Sen Wicker Calls for Oversight Review on COVID-19 Broadband Spending

Sen Roger Wicker (R-MS) urged the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee (PRAC) to conduct an oversight review into pandemic-related spending to ensure broadband funds were used appropriately for assisting unserved communities and those economically affected by the pandemic. In response to the need for broadband amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Congress created multiple broadband accessibility programs that allocated billions of dollars to assist Americans in their participation in remote activities. The CARES Act created the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee (PRAC), within the Council of Inspectors General, to coordinate independent pandemic-related oversight. Sen Wicker requested that the PRAC "guide the independent Inspector General reviews necessary to ensure the federal funds allocated for broadband deployment are spent as Congress intended." Specifically, Wicker asks that the PRAC collect responses to a variety of questions about the performance of broadband-related agencies and programs. These questions fall under three main objectives: 1) Ensuring that funds serve unserved communities; 2) Preventing waste, fraud, and abuse in the Emergency Broadband Benefit program and its successor, the Affordable Connectivity Program; and 3) explaining to what extent the PRAC is planning to engage with the Federal Communications Commission, Treasury and National Telecommunications and Information Administration on enforcement efforts for noncompliance.