On November 18, the House Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Communications and Technology will convene to markup a couple of dozen bills aimed at addressing delays in broadband infrastructure deployment projects winning permits. Subcommittee Chairman Richard Hudson (R-NC-09) said back in September. "Unless we streamline the permitting process, all of the money we have dedicated to deployment will be tied up in burdensome reviews resulting in more unnecessary delays, forcing millions of Americans to continue to wait for connectivity." Here we offer a brief look at the bills under consideration at the markup. 

AT&T CEO John Stankey wasn’t kidding when he said AT&T would use the 3.45 GHz spectrum from EchoStar to cover nearly two-thirds of the U.S. population by mid-November. The operator announced it rolled out the 3.45 GHz spectrum to nearly 23,000 cell sites in a matter of a few weeks—a record-fast deployment for AT&T. The announcement comes before the exchange of spectrum from EchoStar to AT&T has been officially approved by regulators. Thanks to a short-term spectrum management lease, AT&T is able to deploy this spectrum well before that deal is expected to close in 2026. AT&T and Dish Network, now a subsidiary of EchoStar, were the top two bidders in the 3.45 GHz auction in 2021. But EchoStar never deployed its 3.45 GHz spectrum, likely easing the transition for AT&T.

On November 17, 2025, NetChoice filed a lawsuit against Virginia in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia to stop SB 854. This new law, set to go into effect on January 1, 2026, bars Virginians’ access to valuable, lawful speech simply because it happens online. Citizens will have to hand over their sensitive documentation to access digital services. It also imposes a one-hour, government-mandated time limit on “social media” use. Specifically targeting “social media” means that if you wanted to watch a documentary or discuss current political issues on those services for more than an hour, you would be forced to stop watching or discussing and pick it up tomorrow, just because the government says so. Such a restriction is no different than a law that curbs the time spent reading books, watching documentaries on TV or even having in-person conversations, and it violates the First Amendment.

The volatile combination of kids and chatbots has already started to galvanize lawmakers and advocates. Worried that beguiling AI “companions” could push impressionable youth to harm themselves or withdraw from human relationships, they’re racing to put guardrails around the nascent industry. But that could be a far deeper problem—and far harder to solve—than the current bills envision. The bills largely concern “chatbots,” like ChatGPT or Character.ai. But AI is being integrated into more products than just chat platforms—such as dolls, stuffed animals and other toys. In an unsettling report published last week, the U.S. Public Interest Research Group Education Fund—which has been testing toys for hazards since the 1980s—found that some AI toys exhibit disturbing behaviors. A teddy bear engaged in sexually explicit conversations about kinks with one of PIRG’s product testers. A toy robot provided instructions on how to obtain matches and plastic bags, and another discussed the glory of dying in battle in Norse mythology. As lawmakers draft rules to prevent companion chatbots from traumatizing kids, AI toys are starting to look like a dangerous policy gap into which millions of kids could fall.

The early rise of the internet is usually told as an extension of globalization. New networking technology made instantaneous communication possible, complementing and accelerating international commerce and cultural exchange. As in the rest of the world economy, the U.S. was unusually influential online, exporting not just technology but culture and political norms with it. The alternative story of the rise of the internet was exemplified by China, which limited the reach of western tech companies, maintained strict control over its domestic networks, and started building a parallel internet-centric economy of its own. And contra western reporting suggesting that this was purely an exercise in isolationism and control, in 2025, the international influence of the Chinese internet and tech companies—as evidenced by the growth and semi-seizure of TikTok—is enormous. In that context—and the context of America’s renewed trade war—it shouldn’t be surprising that more countries are taking a second look at digital sovereignty and that the global internet as we knew it is pulling apart.