Transcripts For CSPAN The Communicators Rep. Greg Walden R-O

CSPAN The Communicators Rep. Greg Walden R-OR Energy Commerce Coummittee... July 12, 2024

Republican from oregon, former chairman of the energy and commerce committee. Now, the Top Republican on that committee which sees a lot of telecommunications legislation. Our guest reporter, chris mills rodrigo of the hill. Congressman, youre retiring. Why . Rep. Walden i have had a great run. I have been at this 22 years in the u. S. House, the oregon legislature. Im not one of those members leaving cranky and angry. Democracy is built to be messy. Ive had a good run, ive enjoyed it, but it is time for somebody new to step in. My wife and i are ready to go take on some new challenge, of what i have no idea yet. I have been so busy, but it has been a great run. We got a lot done, so i am pleased with what weve done. Peter speaking of that, you are regarded as one of the Telecommunications Experts in the congress because of your background in radio and being on the enc committee. What is your legacy in telecommunications . Rep. Walden thanks. I dont spend a lot of time on that sort of stuff, but i would tell you together, the committee did great work opening up spectrum. And really positioning the United States, i think, to have the spectrum when it needed it to advance the new technologies as they have come along. I remember going back to when we passed some of these laws, you know, there were parts of the band nobody thought had much value that today is like the highest value real estate. As these brilliant Young American lives develop new technologies and innovation, i think making sure they have access to spectrum is kind of like build it and they will come. I think implementing the 9 11 Commission Final recommendations to create firstnet and defined it was really important for our Public Safety officials and the safety of our country. I think that was critical. We got through the whole broadcast transmissions, certainly in terms of the repacket all successfully. I know there is more we have worked on, but those will be some of the highlights. Peter to help us explore some of the unfinished issues is chris mills rodrigo of the hill. Chris thank you for having me. I guess i want to start with some fairly big news that broke last night, obviously on twitter. There were several prominent accounts that were compromised, including former president barack obama, the Presumptive Democratic nominee joe biden, and accounts like apple and uber. I wanted to get your thoughts on this hack and what it means Going Forward for the security of twitter. Rep. Walden i think once again, you start saying if it could happen to barack obama, among others, it can happen to any american anywhere, anytime. I think we have become aware of that. We know there are bad actors out there. Some may be kids in a basement. Others may be russian intelligence services. You see those news reports today as well, that they have been hacking into our covid scientists and companies, which is really despicable. But, we know this goes on. It goes on by the chinese, it goes on by the russians, it goes on by the iranians, and north koreans. You can go down a long list. It also seeks the importance of making sure our Telecommunications Networks are as safe and secure as possible. In each of those things, to secure our own systems. I think it was the attack they discovered, part of the problem in some Health Organizations was they had not provided the updates to, i think it was windows 95 or something. You have to go way back. There were vulnerabilities in the system. Things that should have been patched werent patched. It was a big, long array of issues when he gets into cybersecurity, but the threats are real. We are all vulnerable and we need to do more about it. Chris that does lead into one of these telecommunications security. Later this week, the United Kingdom reversed its decision to allow huawei to build a 5g network. It seems like a big win for the u. S. Campaigning for our allies to avoid using the chinese companys network. What are your thoughts on that . Rep. Walden i am really pleased the United Kingdom took that step. I was surprised they didnt do it sooner, frankly. I was in meetings at nato and various European Countries representatives in the last year where we have these discussions. It is sort of stunning to me knowing what we know and knowing they know what we know to a large extent that they are not doing more to secure their networks from potential malign activity. So, im glad they are making this decision, that they have made this decision. We have work to do here. We have a rip and replace bill that is now law. We need to get that funded so our Communications Networks here are safer and more secure. Chris it seems like one of the steps taken to secure American Networks and to make them more is the u. S. Intelligence act which would promote a shift towards an open network. Can you explain what that is for someone not involved in the industry . Rep. Walden i will do my best and not get too deep in. Bottom line is it allows other entrepreneurs to work in this platform and continue to develop new systems, basically. So, it is not just the hardwired piece of equipment, if you will. I think it allows us to have more flexibility, more innovators and more ability to make sure it is dynamic and that we can develop a Communications Network and improve it all the time. As opposed to having a piece of hardware in place that the owner can then do an update, shall we say, to change. That update may not be what you want in that system but you are locked in. I think the concept makes sense Going Forward. I am glad we moved that legislation unanimously out of the committee. Chris do you see this as an opportunity for American Companies to maybe catch up may not be the right word, but assert themselves in the space of 5g which has been dominated by huawei and other companies . Rep. Walden you are right. Coming away from the meltdown around the world, that is when china put its muscle behind huawei, because everything over there is a state owned enterprise one way or another that flows back into their whole military structure and funding. They have the ability to come in. They steal the technology or come up with that themselves and then they can undercut the market. I have people in my own district say, yeah, but it is good equipment, it works well and reasonably priced. What a great way to infiltrate. I think Going Forward, the extent to which we can get that equipment out of the systems and, i would say not only compete on 5g, but leapfrog to whatever we call the next iteration, 6g, i dont care, is where we need to focus. Where america has already had an advantages where we are able to lead to the innovation of the next technology. If we lose that edge, we are beholden to somebody else. Right now, that somebody else is basically china and i dont think that is good given what they have just done in hong kong, given their track record, everything we know about them. That is a bad place for American Free societies to be, is the hold into chinese equipment and everything that goes along with that. Peter congressman, you have mentioned 5g. We have seem to be on the cusp of getting into 5g. Are we still on the cusp . Rep. Walden thats a good question. Yeah, i think we are still on the cusp. I think they are making progress. They have been moving rapidly. I would say the merger between tmobile and sprint freed up spectrum and capital. I know that company, not to put them ahead of anybody else, but they have been really aggressive of trying to move forward in this space, especially the rural areas. At t, verizon and others are as well. It is essential, but part of it was someone billed it as you go, developing the technology, developing the software, getting the towers up. Where they are doing it, it seems to be deployed and working. Now it is a matter of getting it built out. They will continue to refine and improve and enhance, i know that. I want us to be in the lead. By us, sure, it would be great if it were all American Companies, but at least lets make it our allies and friends companies as well. I think there are partnerships to be had, internationally, but certainly domestically we would like to continue to move forward. Weve got some catch up to do in terms of making that spectrum fully available and understanding the importance of getting this out there. Then, getting the build out going. We still hamper filled out through arcane, expensive overregulation by the federal government in citing and approval processes. Peter just to piggyback on an earlier question by chris what do you think the reputation of Silicon Valleys right now in washington . Rep. Walden i think it is twofold. One is there is great admiration for the innovation and the brilliance that just pulses in the Silicon Valley. I have toured a lot of the companies, met with a lot of the leaders. It is so exciting to see what is being developed and what the future holds. I will be careful how i say this and i will probably offend somebody but theres also an arrogance that comes with that incredible productivity and innovation that tends to downplay the effect that they have on Public Policy and people who are engaged in Public Policy. When you are that good, that big, that strong, that innovative, sometimes you think you can discard public reaction or political reaction. I was in a meeting with one of the ceos with a democrat friend colleague of mine who said you basically dont have any friends on capitol hill anymore. The right thinks you are bias of the left, and the left thinks you are whatever. That is a bad place to be and they dont have to be there. If they were more transparent, more forthcoming, and if consumers knew what was really going on and had more choice in some of the privacy issues and content issues we got some proposals on those fronts i think they would be in a better place. They are new, exciting, rich, powerful. You know, every company that gets in that place ends up eventually running into a Political Organization called the congress that says hold on a second. You dont have free reign. There are laws, and public opinion. That is kind of where they are at. Peter chris mills rodrigo. Chris continuing with the discussion of privacy. During the coronavirus pandemic, theres been a lot of questions about Technology Companies having access to more Sensitive Data like health information. I know that you and your colleagues in the committee and democrats both introduced competing legislation on privacy related to coronavirus. Can you give us a little bit of information about where you are at in that process and what is the Sticking Point now . Rep. Walden i wish we were farther along. It is always easy when you have been the chairman and now chairman and exxon permanently since i am retiring. This is what i would have done. Privacy is something the senator and i would have joined focus on early on. We talked a lot about it. Then my party lost the majority and i lost the gavel. We were hoping to get ahead of california privacy laws taking effect and look at what worked and didnt work there. You have the whole european issue now, as you know, on data privacy. America should lead in this space. We should set a strong Privacy Protection for consumer law on the books. The longer we wait, the more other governments, including the states, let alone foreign governments, are going to meander around in this space and you are going to have all this patchwork of competing requirements. If america led in this space, as we should, as we should have, then we could help set International Standards that protect privacy and protect freedom of speech and really empower our American Companies to lean back and say, hey, i got what you want me to do but i am an american company. If i do that, im in violation of american law, so therefore i cannot do this. It will empower those executives and those teams to bring our vision of freedom of speech and protection into other areas where that simply doesnt exist. So, we should have moved forward. I think we had one hearing on privacy in this congress. And were basically at the end of this congress. We have lost two years. Unfortunately, now you have more and more patchwork, it is hard to go back. At the end of the day, a lot of it has to do with the trial bar and all of that. That is a stumbling block on the Autonomous Vehicle legislation which we pass in the house when i was chairman unanimously. Nothing moved in this congress. What do you think an baton of his vehicle really is . It is a computer on four wheels. It will be a data sharing device that takes you to a location, but along the way, it is going to be accumulating data back and forth. Who do you want to set those standards and build that equipment . The United States or china . Id like the u. S. To lead in that. In all, its kind of interesting you think about the telecom act and some of those laws that were written in the 1990s. Everything was siloed, everybody stayed in their own business. None of that exists today. Theres a broad need for updating our laws in all of these spaces. Chris you sort of mentioned the area want to get to next which is Autonomous Vehicles. It seems like during the pandemic would be the ideal time. To transport people that otherwise might not be able to get transport without exposing themselves. This was an area of committee has been working on for years. What step in the process are you now . Rep. Walden well, there you go. Not very far down the road. Again, we have run into the liability issue and the trial lawyers. We have that worked out in the house bill we passed two years ago. Again, it was done unanimously. There are ways to work through that, i think. Nothing seems to be moving. It is really frustrating. To your point, during covid, i forgot where it was but there was a hospital that was using basically unattended vehicles, robot capabilities to move samples from wherever they were taking them from people being tested to wherever the test was being evaluated so you didnt have a human in that chain. Boy, you think about the future that lies ahead with baton of vehicle technology. To save lives from accidents, preventing them. By transporting people who otherwise shouldnt drive themselves. Theres a whole host of incredible things coming down the pike. Again, if we had a national law to do like we had in our bill a couple of years ago, wed be leading in the u. S. I fear we are going to lose this innovation edge if we dont have a National Standard. The administration has tried. I worked with secretary chao and the president and others. They are doing what they can through the regulatory process, but theres only so much they can do there. Moving forward, we can do a lot more legislatively. Chris you sent a letter to the industry asking for input in may. What was the response like to that . Rep. Walden they gave us some good response back. Look, we want the vehicles themselves, we want to regulate how fast you go. There are certain things states can do. But what they want is the ability to do the testing and the ability to have enough vehicles to get them out there and test them, and have standards in place that we would have nhsta and others set. They are looking for basic federal standardization so they can build whatever that standard is. And so, i think you see that in the proposals we have put forward to give them that framework. That is really what innovators need. Give us the rules of the road and let us go. Right now, there are literally no rules to the road that work for them in a meaningful way. Peter go ahead, chris. Chris have you been seeing that lack of a federal law stunt the development of these actual companies in technology . Rep. Walden it is always hard to say what would have happened if you didnt have Something Else and point to the absence of it. I think that the short answer is yes. It is not that they are not working on the technology itself, its about the deployment and all of that where they can really drive forward and test more rapidly. I think you are starting to see that more in other countries than here. You are not going to hold back American Ingenuity and genius. They will continue trying to tinker and toy and make things work. We ought to have a streamlined process. We ought to have everybody understand the rules of the road here. And our Autonomous Vehicle act would have done that. There is still a chance to get something done there. Kathleen Morris Rogers has been working on that. Gosh, we are almost done with the twoyear process and we passed this, i think it was two years ago in july out of the house unanimously. So, the framework is there. To me, that would have been one i said, ok, lets get that going as soon as the new congress starts. Remember, part of the fight was over heavy trucks. We didnt have jurisdiction over heavy trucks. That brought in a whole debate about drivers and unions that we avoided. We went as far as pickup trucks, if you will, light duty trucks. Heavyduty was over a Different Committee in the house. The senate had some heavy duty stuff. Im not picking on the teamsters because one of the biggest jobs for guys over 50 is driving trucks. That it want to see those jobs go away. So, we let the heavy truck argument out of it. Get the standard in place for Passenger Vehicles and light duty pickups. Peter congressman, i want to circle back. You mentioned having a federal standar

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