Add New America's Open Technology Institute (OTI) to those unhappy with Sen. Maria Cantwell's decision to scheduled a second nomination hearing for Democratic Federal Communications Commission nominee Gigi Sohn.

Sohn's confirmation vote had been scheduled for this week but has been delayed after Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) suffered a stroke and could not participate. Sohn's was one of three nominations delayed because Republicans are expected to oppose them and every Democratic vote is needed.

That delay allowed Cantwell (D-Wash.), chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, to grant the request by ranking member Roger Wicker for a second Sohn hearing he argued was needed due, in part, to Sohn's offer to recuse herself from some issues due to her former advocacy role at Public Knowledge and elsewhere.

But scheduling that hearing has not sat well with Sohn fans, who see it as helping her opponents delay or derail her confirmation.

Also Read: Cantwell Targeted Over Second Sohn Hearing

While conceding the Sohn confirmation vote probably needed to be delayed, OTI made clear that should have not have extended to a second hearing.

“Senator Lujan is a dedicated public servant and we wish him well in his recovery. While his absence necessitates a pause on some of the Commerce Committee’s work, we are dismayed to see what has been added to the agenda," said Joshua Stager, deputy director for broadband and competition policy, at OTI.

"The hearing that chair Cantwell noticed last night is a gift to AT&T, Comcast and the other companies that have worked for years to weaken the FCC’s authority and who benefit from a deadlocked agency," said Stager.

Stager argues Sohn should not be recusing herself anyway, so Cantwell should ask for the recusal to be withdrawn.“The Senate’s role here is to advise and consent, not obstruct and delay,” he said. “Gigi Sohn is an exceptionally qualified nominee and it’s time to confirm her. We need a fully functioning FCC."

The FCC is currently at a 2-2 tie, with decisions on partisan issues like net neutrality and broadcast regulation needing Sohn's third Democratic vote to be taken up. One of the other two nominations delayed due to Lujan's stroke is a third Democrat for the Federal Trade Commission so it, too, can take up issues with partisan divides.

One source familiar with the thinking of the committee majority said: “[W]e’re all frustrated that Republicans will literally do anything — including boycotting a markup of qualified, critical nominees like Gigi Sohn, Alvaro Bedoya [the fifth Federal Trade Commission member], Mary Boyle [to the Consumer Product Safety Commission] and countless more — in order to hamper the president’s agenda.” ■

Fight for the Future (FFTF) is fighting mad over a second Senate Commerce Committee hearing on the nomination of Gigi Sohn to the open Federal Communications Commission seat and has directed its anger at the powerful committee‘s chairwoman, Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.).

The group sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) calling on him to remove Cantwell as chair over what it said was “her refusal to advance [President Joe] Biden‘s highly qualified nominee to the FCC, Gigi Sohn.”

Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), the ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee, had suggested the need for a second hearing over issues related to Sohn's association with former TV station streamer Locast.

The committee had already held a hearing on her nomination back in December, but because no vote had been taken — likely because there were not enough Democratic votes at the time — her nomination had to be resubmitted by the President in the new year, but that did not necessarily mean she had to have a new hearing.

There is no indication that Cantwell is purposely trying to slow-roll the nomination. 

More likely is that she was making sure the vote would be favorable, and there has been some talk that Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) might need persuading after progressive Democrats hammered her — including paying for a billboard in her home state branding her "corrupt"--during the net neutrality debate for not voting to repeal the 2017 FCC decision to eliminate the net neutrality rules, rules that Sohn stumped for under then-FCC chairman Tom Wheeler. According to sources, supporters of Sohn have reached out to Sinema to tell her Sohn had no part in the billboard incident.

Cantwell had not granted the hearing but instead scheduled a vote on Sohn's nomination this week. After Democratic committee member Sen. Ben Ray Luján of New Mexico suffered a stroke, though, that vote was put off due to a lack of Democratic votes for Sohn's and two other nominations with which Republicans had some issues, including a fifth Federal Trade Commission member.

Following that announced delay, and with Lujan still recovering in the hospital, Cantwell granted the second Sohn hearing for February 9.

Cantwell's office had no comment at deadline on the letter. ■

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), chair of the powerful Senate Commerce Committee, is still looking to hold a confirmation vote for FCC nominee Gigi Sohn sometime soon.

Sohn‘s nomination has gotten pushback from Republicans citing her support for Title II-based network neutrality rules and her support of fair-use carveouts from content copyright protections, and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) has said he would put a hold on her nomination before it got to a floor vote.

A Cantwell spokesperson had told Next TV earlier this month that the plan was to hold a vote by the end of the month. But with only a week left, no vote had been scheduled.

Asked Friday (January 21) about the holdup, the spokesperson cited scheduling issues rather than any political pushback. “That’s because the recess [a planned January 17-21 ‘state work period’] was moved to next week,” she said. “Hopefully we will have something confirmed at some point next week.”

Sohn's nomination had to be resubmitted by President Joe Biden on January 4 after no action was taken by the committee before the end of 2021.

Sohn has already faced a nomination hearing, during which the Republican questioning seemed less pointed and adversarial than expected. But since then there appears to have been a ramping up of opposition, which fans of Sohn attribute in part to pushback from industry players over the net neutrality issue and perhaps an effort to slow-roll any third Democrat on the five-member commission to forestall internet service provider or broadcast reregulation.

Sohn was a big supporter of Title II as top adviser to Obama-era FCC chair Tom Wheeler, whose FCC adopted rules against blocking, throttling and paid prioritization before they were reversed by the Republican FCC majority under Trump-era chairman Ajit Pai. Current chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel is expected to readopt the rules once she gets a Democratic majority, which would mean the confirmation of Sohn or some other Democrat.

It is likely that whoever gets the third Democratic seat would support restoring net neutrality rules, which is why the opposition to Sohn could just be opposition to filling the third seat for as long as possible. ■

A spokesperson for the Consumer Technology Association said Thursday that a quartet of legislators still plan in-person appearances at CES in Las Vegas.

A number of exhibitors have canceled in-person attendance due to the dramatic rise in COVID-19 cases over the past few weeks.

Scheduled to appear on a panel are Senate Commerce Committee Chairwoman Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.V.).

Asked Thursday if that was still the case, the CTA spokesperson said yes, citing the association's earlier announcement of a record number of senators making the trip.

Also scheduled to speak at the show is House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.), father of former acting FCC Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn and whose endorsement was a key to then-candidate Joe Biden's successful presidential run.

Asked if he still planned to make the trip, press secretary Derrick Hope would only say: "Check back after the holidays." ■

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) has called on Federal Trade Commission chair Lina Khan to immediately launch an investigation of "recent revelations and public documentation" that it had misled advertisers and the public in making claims about the "brand safety" and reach of its ads, which she said would violate the FTC's prohibition on unfair and deceptive practices.

If the investigation confirms that public documentation, she said the FTC should take action including getting monetary relief for advertisers and "disgorgement" of the company's "ill-gotten gains."

Despite Facebook's claims about the safety of its product for ad brands and users, she said, whistleblower documents show that while Facebook has asserted that it is 97% effective in weeding out hate speech, its processes "miss more than 90 percent of hate speech content."

If that is the case, "Facebook may thus have made material misrepresentations or omissions to advertisers regarding the effectiveness of its brand safety controls, including its ability to remove criminal content," which would obviously impact how "safe" an ad environment the platform is.

She added that Facebook's rollout of some new brand safety tools claims to avoid adjacency with content in its "tragedy" and "conflict" categories 99% of the time. "If experience is any guide, these newest claims to advertisers may similarly break down under a microscope."

She wants the FTC to pull out that microscope and start looking, including at whether Facebook knew that its "potential reach" ad metric may have been inaccurate when it offered prospective advertisers that metric as a key measure of an ad's potential success, calling it “arguably the single most important number in our ads creation interfaces.”

"A thorough investigation by the Commission and other enforcement agencies is paramount, not only because Facebook and its executives may have violated federal law, but because members of the public and businesses are entitled to know the facts regarding Facebook’s conduct as they make their decisions about using the platform," she told Khan.

As evidence Facebook may have known that was not the case, she cited public analysis as far back as 2017 that demonstrated that its ads might have claimed potential reach that exceeded every 18-34-year-old in the country. ■

The latest draft of President Joe Biden's Build Back Better legislative package includes help for local journalists.

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), chair of the Commerce Committee, said several of the provisions she wrote into the Local Journalism Sustainability Act made it into the package, which has yet to get a vote in the House.

Those provisions would provide tax credits for broadcasters, online media and newspapers to incentivize them to hire and keep journalists. Cantwell said the incentives will help news outlets remain financially viable.

Cantwell has been an advocate for helping local journalism help itself, including authoring the provision in the COVID-19 Economic Relief Bill that made local news eligible for the Paycheck Protection Program, which made more broadcasters eligible for the funding.

National Association of Broadcasters President Gordon Smith said he appreciates Cantwell's work, and those of her colleagues, to have the provisions included in Build Back Better.

"The payroll credit for compensation of local journalists will solidify the sustainability of vital local community news in the Low Power TV sector," said Frank Copsidas, president of the LPTV Broadcasters Association.

Copsidas points out that the tax credit has been in, out, and back in the package so "it's not over!" until the bill gets voted out with the provision still in.

D.C. insiders were on the lookout for FCC nominations Friday after Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) reportedly said Tuesday (Oct. 19) that she was expecting them to come from the White House this week.

Acting FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel has to leave the commission by the end of the year unless she is re-nominated and confirmed and there is an empty Democratic seat that needs filling if the Democrats want to start exercising their majority.

Also: Music, Education Groups Urge Biden To Make Rosenworcel FCC Chair

Given the short time frame left in this Congress for the confirmation process and the fact that if Rosenworcel is not named chair she could decide to exit regardless, prospects for her getting the nod as chair were looking up. For one thing, she would not need a nomination hearing since she has already been fully vetted.

One former top FCC official said he thought Rosenworcel would make it after all, saying that some of the more progressive candidates being proposed had not panned out.

Also: Senators Push Biden for Jessica Rosenworcel as Permanent Chair

If the White House does not move quickly, there is the prospect of a three-person commission starting in January, majority Republican, with lone Democrat Geoffrey Starks as acting chair but unable to do anything the Republicans did not agree with.

The hold-up on President Biden naming a chair apparently stems from a number of factors, including the early endorsement of Starks by the Congressional Black Caucus, whose leading member, James Clyburn (D-S.C.), was instrumental in Biden's election; the push by progressives for a more activist chair in the mold of FTC chair Lina Khan; and the apparent pushback on Rosenworcel by some former top FCC Democrats.

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, has tapped a former Charter Communications executive with plenty of Capitol Hill experience for a top communications post.

Christianna Barnhart is joining the committee as senior counsel for the Communications Subcommittee.

“Ms. Barnhart will bring more than a decade of experience and expertise in both the public and private sectors to advance the Committee’s priorities in broadband deployment and affordability, spectrum policy, oversight of the Federal Communications Commission and the National Telecommunications Information Administration,“ Cantwell’s office said.

Barnhart has been the technology and telecommunications team lead for Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), who is the former ranking member on the Communications Subcommittee, a post held by a Republican after Democrats took over the Senate in the last election.

Before joining the Senate, Barnhart was VP for regulatory affairs for Charter and before that, an adviser to then-Federal Communications Commission member (now acting chair) Jessica Rosenworcel, dealing with the Rural Health Care Program.

Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) told an audience of broadcasters this week that she was trying to fight the trend of broadcasting workforce losses due to the pandemic and "information age changes" (translation: Big Tech), including by proposing a big government investment in local news.

In a virtual keynote at the National Association of Broadcasters state legislative fly-in, Cantwell said that was why she believes broadcast journalism should be considered part of the nation's critical infrastructure.

She said that if the President moves an infrastructure bill, journalism should be included as a source of trusted information because it "puts faith into many of our policy decisions because we know there is competition and we know we can trust the source of information."

Also Read: Cantwell Says American Jobs Plan Bucks Should Buttress Broadcasting

She said the chances that an infrastructure bill would get passed were high, but that the chances broadcasting would be part of it were not as high. But she said that she thought that broadcasters and legislators working together could succeed, as they did with getting more money for stations in the COVID-19 small business aid package.

As to the knock on fake news, Cantwell said that if "from time to time" it may be inaccurate, the system is self-correcting.

She said that was why she would be proposing that infrastructure investment include "at least" $2.3 billion in tax credits and grants for local journalism over the next two to three years.

She said that while Congress investigated unfair antitrust impacts on the news marketplace--most notably whether broadcast and print journalists should get an antitrust exemption to collectively negotiate for the use of their content by online aggregators--those journalists needed help now.

The tax credits would help broadcasters pay for salary and healthcare benefits, while a grant program would help rehire some of the workforce.

"Local journalism has won the support of many advertisers and others who believe this is the go-to source when they want their brand to be trusted," she said.

Cantwell said her committee would be launching a series of hearings in the next few weeks on the state of broadcasting, unfair market competition in the sector and what Congress should do about it.

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), chair of the powerful Senate Commerce Committee, says she is going to push for local broadcast and print media to be considered critical infrastructure that needs preserving.

The Biden Administration has been pushing its massive $1.9 trillion American Jobs Plan infrastructure bill. That plan does not address local journalism as critical infrastructure in need of government support, but Cantwell said it should and she will work to try to make that happen.

Also Read: NAB's Smith Says Broadcasting Is Best Place for Vaccine Messaging

During a hearing Thursday (April 15) on vaccine information campaigns, Cantwell pointed out that one of the reasons that the COVID-19 relief paycheck protection program for small businesses was extended to radio and TV, which she advocated for, was because it was a trusted and important source of health information. 

She asked witness and former member of the Senate Commerce Committee, Gordon Smith, now president of the National Association of Broadcasters, how important it was to continue to support local broadcasting. Smith suggested it was very important to preserve broadcast revenues as a way to support trusted information, democracy, and the First Amendment.

Smith said he considered broadcasting critical infrastructure when it comes to informing the public during the pandemic and beyond. Cantwell had asked whether he believed that was the case, clearly indicating she felt local TV and print journalism outlets should be treated as critical infrastructure that needed the government's support.

She said that when it comes to the administration's infrastructure investment: "I plan to push this issue as it relates to this critical infrastructure investment we're making. I think local news, particularly, [which is] a trusted source, is frayed beyond belief and if we don't shore it up, at least until the legal battles play out with the tech industry, we will be making a big mistake.

The Big Tech battle was a reference to efforts by online content providers, including broadcast and print journalism outlets, aided by some in Congress including Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) to grant those providers an antitrust exemption to collectively bargain with big tech platforms for payment of the use of their news product.

Smith and NAB strongly support that effort.

The bipartisan leadership of the Senate Commerce Committee has introduced a bill to update the government's tech ed program. 

The bill, the Advanced Technological Manufacturing Act, would reauthorize the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Advanced Technological Education (ATE) program but also retool it given that COVID-19 has put an exclamation point on the need for more high tech workers in a world having to connect remotely. 

"This legislation would spur economic recovery in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic by developing a workforce prepared to fill roles in advanced technological sectors," said Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), chairman of the Committee, who joined with ranking member Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) to introduce the bill. 

Cantwell said the idea is to spur STEM education, particularly with the community colleges and technical colleges that have "led the way," in STEM. 

The bill would direct the National Science Foundation to reestablish pilot programs expanding the number of colleges and universities that can compete for NSF grants. 

The bill also does some linguistic housekeeping, changing the language in the program from "scientific and educational content" to STEM. 

Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) used a hearing on 5G network security to hammer home that the U.S. needs to practice what it preaches.

Cantwell is ranking member on the Senate Commerce Committee, which is looking into how to remove suspect Chinese tech from 5G networks and where to find the trusted tech to replace it.

Related: Senate Committee Vets 5G Security

But Cantwell framed the issue in terms of governments not having any back-doors into network tech, by which she meant any governments, including the U.S.

She said there needed to be global agreement and a unified voice against any government asking a company to provide encryption work-around.

She pointed out that she fought a past Democratic Administration on the "clipper chip," an encryption chip promoted by the National Security Agency that had a back door for law enforcement access.

She said she thought it was a bad idea that instead of saying "Intel inside," it would be U.S. government inside. She said "it didn't work them and shouldn't work today."

She said it was just unacceptable for any company to be asked by the government for an encryption back door, and that a global alliance should be able to come out against any such government demands.

Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and a couple other Democrats called of an immediate vote on the Save the Internet Act, the bill that would reclassify internet access as a telecom service subject to common carrier regulation and reinstate the net neutrality rules eliminated by the FCC under chairman Ajit Pai as well as the general conduct standard to get at future conduct unbecoming an open internet but not falling under those rules.  

That came in floor speeches Tuesday (Dec. 10) to mark the second anniversary of Pai's deregulatory Restoring Internet Order. 

While the Save the Internet Act passed the Democratically controlled House last April Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has declined to schedule a vote in the Senate, and is unlikely to do so at the urging of Markey or fellow Dems Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.). 

The same three Senators made a similar Senate floor stand back in June to mark the one-year anniversary of the Restoring Internet Freedom (RIF) order's effective date.  

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee, wants to get a better handle on the Federal Trade Commission's July settlement with Facebook. 

She asked for that info in a letter Thursday (Oct. 10) to FTC Chairman Joseph Simons. 

“I am concerned that the settlement lets Facebook off the hook for unspecified violations, and given the many public reports of Facebook’s mishandling of consumer data, it is difficult to fully understand the impact of this provision of the settlement on the data privacy protection of the millions of U.S. consumers that have used and continue to use Facebook,” Sen. Cantwell wrote, according to a copy obtained by Multichannel News. 

Critics of the settlement, including Cantwell, are concerned it absolves the company of liability for past conduct that might not have yet been uncovered.  

Related: State AGs Investigating Facebook 

Cantwell wants information on "how [the FTC] conducted its investigation of Facebook, including the impact of Facebook’s release from liability, the impact that release has on future Commission actions, and whether the settlement really provides any true independent oversight of Facebook." 

FTC Chairman Joseph Simons has said in defense of the deal that the FTC's $5 billion settlement with Facebook was the best deal it could get with limited authority, and called on Congress to pass comprehensive privacy legislation. 

Simons said he was faced with two choices, get an "excellent" settlement, as he suggested this was, or face years of litigation that would likely achieve "far less" relief than the FTC got, which he took pains to outline. 

He called the settlement the only "real world" choice the agency had, and an "excellent" job. Simons pointed out that the $5 billion was more than 20 times that of the toughest European settlement under its GDPR privacy regime, and 200 times the previous record for a U.S. settlement. He also said it represented 9% of 2018 revenue, and 23% of 2018 profit. 

He also said the decision was laying down a marker for others dealing with consumer privacy, saying it "resets the baseline for privacy cases."