Donald Trump’s most clearly articulated economic plan is that he intends to impose a lot of tariffs on foreign-made goods entering the U.S. We can also speculate that he won’t allow tax breaks given in 2018 to lapse as they’re scheduled to do, and that Republicans will probably address taxes as one of the first items on their agenda. The effect of these policies on the telecommunications sector will be a mixed bag. Grant Spellmeyer, CEO of the trade group ACA Connects, predicts that the new administration will immediately put a big focus on taxes, and a lot could change besides just extending previous tax cuts. The Wall Street Journal did an analysis, saying that less tax funds would result in a higher federal deficit and put upward pressure on interest rates. And as we’ve seen over the last couple of years when the Federal Reserve has increased interest rates, that’s difficult for companies that are carrying debt or that want to engage in mergers and acquisitions. Dish Network, for example, has almost crumbled under the weight of its high interest debt. And the higher cost of capital also crimped some capital investment and merger and acquisition activity in the telecommunications sector as companies wait for rates to go down.

It's very likely that the incoming Trump administration will smile on satellite Internet companies such as SpaceX's Starlink and Amazon's Project Kuiper. And that could have serious implications for fiber vendors like Calix and Corning, as well as fiber network operators like AT&T, Brightspeed, Altice, Windstream and others. The Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program is designed to funnel $42.45 billion through US states for broadband networks in rural areas. Although satellite and fixed wireless companies may be eligible for some of the funding, Biden administration rules likely would funnel the bulk of BEAD to fiber operators and their vendors. However, states have not yet begun issuing grants through the program, and a Trump administration may be able to affect the distribution of those state-level funds."If Trump wins, the BEAD program is likely to see a delay in spending (relative to a Harris win) and a reduction in expenditure for fiber (relative to a Harris win)," summarized Blair Levin, a policy adviser to New Street Research and a former high-level Federal Communications Commission official.

Even before Donald Trump was re-elected, his best-known backer, Elon Musk, had come to him with a request for his presidential transition. He wanted Trump to hire some employees from Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX, as top government officials — including at the Defense Department. That request, which would seed SpaceX employees into an agency that is one of its biggest customers, is a sign of the benefits that Mr. Musk may reap after investing more than $100 million in Trump’s campaign, pushing out a near-constant stream of pro-Trump material on his social media platform, X, and making public appearances on the candidate’s behalf across the hard-fought state of Pennsylvania. In addition, Musk's allies in Congress and at the Federal Communications Commission have already challenged a decision by the commission to revoke a plan to offer SpaceX an $856 million subsidy to provide broadband internet service in rural parts of the United States. The effort was led in part by FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr. He has championed Mr. Musk and SpaceX on his social media feed in recent months, even intervening in Musk’s battle with the government of Brazil over X, even though the social media company is not in Carr’s purview. (Starlink, which was caught up in the dispute, is.) House Republicans recently started an investigation into the FCC’s position on the rural internet request, suggesting that the agency’s decision might be reconsidered if Republicans take control of the commission, as is likely once Trump is sworn in.

Of all the groups celebrating Donald Trump’s reelection, maybe no one has more of a reason to celebrate than his boosters in the tech world. Given the key role Elon Musk played in bringing Trump back to office, the newly vocal Silicon Valley right expects a bonanza of industry and “innovation”-friendly de-regulation — and they are celebrating it, very publicly.  Behind the chest-thumping is a real, if not yet completely defined, new style of Republican politics emphasizing state capacity, industrial policy, and closer ties between Silicon Valley and the federal government. Now, the question is: What do Trump’s tech backers actually get for their support?  If you want a laundry list of asks, you can look at the VC giant Andreessen Horowitz’s “American Dynamism” project, which emphasizes a mixture of deregulation and public-private partnerships in fields like defense and education. The “let’s build” crew emphasizes onshoring industrial production, building massive fleets of military drones and getting humanity a foothold in space, all with a laser focus on getting bureaucrats out of the way and letting tech wizards work their magic.

When it comes to tech policy, the next Congress has a seemingly endless to-do list. It includes hashing out a deal on an elusive federal privacy law, coalescing on how to address booming products driven by artificial intelligence and countering harms on social media. With Republicans retaking the Senate and seemingly on track to retain the House, the party may largely be able to set the tone in those legislative negotiations. Here’s what that could look like: 

• An early leg up in the artificial intelligence debate: Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY)  kicked off a process to educate senators about AI tools and begin sketching out a regulatory approach while House lawmakers launched a new bipartisan task force to craft recommendations on the issue. But neither has translated into any significant new laws, leaving much unfinished work for Congress. Joel Thayer, president of the Digital Progress Institute nonprofit, said Republicans will probably push for more “pro-market” AI proposals that emphasize countering Chinese technologies.
• A reset on child online safety: After the Senate overwhelmingly passed a pair of measures to expand privacy and safety protections for children online, House lawmakers are expected to make an end-of-year push to get the bill over the finish line in the lower chamber. But their odds for success are steep given that House Republican leadership has opposed the Senate proposals.
• A more united front on privacy: When Democrats controlled both chambers last Congress, they got closer than ever to advancing a bipartisan data-privacy deal in the House. Now Republicans may get their first major chance to pass such a law without divided rule.

Mercury Broadband filed letters notifying the Federal Communications Commission that the company is returning census block groups (CBGs) awarded funding in Kansas, Illinois, Michigan, and Indiana. Mercury said deployment costs have increased dramatically since Mercury made its bids in the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund auction and factors outside of its control, including rising costs and competitive encroachment, have rendered deployment to many of these RDOF CBGs economically unviable and ultimately unachievable.

Rise Broadband announced it has acquired MidAtlantic Broadband’s 100% fiber-to-the-home broadband/internet business in Missouri. Operating under the Yondoo Broadband brand, MidAtlantic Broadband’s business in Missouri adds almost 10,000 residential and commercial locations across eight markets in the eastern part of the State. With this acquisition, Rise Broadband will now provide service in the cities of Kahoka, Canton, La Grange, Bowling Green, Elsberry, Potosi, Belle, and Bland in Missouri. 100% of homes passed are serviceable with fiber-optic service. 

The fixed wireless access (FWA) market has largely matured, and it's no longer offering many surprises. As a result, the pressure the technology has put on the cable industry appears to be easing. "We now have better insights into FWA collectively," wrote the financial analysts at New Street Research. The analysts now expect T-Mobile to gain around 1.45 million fixed wireless customers next year. Verizon ought to come in second with 1.3 million, and AT&T should gain around 550,000 fixed wireless customers during the course of 2025. The analysts continued: "This is a big deal for cable. We have been expecting slower growth from T-Mobile and Verizon, but we didn't know what AT&T could ramp to. With better insight into AT&T, we now know that we are past the peak." Others have reached similar conclusions. "The impact of FWA will linger but has likely peaked," wrote the financial analysts at MoffettNathanson.