. At the end, the auction raised just over $3.5 billion, which was a big relief to EchoStar. This spectrum was originally won at auction by EchoStar, which was subsequently accused of claiming bidding discounts it didn’t deserve, and the FCC expected EchoStar to make up any shortfall under $3.4 billion. .

AT&T Offers Daily Rates for iPad Users. In a new pricing plan, AT&T is offering a daily rate of $3 to activate broadband on a SIM-enabled iPad. This can be done using the iPad settings and doesn’t require a special app. No contract, subscription, or credit check is required. This is interesting because this is how broadband is sold in much of Africa, where users buy broadband by the day and use those days to tackle all broadband tasks. The $3 rate is not cheap, at $90 per month, but would be a savings for somebody buying usage as few times per week.

FCC Questioning State Pole Regulation

The FCC issued a Public Notice with the longest title I can remember: Wireline Competition Bureau Reminds Reverse-preemption States of Obligation to Effectively Regulate Pole Attachments and Seeks Comment on Need for Changes to the Commission’s Certification Rules to Ensure Effective State Pole Attachment Regulation.

The Public Notice asks for comments on the effectiveness of regulations in States that have chosen to regulate pole attachments, meaning rules that regulate how telcos and others get access to poles that are in the public right-of-way. Comments are due on the Public Notice by July 13, 2026.

States were given the right to regulate pole attachments in Section 224 of the 1934 Communications Act. Twenty-three States have elected to regulate poles over the years, and the FCC has created regulations for the States that have not done so. In one of the oddities of regulatory language, States that have elected to regulate pole attachments are said to have “reverse-preempted” the federal pole attachment rules.

The Public Notice is seeking comments on whether States are properly regulating the rates, terms and conditions of pole attachments. More specifically, the FCC is asking what steps it could take to make sure that state pole attachment regulations are “transparent and effective”.

In strongly worded language, the FCC reminds States of the “obligation to effectively and clearly regulate pole attachments in their jurisdictions.” In what feels like a veiled threat, the FCC asks if it should require reverse-preemption States to refile new certifications for FCC review. This could present an opportunity for the FCC to refuse the certifications and take over the pole attachment rules. It will seem likely that there will be lawsuits if the FCC tries to take back jurisdiction of pole attachments, since the state’s right to regulate pole attachments is clearly stated in the Communications Act.

There is one annoying mention in the Public Notice that this is being done to protect the $42 billion BEAD program. NTIA’s Benefit of the Bargain rules cut the amount that will be used for infrastructure in half. Of the remaining BEAD awards, a lot will go to satellite, fixed wireless, or buried fiber construction that will not require the use of pole attachments. If only this was being done to protect $42 billion of infrastructure construction.

I also have to wonder about the timing of this. Many States are in the process of signing BEAD contracts, and some of the earliest steps for an ISP starting a new project is to immediately start the pole attachment paperwork process along with seeking rights-of-way. Even if the pole attachment rules could be better in some states, the FCC’s action would make more sense if it had been started a year earlier.

I think that it would be very disruptive if the FCC chooses to seize pole attachment regulation back from the states. At a minimum, in a state where the regulations reverted to federal authority, it seems likely that pole owners will take some time to fully digest and cope with the change, and to look at forms and processes.

I could be wrong, but this feels more like the FCC trying to take regulatory authority from States more than an attempt to improve BEAD. While BEAD is a large grant program, the many other grant programs in recent years have collectively funded more fiber than BEAD. My guess is that some States will fight to keep their own pole attachment rules, and any attempt to do this will result in a protracted court fight, and that BEAD will be in the rearview window before this is settled.

AT&T v. California

AT&T filed several petitions at the FCC asking the Commission to override regulations from the State of California. The State is forcing AT&T to maintain copper networks until such time that AT&T can offer the same services to customers using some alternate technology.

The FCC reacted by issuing two requests for public comments related to the AT&T petitions. In the first, the FCC asks for comments related to its ability to preempt California’s regulations related to copper networks. The second asks for public comments related to AT&T being able to walk away from carrier-of-last-resort responsibilities in California as it tears down copper networks.

These proceedings ask some interesting questions, although my hunch is that the FCC already plans to preempt California on these issues and is only going through the formalities first.

One interesting issue raised is whether the FCC can grab regulatory authority from a State. The historic framework for telecom regulation has always been that States are free to regulate anything that the FCC elects not to directly regulate. Back when AT&T was the primary telephone company, every state had numerous regulations related to telephone companies. The FCC established the big nationwide rules, often dictated by Congress, but the States were free to regulate anything the FCC didn’t directly regulate. This usually meant issues like consumer rates and customer service practices. As competition was introduced into the telecom market, AT&T and the various Bell companies were successful in convincing most states to relax regulations, and in some case telcos became almost totally unregulated. California eased some regulations, but still maintains a lot of regulation of telcos. It will be interesting to see how hard California will fight back if the FCC overrides the state’s regulatory authority.

Another interesting request is for AT&T to get out of carrier-of-last resort (COLR) obligations. The petition describes this as AT&T being relieved of ETC status (Eligible Communications Carrier), which is the formal process where states certified companies with COLR status. COLR is an obligation originally created by the Communications Act of 1934, and expanded by the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which said that regulated telcos are required to serve customers located inside their regulated service areas, with only a few exceptions related to customers in remote locations. Telcos have been obligated to connect new customers to the existing networks and to build new networks to meet new homes and businesses. This feels like a quaint concept today, and it’s one of the first things that disappeared as states deregulated telephone companies. I find it interesting that many telcos still have ETC designations and use that status to receive various kinds of universal service funding while only playing lip service, at best, to carrier-of-last-resort obligations. The real question being asked in the FCC proceeding is whether the agency has the authority to override any COLR obligation required by California.

I have to think that AT&T has already been ignoring this obligation for years in California. I recall news stories of AT&T discontinuing rural copper services in rural California with little or no notification to customers. I have to think that it’s been a long time since AT&T has built any new copper infrastructure to reach newly constructed homes and neighborhoods. But there are other obligations related to COLR and ETC status that AT&T would like to have preempted.

It’s going to be interesting to see who, other than regulators in California, responds to these dockets. These particular issues are largely already dead in most of the rest of the country, although some states still maintain greater levels of regulation over telcos than others.

These dockets don’t address the even bigger question, which is whether the state or federal government should be regulating telephone service at all. I think everybody is in favor of the FCC’s efforts to tamp down on robocalls and texts, but how much other regulation of traditional telephone companies is still needed?