Policymakers

The Federal Communications Commission is renewing the charter of the Advisory Committee on Diversity and Digital Empowerment for a two-year period. The purpose of the Committee is to make recommendations to the FCC on how to empower disadvantaged communities and accelerate the entry of small businesses, including those owned by women and minorities, into the media, digital news and information, and audio and video programming industries, including as owners, suppliers, and employees.

After high-tech phone network outages hit major US cities in 1991, the Federal Communications Commission chartered an advisory group to help the agency troubleshoot emerging technology issues. Yet instead of helping solve problems, this industry-dominated group has at times been a barrier to strengthening the security of America’s communications. 

Two House lawmakers looking to craft a consensus data privacy bill found themselves on opposite sides of an emerging debate: whether legislation should create a new privacy division at the Federal Trade Commission. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), who heads the House Commerce Committee's Consumer Protection Subcommittee, said she’ll pursue that option.

Federal Communications Commissioner Mike O’Rielly’s current term expires in June 2019. Although he can remain seated until the end of 2020, he would need President Donald Trump’s renomination and a Senate confirmation vote to serve beyond then. Commissioner O’Rielly has said he wants another five-year term if possible. “I think he’s outstanding,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX).

Kristine Fargotstein has been named VP, policy and advocacy, for USTelecom-The Broadband Association. Fargotstein comes from the Federal Communications Commission, where most recently she had been detailed to the House Communications Subcommittee to work on broadband infrastructure, network neutrality, and spectrum issues. While at the FCC, Fargotstein's posts included acting wireline advisor to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, special counsel in the Office of General Counsel, legal advisor to the Wireline bureau chief, and attorney advisor in the Wireline Competition Bureau.

I recently traveled to Brussels to see my long-time friends Gerry Salole and Rien van Gendt at the European Foundation Centre. As usual, we spoke about the status of philanthropy in Europe and the United States. A huge topic, indeed.

Pew Charitable Trusts, which has spent more than a year studying Americans’ access to broadband, will soon be launching an online explorer inventorying the data it’s collected — including information on gaps to coverage and the policies state governments are pursuing to fill them.  The explorer will be a searchable catalog of everything from current laws and policies, to information on funding and financing, and will likely launch sometime late this summer, said Kathryn de Wit, manager of the project. “What we know at this point is that different communities can be difficult to connect for

Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang is both of the tech world and one of its harshest critics. Viewed from a great distance, Yang’s candidacy has a lot in common with the two political comets that streaked across the 2016 presidential campaign: Donald Trump on the right and Bernie Sanders on the left. Yang runs essentially the same playbook: embracing economic grievance, hammering the tech giants and other darlings of the ‘new economy,’ selling his case directly to the working American.

A California man was sentenced to more than one and a half years in prison for threatening to kill the family of Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai. On or about Dec 19 and 20, 2017, Markara Man, 33, of Norwalk (CA), sent three emails to Chairman Pai’s email accounts. The first email accused Chairman Pai of being responsible for a child who allegedly had committed suicide because of the repeal of net neutrality regulations. The second email listed three locations in or around Arlington (VA) and threatened to kill the Chairman’s family members.

With few allies left in the West Wing, President Donald  Trump frequently leans on Dan Scavino, his unassuming social media guru (officially: senior adviser for digital strategy), for affirmation and advice about how his most sensitive policies will be received. To admirers, Scavino is a social media pioneer who fine-tunes Trump’s critical bond with his supporters. To critics, he is a yes-man and enabler who has no business working in the White House. Scavino routinely provides rationalizations or justifications for the president’s most controversial policy directives.