Jeffrey Eisenach’s thinking takes on a new importance as he helps shape Trump's telecom policy

We're learning more about Jeffrey Eisenach, the Trump transition team's point man on telecommunications. In 2014 he co-authored a pitch for Congress to curtail much of the Federal Communications Commission's jurisdiction and responsibilities. Submitted as part of comments to the House communications subcommittee's work on updating the Communications Act, Eisenach and colleagues at the American Enterprise Institute argue that much of the agency's current function is duplicative of agencies like the Federal Trade Commission and National Telecommunications and Information Administration. "Congress should rationalize the commission, apportioning the majority of its functions and resources to its sister agencies. In particular, Congress should consider merging the FCC's competition and consumer protection functions with those of the [FTC] thus combining the FCC's industry expertise and capabilities with the generic statutory authority of the FTC," they write.

Eisenach's thinking takes on a new importance as he helps shape Trump's telecom policy and who will carry it out. He declined to elaborate on the 2014 comments, but the full filing is worth a read. While the authors say they don't want to eliminate "important functions" that the FCC should play in the communications world, those responsibilities "would be preserved under the auspices of a new agency with limited jurisdiction and discretion."