President Trump Wants to Keep America Digitally Divided

Gigi Sohn, executive director of the American Association for Public Broadband, says that Trump’s reversal of the Digital Equity Act will result in more Americans being unable to access the Internet due to lack of resources or skills. “We will continue to have a massive digital divide in this country,” said Sohn. “There are millions of people in this country who do not know how to turn on a computer, that don’t know how to use a search engine, that don’t know how to use a web-browser.” Jessica Rosenworcel, the former chair of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) under President Joe Biden, estimated in 2024 that “nearly twenty-four million Americans are not connected to the Internet, including 28 percent of Americans living in rural areas and more than 23 percent of people on tribal lands.” The lack of comprehensive access, she said, “means millions of people still do not have the broadband they need to fully participate in modern life.” What’s more, many of those who will be negatively impacted from the potential loss of funding are Trump’s own supporters, who are highly concentrated in rural areas where broadband connectivity is still prevalent. Any attack on programs funded under the Digital Equity Act will also result in the loss of jobs including those of people Sohn calls “first-line sufferers” who teach others how to get online, often through non-governmental organizations or local offices of the nonprofit fundraising organization United Way. “We call them ‘digital inclusion’ organizations or ‘digital equity’ organizations,” she says. “There are thousands of people across the country whose job it is to get people online.”