Daily Digest 5/21/2025 (George Robert Wendt Jr)

Benton Institute for Broadband & Society
Table of Contents

Broadband Funding

At least 20 states have reportedly lost digital equity grant funding  |  Read below  |  Chris Teale  |  Route Fifty
FCC Directs USAC to Fully Fund Eligible C1 and C2 E-Rate Requests  |  Read below  |  Public Notice  |  Federal Communications Commission
American Youth Academy Withdraws from Schools and Libraries Cybersecurity Pilot Program  |  Federal Communications Commission
Flawed Federal Programs Maroon Rural Americans in Telehealth Blackouts  |  Read below  |  Sarah Jane Tribble, Holly Hacker  |  Kaiser Family Foundation

Wireless

American Customer Satisfaction Index Telecommunications, Cell Phone, and Smartwatch Study 2025  |  American Customer Satisfaction Index

Cybersecurity

The Atlantic Council: US should rethink current views of Russia’s cyber might  |  nextgov

Oversight

Testimony before the House Appropriations Committee  |  Read below  |  FCC Chairman Brendan Carr  |  Speech  |  Federal Communications Commission

Journalism

Sens Warren, Sanders, Wyden Open Investigation Into Whether Paramount Is Engaging in Bribery With Trump for Approval of $8B Merg  |  US Senate
New media company "ATM" launches to give executives control of their coverage  |  Axios

Platforms/Social Media

Fortnite returns to U.S. iPhones after a protracted legal battle  |  Washington Post
Musk was once a political force on X. Now he’s back to business.  |  Washington Post

A.I.

The NYC Algorithm Deciding Which Families Are Under Watch for Child Abuse  |  Markup, The
Throw the AI Regulations Ban out with the Byrd Bath Water  |  Center for Democracy & Technology
Google Unveils A.I. Chatbot, Signaling a New Era for Search  |  New York Times
Google Takes Aim at AI Firms Challenging Its Search Dominance  |  Wall Street Journal
Googling is getting more complicated with the arrival of a new AI Mode  |  Washington Post
Will Writing Survive A.I.? This Media Company Is Betting on It.  |  New York Times

Budget

Estimated Budgetary Effects of the Reconciliation Bill  |  Congressional Budget Office
Potential Statutory Pay-As-You-Go Effects of the Reconciliation Bill  |  Congressional Budget Office
Preliminary Analysis of the Distributional Effects of the 2025 Reconciliation Bill  |  Congressional Budget Office
Throw the AI Regulations Ban out with the Byrd Bath Water  |  Center for Democracy & Technology

Accessibility

FCC Seeks Comment on TRS-Supported Captioner ClearCaptions Petitions for Waiver  |  Federal Communications Commission

Labor

FCC Chairman celebrates court loss in case over broadcast workforce diversity rule  |  Ars Technica
Commissioner Gomez on 5th Circuit Finding FCC Lacks Authority on Hiring Practices  |  Federal Communications Commission

Elections & Media

Elon Musk Says He's Cutting Back Political Spending  |  Wall Street Journal
Meta to start removing expired ads from political ad archive  |  Axios

Advertising

T-Mobile to Appeal BBB National Programs’ NAD Decision on Verizon Challenge  |  telecompetitor

Stories From Abroad

The Tech Industry Is Huge—and Europe’s Share of It Is Very Small  |  Wall Street Journal
Today's Top Stories

At least 20 states have reportedly lost digital equity grant funding

Chris Teale  |  Route Fifty

Within days of President Donald Trump announcing on social media that he was ending the federal digital equity grant program, it looks to be consigned to history. All information about the program, which provides funds to help states close the digital divide by building residents’ digital literacy, improving the online accessibility of social services and letting rural communities measure their needs, has disappeared from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s website. Meanwhile, states are starting to see their funding cut off. The State Educational Technology Directors Association said at least 20 have seen planning and capacity grant funding pulled by NTIA in light of the president’s order. The future of states’ digital equity efforts looks murky at best. Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), the architect of the Digital Equity Act, wants her colleagues to step up, or else legal action could ensue. “All this will take is for Republicans to join us and speak up for their states,” she said. “All 50 states put together a plan and asked for the resources, and I cannot believe there aren't Republican governors out there that are going to join with us to fight back on this. That's one way to do this, and the other way is through the courts, and I'm sure that that will happen as well.”

FCC Directs USAC to Fully Fund Eligible C1 and C2 E-Rate Requests

Public Notice  |  Federal Communications Commission

The Federal Communications Commission's Wireline Competition Bureau (Bureau) announced that there is sufficient funding available to fully meet the Universal Service Administrative Company’s (USAC) estimated demand for category one and category two requests for E-Rate-supported services for funding year 2025. On March 27, 2025, USAC submitted a demand estimate for the E-Rate program for funding year 2025.  USAC estimates the total demand for funding year 2025 will be $3.225 billion, which includes estimated demand for category one services of $1.806 billion, and of $1.418 billion for category two services. The Bureau announced that the E-Rate program inflation-based cap for funding year 2025 is $5.059 billion.  Additionally, as of March 31, 2025, USAC projects that $500 million in unused funds from prior funding years is available for use in E-Rate funding year 2024.5

Flawed Federal Programs Maroon Rural Americans in Telehealth Blackouts

Sarah Jane Tribble, Holly Hacker  |  Kaiser Family Foundation

Years of Republican and Democratic administrations have tried to fix the nation’s broadband woes, through flawed attempts. Bad mapping, weak standards, and flimsy oversight have left nearly 3 million rural Americans in dead zones, with eroded health care services and where telehealth doesn’t reach. Blair Levin, a former executive director of the Federal Communications Commission’s National Broadband Plan, called one rural program rollout during the first Trump administration “a disaster.” It was launched before it was ready, he said, using unreliable federal maps and a reverse-auction process to select internet carriers. Locations went to the lowest bidder, but the agency failed to ensure winners had the knowledge and resources to build networks, said Levin. The fund initially announced awards of $9.2 billion to build infrastructure in 49 states. By 2025, $3.3 billion of those awards were in default and, as a result, the program won’t connect 1.9 million homes and businesses, according to a recent study. A $42 billion Biden-era initiative still may not help households shortchanged by earlier federal broadband grants. The new wave of funding, the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment Program, or BEAD, has an anti-waste provision and won’t provide service in places where previous grants were awarded, even if companies haven’t delivered on their commitments.

Testimony before the House Appropriations Committee

FCC Chairman Brendan Carr  |  Speech  |  Federal Communications Commission

It has been a particularly busy time at the Federal Communications Commission since Inauguration Day, when President Trump designated me as Chairman of the agency.  We have hit the ground running, and I’d like to highlight some of the Commission’s critical work under my leadership thus far:

  • To start, we have already taken steps to unleash new high-speed infrastructure builds.  We have done so by making it easier for providers to retire aging, copper-line networks and invest resources into fast, modern ones instead. 
  • The FCC has taken steps to restore America’s leadership in wireless and free up more spectrum up for consumer use. We launched a new proceeding that looks at freeing up a large swath of prime, mid-band spectrum in the C-Band and started a proceeding to explore new and creative ways that we could allow more intensive use of spectrum in the 37 GHz band. We also kicked off the process of auctioning AWS-3 licenses after Congress authorized the FCC to conduct the auction
  • The FCC has focused on boosting America’s space economy. We streamlined the FCC approval process for earth station siting requests to reduce burdens on satellite companies and ensure the agency can move faster as more of these requests come in.
  • The FCC launched [sic] a massive deregulatory effort titled, “In Re: Delete, Delete, Delete.”  Right now, the FCC is doing a top to bottom review of every rule, regulation, and guidance document for the purpose of eliminating unnecessary regulatory burdens.    
  • The FCC has expanded its work to combat illegal robocalls and bolster our call blocking rules.
  • The FCC is also taking steps to enhance our national security and public safety. I created a new Council on National Security within the FCC to leverage all of the agency’s authorities and relevant work streams to counter the threats posed by foreign adversaries.  

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Benton (www.benton.org) provides the only free, reliable, and non-partisan daily digest that curates and distributes news related to universal broadband, while connecting communications, democracy, and public interest issues. Posted Monday through Friday, this service provides updates on important industry developments, policy issues, and other related news events. While the summaries are factually accurate, their sometimes informal tone may not always represent the tone of the original articles. Headlines are compiled by Kevin Taglang (headlines AT benton DOT org), Grace Tepper (grace AT benton DOT org), and Zoe Walker (zwalker AT benton DOT org) — we welcome your comments.


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