Government & Communications

I am glad to see Disney find its courage in the face of clear government intimidation. More importantly, I want to thank those Americans from across the ideological spectrum who spoke loudly and courageously against this blatant attempt to silence free speech. It will continue to be up to us as citizens to push back against this Administration’s growing campaign of censorship and control. As this FCC considers steps that would let the same billion-dollar media conglomerates that caved in to government pressure grow even bigger, we must combat these efforts to stifle free expression.

We cannot allow an inexcusable act of political violence to be twisted into a justification for government censorship and control. First, an ABC reporter was told that his coverage amounted to hate speech and that he should be prosecuted simply for doing his job. Then, the FCC threatened to go after this same network, seizing on a late-night comedian’s inopportune joke as a pretext to punish speech it disliked. That led to a shameful show of cowardly corporate capitulation by ABC that has put the foundation of the First Amendment in danger.

Brendan Carr, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, which is the nation’s top watchdog over the broadcast industry, was at the center of a media storm on Sept 17. In an interview on a right-wing podcast, Chairman Carr criticized comments that late night host Jimmy Kimmel had made about the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

President Donald Trump and MAGA spent years lampooning censorship, discrimination against conservatives, and progressive "cancel culture." Now in power—and riding an outpouring of grief and fury over Charlie Kirk's tragic killing—they're enforcing speech codes to punish ideological opponents. Backed by the Trump administration, digital vigilantes are demanding arrests, firings, and deportations for anti-Kirk posts and remarks. Any person who celebrates or mocks Kirk's death—or even criticizes his right-wing views—is being cast as complicit in political violence.

President Donald Trump filed a defamation lawsuit against the New York Times and several of its reporters, accusing the newspaper of libeling him in several articles in the lead-up to last year’s presidential election. In a Truth Social post, President Trump described the 174-year-old newspaper as “one of the worst and most degenerate newspapers in the History of our Country.” “The New York Times has been allowed to freely lie, smear, and defame me for far too long, and that stops, NOW!” he wrote

Since Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick’s arrival at the helm of the Commerce Department, the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program has gotten a bit off track. In recent days, a fact sheet of sorts has been circulated, ostensibly authored by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), claiming to “debunk lies” by “swampy special interests” about BEAD.

President Trump led leaders of the world’s biggest technology companies in a version of his cabinet meetings, in which each participant takes a turn thanking and praising him, this time for his efforts to promote investments in chip manufacturing and artificial intelligence.

If it’s August, it means it’s time for the Foundation for Rural Service (FRS) Congressional Broadband Tour. This annual event brings congressional staff members to different parts of the country to learn about rural broadband and how it is critical for education, health care, economic prosperity and thriving rural communities.

US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled that the Federal Communications Commission must produce more documents related to its communications with Elon Musk's government-slashing Department of Government Efficiency. Public interest group Frequency Forward and journalist Nina Burleigh have sought agency records tied to the work of Musk's DOGE and moved for a preliminary injunction forcing the agency to fully comply with their Freedom of Information Act request.

America has long led the world in innovation, technological advancement, and design.  But with a sprawling ecosystem of digital services offered to Americans, the Government has lagged behind in usability and aesthetics.  There is a high financial cost to maintaining legacy systems, to say nothing of the cost in time lost by the American public trying to navigate them.