Commissioner Carr Statement on 2019 Broadband Deployment Report

This year’s Section 706 report contains more good news for American leadership in 5G. The FCC’s policies are working. Internet speeds in the U.S. have never been faster: they’re up nearly 40%. The digital divide— the percentage of Americans without access to high-speed Internet access—narrowed by nearly 20%. Providers built fiber broadband out to more homes last year than ever before. The U.S. now has the largest commercial deployment of 5G in the world, and we’re predicted to have more than two times the percentage of 5G connections as Asia. That is more broadband for more Americans. None of this is to say that our job at the FCC is done. As the Report makes clear, far too many Americans remain unable to access high-speed broadband, and we have much more work left to do. But the question Congress set out in Section 706 is “whether advanced telecommunications capability is being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion.” The data show that it is.