Reps Zach Nunn (R-IA), Gabe Vasquez (D-NM) and Eric Sorensen (D-IL) introduced the ReConnecting Rural America Act, bipartisan legislation that would permanently authorize and improve the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) ReConnect Program, which delivers broadband internet to underserved rural communities. The ReConnecting Rural America Act would codify and enhance the ReConnect Program within the Rural Electrification Act, establishing stronger minimum broadband speeds and ensuring federal support reaches the communities most in need of internet service upgrades. It addresses the disparities in internet connection by:

• Authorizing $650 million annually through 2030 for broadband deployment in unserved and underserved rural areas,
• Requiring a minimum broadband speed of 100 Mbps upload and 100 Mbps download,
• Focusing funding on areas where at least 75% of households lack access to 100/20 Mbps service,
• Allowing USDA to offer a mix of loans, grants, and loan/grant combinations,
• Prioritizing small, remote, and underserved rural communities, and
• Providing up to 100% grant funding for tribal areas, colonias, and other socially vulnerable or persistently poor communities.

The bill also supports broadband deployment for precision agriculture on cropland and ranchland and ensures participating providers join affordability programs like Lifeline or the Affordable Connectivity Program.

SEMO Electric Cooperative, through its subsidiary GoSEMO Fiber, provides high-speed internet service to over 10,000 subscribers in rural Missouri. In this open letter, SEMO urges members of the Missouri congressional delegation to support the state’s approach to expanding fiber through the the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program. Fiber, SEMO says, is essential infrastructure for Missouri to recover from tornadoes, storms, and other disasters. "The recent series of tornadoes and wind storms, with damages to date well into the millions of dollars, have made for a long, tough spring. These storms make one thing abundantly clear…the importance of fiber broadband infrastructure in rural areas! Our ability as a utility to communicate, mobilize resources, and help in restoring things back to as normal as possible was because of this very key infrastructure that is fortunately in place in our area."

The Minnesota Senate passed legislation authored by Senator Rob Kupec (DFL-Moorhead), which will help accelerate broadband installation while upholding strong labor and safety standards. The bill passed in a unanimous vote of 64–0 . The bipartisan legislation, SF 908, will require any workers installing underground broadband in Minnesota to have a broadband safety certification beginning on January 1, 2026. The bill also removes the requirement to have at least 2 workers on site for an installation, while leaving requirements that any worker performing specific tasks have the necessary certification. The bill also allows broadband training providers to provide credit toward certification for workers if their past coursework happened within two years of the upcoming January 1, 2026 deadline. 

The final nail in Culpeper County’s (VA) broadband project has been struck. All Points Broadband recently emailed customers who had pre-registered for the project to tell them it wouldn’t be happening, placing the blame solely on Culpeper County. The county partnered with APB in 2020 to use Virginia Telecommunications Initiative funding, applied for and awarded through the Department of Housing and Community Development, to bring high-speed broadband internet service to approximately 4,300 unserved homes through the construction of 536 miles of fiber. The project was supposed to be completed by Feb 28, 2024, but the county requested that the state extend the grant funding and timeline, creating a new completion date of Feb 28, 2025. As of the end of February, only one home had been connected to the service. According to county officials, due to APB’s failure to perform, the contract for grant funds with the state expired, and it was determined that the county must terminate its contracts with APB in early March.

Key Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee say there’s been headway in recent weeks on reaching an agreement to auction off wireless spectrum, expressing renewed hopes for attaching a telecommunications deal to the party’s massive bill to enact swaths of President Donald Trump’s domestic agenda. “There’s progress, we’re almost there,” said Senate Armed Services Chair Roger Wicker (R-MS). “We’re at a place where almost everyone is comfortable.” Reauthorizing the lapsed spectrum auction authority of the Federal Communications Commission and facilitating the direct the sale of airwaves to the private sector could net tens of billions of dollars in revenue—an attractive offset for the party-line legislative package. The plan has run into obstacles, however, with allies of the Pentagon worrying about protecting the military’s vast store of spectrum, which the Pentagon uses for technology like radar.

An ostensible goal of the Trump administration is to use the threat of tariffs to encourage companies to build their products in the US. Some companies in the telecommunications industry have said they do plan to expand their US-based operations. But others aren't so sure. "Our ODMs [original design manufacturers] do not have plans to open manufacturing here in the US," said Ed Meyercord, the CEO of Extreme Networks, which sells software and equipment to enterprises for wired and wireless network infrastructure. Other companies have expressed optimism over moving more manufacturing to the US. "We see a lot of interest in that," said Ashish Chand, CEO of Belden, a global manufacturer and supplier of networking, connectivity, and cabling products. Of course, an emphasis on US-based manufacturing is nothing new. President Trump made it a central theme of his first administration, as did President Biden after him. But President Trump's new tariffs during his second term have reignited such discussions, in part because they're a bit of a moving target.

My colleague Mark Jamison recently observed that “[f]or decades, well-functioning independent regulatory agencies have been a stabilizing force.” Though primarily addressing the Federal Trade Commission following President Donald Trump’s firing of two Democratic commissioners, Jamison highlights four “core principles of stability, predictability, legitimacy, and credibility” for the FTC’s success that also could apply to another independent agency, the Federal Communications Commission. Unfortunately, the predictability that exists at the FCC under Republican Chairman Brendan Carr’s leadership is that most Democrats (and some Republicans) will view many of its prominent investigations––ones into programming on CBS, ABC, and NBC, a news story on KCBS radio, and underwriting announcements on NPR and PBS––as blatantly partisan efforts to aid Trump and attack press freedom. This perception erodes the FCC’s legitimacy and credibility. When President Trump elevated Carr as chair, the new Chairman said he looked “forward to collaborating with the Trump Administration.” Carr is taking collaboration to a hand-in-glove level that’s eroding the credibility of––in Carr-like parlance––“the Trump FCC” while shredding any semblance of independence.