Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act

I’ve been saying for the last few years that the hardest job in the industry has been the folks who head State Broadband Offices. A lot of the hard work these folks did over the last three years was erased when the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) first eliminated the Digital Equity grants and then recently eviscerated the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program grants. What is probably the most disturbing about the sudden change in the rules is that BEAD was finally working.

The Trump administration has released new rules for distributing $42.5 billion in the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program, easing restrictions on Starlink and other satellite providers competing for support under the program. The Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) said June 6 it will now apply a technology-neutral approach in awarding subgrants under BEAD.

Although the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) was intended to ensure that broadband was available to low-income households, logic should also dictate that free broadband would increase broadband adoption (i.e., bring in new broadband users). Using (one-year) data on adoption from the annual American Community Survey (“ACS”) in years 2019 (before the ACP and its predecessor the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program starting in 2021, or “EBB”) and 2023, I estimate by regression the number of new broadband connections per ACP subscription. Should adoption subsidies be abandoned?

As state and local governments and their partners plan to invest billions of dollars in federal funding to build broadband infrastructure, choosing the best technology will have significant long-term implications. Federal policymakers have addressed this subject to some degree: For example, the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program’s notice of funding opportunity (NOFO) preferences fiber over fixed wireless.

A group of representatives from Illinois, led by Sen Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), wrote to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick regarding the termination of the Digital Equity Act. The group objected to the cancellation of the funding and urged Secretary Lutnick to reinstate the funding immediately. "Congress recognized that broadband access and digital literacy are increasingly critical for employment, education, healthcare and participation in the broader economy.

SpaceX’s low-Earth orbit satellite provider Starlink is making inroads in the U.S. broadband market and trying to attract more subscribers by offering free equipment to new customers in states where it says it has excess capacity. Ookla Speedtest data on Starlink indicates that the satellite company’s network performance has been on the uptick over the past couple of years and as of Q1 2025, 17.42 percent of U.S.

Figuring out how to provide high-speed internet to all Americans has been an important public-policy goal for decades. As the coronavirus pandemic made painfully clear, broadband is crucial to full participation in society.

County officials understand better than anybody that better broadband is economic development. They understand that fiber means people will have enough upload speeds to work from home and how higher-paying jobs uplift a local economy. They were looking at the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program as a tool that would bolster the future of their County. The most disheartening thing about the National Telecommunications and Information Administration Notice is seeing all of the effort local folks have made to get better broadband fall by the wayside.

Sen Jacky Rosen (D-NV) said she plans to slow-walk Commerce Department nominees that oversee broadband in response to the agency rescinding approval of her state’s $416 million broadband expansion plan. The Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration under Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick released its revised rules for the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program.

The deed is done. NTIA has officially rewritten the rules of the $42.5 billion Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program, essentially forcing states back to square one on their plans to address the digital divide. As anticipated, the new notice of funding opportunity nixed the BEAD preference for end-to-end fiber.