Makena Kelly

Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) took to the floor of the Senate in an attempt to force a vote on a bill to reinstate net neutrality on the one-year anniversary of its reversal. “Under Sen. McConnell’s leadership, the Republicans are trying to bury this bill in a legislative graveyard,” Sen Markey said, referring to the Save the Internet Act passed by the House in April. Sens. Ron Wyden (D-OR), Ed Markey (D-MA), and Maria Cantwell (D-WA) noted that the Senate approved a measure nearly identical to the one in the House in 2018. 

Rep. Mike Coffman (R-CO) introduced a bill that would codify network neutrality regulations into law. Titled The 21st Century Internet Act, the measure would institute the basic outlines of the Federal Communication Commission’s 2015 Open Internet order, which banned the throttling and blocking of content as well as harmful paid prioritization practices.

By the end August 2023, adult content will get a lot harder to watch in Texas. Instead of clicking a button or entering a date of birth to access adult sites, users will need to provide photos of their official government-issued ID or use a third-party service to verify their age. It’s the result of a new law passed earlier in summer 2023 intended to prevent kids from seeing adult content online.

Nearly 500 days had passed since President Joe Biden first picked Gigi Sohn [Senior Fellow and Public Advocate at the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society] to become the third Democrat to the nation’s top telecommunications regulator, and she was nowhere closer to confirmation than when her name was first announced in October 2021.

Shortly after coming into office, President Joe Biden moved to restore net neutrality.

The bipartisan infrastructure bill contains billions to expand high-speed broadband across the country, aiming to close the digital divide over the next 10 years. But the Biden administration’s $65 billion down payment on broadband can only help connect families who can afford a computer. So President Biden’s latest version of the Build Back Better program goes further, allocating new funds to bring federally funded desktops, laptops, and tablets to low-income Americans.

Sen Ron Wyden (D-OR) is calling on the Treasury Department to fund broadband projects in communities without access to 100Mbps upload and download speeds with the money allocated by the American Rescue Plan earlier in 2021. The plan’s language suggests funding can only go to “unserved” or “underserved” communities.

The Biden administration’s ambitious infrastructure proposal, the American Jobs Plan, includes $100 billion in broadband funding, with the goal of connecting every American to high-speed broadband by the end of the decade. But with Senate Republicans set to dramatically cut total investment in their counter-proposal, the future of the package is unclear.

Rep Jamaal Bowman’s (D-NY) “Broadband Justice Act,” co-sponsored by Housing Subcommittee Chairman Rep Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO), would require the Housing and Urban Development Department, along with the Treasury and US Dept of Agriculture, to update its utility allowance definitions to include broadband so it can be subsidized for families living in government-assisted housing. Other utilities like gas and electricity are already subsidized in this way.

A new bill to bring back net neutrality is on its way, spearheaded by Sen Ed Markey (D-MA), one of the open internet’s most fervent advocates. If a legislative solution isn’t viable, Democrats are preparing to pressure the Federal Communications Commission to take measures into its own hands (again).