Government & Communications

A group of 19 Democratic Sens wrote to national security adviser John Bolton urging him to reconsider the move to elminate a top cybersecurity position at the White House, calling it a “step in the wrong direction” and worrying that it would “lead to a lack of unified focus against cyber threats.” The role of White House cybersecurity coordinator was established under the Obama administration to coordinate cybersecurity policymaking efforts across the federal government.

President Donald Trump is continuing to react to the controversy over the cancellation of “Roseanne,” which was taken off the air May 29 after lead actress Roseanne Barr posted offensive and racist tweets. President Trump on May 31 repeated his complaint that Disney chief Bob Iger has not apologized to him for anti-Trump comments made by ABC personalities, something he believes is a double standard since Iger got in touch with Valerie Jarrett, the former top aide to President Barack Obama who was the target of Barr’s racist comments.

The US Digital Service emerged from the technological and political meltdown of the 2013 launch of healthcare.gov. After a squad of Silicon Valley techies descended to fix the site, President Barack Obama created USDS to get tech workers helping other parts of government. Under President Obama, the group’s missions included speeding immigration processes, and expediting the acceptance of refugees. Under President Donald Trump, the unit’s current leader, Matt Cutts, admits that he’s less likely to highlight those projects.

From Washington to Texas to California, politicians are road-testing their political messaging strategies, searching for the best way to reach voters in ways that often bypass the traditional media gatekeepers. These media methods have obvious appeal: Politicians can appear accessible but remain insulated from the press. They are also not altogether new. President Donald Trump eschewed traditional television advertising during the 2016 campaign and can now overshadow even his own party’s message at the drop of a tweet. And many politicians have long made a practice of ducking reporters.

Congress recognized the deficiencies of the current broadband data collection process when it directed National Telecommunications and Information Administration to update the national broadband availability map. Congress asked us to acquire third-party datasets to augment the information that is already available, in order to more accurately identify regions with insufficient capacity.

Surveillance systems that track the locations of cellphone users and spy on their calls, texts and data streams are being turned against Americans as they roam the country and the world, security experts and US officials say.  Federal officials acknowledged the privacy risk to Americans in a previously undisclosed letter from the Department of Homeland Security to Sen Ron Wyden (D-OR), saying they had received reports that "nefarious actors may have exploited" global cellular networks "to target the communications of American citizens." The letter, dated May 22, described surveillance syste

A minimum of 21 journalists worldwide were imprisoned on charges connected to "fake news" in 2017, according to a new report from the Committee to Protect Journalists.  The report cites the recent implementation of measures in countries such as Brazil, the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia and Russia aimed at targeting the rise of fake news. Arrests blamed on fake news reportedly more than doubled from 2016.

President Donald Trump promoted new, unconfirmed accusations to suit his political narrative: that a “criminal deep state” element within Obama’s government planted a spy deep inside his presidential campaign to help his rival, Hillary Clinton, win — a scheme he branded “Spygate.” It was the latest indication that a president who has for decades trafficked in conspiracy theories has brought them from the fringes of public discourse to the Oval Office. Now that he is president, Trump’s baseless stories of secret plots by powerful interests appear to be having a distinct effect.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders has held briefings less frequently than her two predecessors, her briefings have been shorter, and she has been more likely to fill up time with guests who can’t speak to what the White House is doing. Between January 2016 and Jan. 20, 2017, President Barack Obama's press secretary Josh Earnest spent 11,800 minutes briefing the media, with his deputies adding another 906 minutes. Since late last July, about 10 months, Sanders has spent 2,800 minutes briefing the media, only about four more hours than Sean Spicer spent during his tenure in the White House.

Sens Roger Wicker (R-MS), Maggie Hassan (D-NH), and Jerry Moran (R-KS) introduced the “Mobile Accuracy and Precision Broadband Act” (MAP Broadband Act) (S 2955). If enacted, the bill would help improve the accuracy of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) mobile broadband coverage map and ensure that federal resources are targeted to unserved communities that do not have access to reliable mobile broadband service. The legislation would address problems with the FCC’s Mobility Fund Phase II (MF-II) presumptive eligibility maps.