Analysis

Congress has expressed a clear desire to reinvigorate the Universal Service Fund (USF) through legislation. The latter half of 2025 is a critical period for determining the future of the USF. There is a demonstrated need for additional cybersecurity investment in K-12 education, and there are several mechanisms policymakers could use to leverage universal service funds for this purpose. However, it will be up to Congress to decide whether security measures should be baked into broadband offerings or bolted on through other funding mechanisms after the fact.

The Trump administration revealed its AI Action Plan in July 2025 with a focus on “global AI dominance” in artificial intelligence. Like so much else in the second Trump administration, AI policy has become an ideologically polarized battleground. This marks a shift from prior administrations, including the first Trump administration, when pairing innovation goals with concerns about AI harm was broadly accepted as a baseline, even if views differed on how to address it.

It seems like there is daily news concerning satellites used for broadband and telecommunications. Starlink experienced a worldwide 2.5-hour network outage on July 23 that was blamed on “key internal software services that operate the core network”. This raises questions about using satellite broadband for mission-critical uses, such as for military field operations. T-Mobile has been plastering the airwaves with ads that tout the ability of T-Mobile customers to use its satellites to send text messages from remote locations.

In July 2025, the White House released Winning the Race, America’s AI Plan, that described the administration’s view of the role that government will have in the future of Artificial Intelligence.

You probably haven’t noticed, but the press is no longer full of articles claiming that Fixed Wireless Access cellular broadband is a poor broadband choice for customers. For several years, there was a constant stream of quotes by executives of big cable companies and telcos saying that FWA was a flash in the pan that was only selling quickly because of low prices. They said that FWA performance was erratic, and cellular carriers didn’t have enough excess capacity to provide a reliable broadband connection.

What is a community anchor institution? The National Telecommunications and Information Administration recently changed its answer to this question.

The Supreme Court recently ruled that the Federal Communications Commission has the authority to operate and fund the Universal Service Fund, overturning rulings by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, which agreed with Consumers’ Research and said that the USF is unconstitutional. This puts the issue back on the table of somehow fixing the USF, which universally is regarded as broken. The current funding mechanism of taxing interstate telephone services is becoming untenable, with the current USF fee set at 36 percent of the applicable revenue source.

Nebraska’s state broadband map—which was carefully designed and included a wealth of local input—received a major jolt with the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s changes to the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program. The map is now inundated with industry data from unlicensed fixed wireless providers. Congress allocated $405 million to Nebraska to bring broadband internet to all unserved and underserved locations in the state.

Broadband is no longer a luxury—it’s essential for economic opportunity, education, and community resilience. The Maine Connectivity Authority is meeting this need by investing in infrastructure through a deeply local, collaborative approach. In June 2025, MCA President Andrew Butcher's 900-mile journey across Maine in a 1984 Westfalia VW van affectionately named “Buttercup” offered more than scenic views—it offered a deep dive into the human side of digital connectivity.

On August 5, the Federal Communications Commission voted to kick off its annual review of the pace and cadence of broadband deployment.