Communications in the subcommittee on communications and technology will now come to order. And the chair recognizes herself for five minutes for an Opening Statement. And i do want to welcome each and every one of you. Obviously a hearing of interest as we have a full room in front of us. And it is our first hearing in 2017 with a fully formed federal Communications Commission as often seems to be the case, the senate takes their dear ever loving time to get things done, but im pleased to see that the commission is back up to speed and ill tell you i am pleased that we have five members of this commission and they have different points of view to bring to the discussion on all things telecom related. I think that is healthy for the telecommunications and technology industry. Were here today to conduct oversight of the agency which is this subcommittees primary role. It is very important that we fulfill these obligations because we have given the fcc a Critical Mission and critical task to fulfill. From the commissions Disaster Response efforts to its work supporting the deployment of rural broad band to its efforts to streamline and modernize the Regulatory Environment impacting some of americas greatest creators and innovators, you are all doing important work and we appreciate what you do. One of the fccs many jobs is to regulate broadcasters who accept and fulfill unique Public Interest obligations due to their use of valuable public spectrum. While we were in the final stages of planning for this routine oversight hearing, some of my colleagues asked that the committee hold an entire hearing about comments by the president on twitter regarding certain broadcasters work. So i fully expect them to question the trump tweets and chairman pai, since we have a very full slate of issues, my hope is that you will address that concern so that we can focus on the work and responsibilities of the commission. The commission has conducted entirely appropriate oversight of broadcast licenses. There is no indication it has any interest in regulating political content, unlike some in our chamber who have urged the fcc to adopt a new fairness doctrine mandating that broadcasters provide equal time to the opposition if they allow anyone to express any type of political opinion on air. The outrage over the president s twitter musing stands in contrast to the silence as twitter cuts off the voices of anyone who posts something they just dont like for whatever reason. All this on a platform so powerful and far reaching that you could argue that it is the modern day public square. And some on twitter have even called to suspend the president s account and after my recent experience i will say i wouldnt put it past some people. The latest twitter scandal is an attempt to distract from the commission and the American People from the fccs real work which is delivering on a mission to unleash American Innovation. So chairman pai, no matter what questions are said, i hope that were going to stick to keeping our eye on the ball and making certain that we address things like media ownership rules, the Life Line Program, the imperatives of expanding rural broad band and restoring a free and open internet. That is something that we want to see done by the end of this year. And at this time i yield one minute to the vice chairman of this subcommittee mr. Lance. Thank you very much, chair and welcome to chairman pai and the full complement of commissioners. What a goodlooking group. Thank you for appearing before us today. Since our last oversight hearing in july the commission has continued its work on issues such as Disaster Relief and recovery and the communities affected by the recent hurricanes, commercial spectrum availability, Fraud Prevention and closing the Digital Divide. Also moving forward in the process to roll back the misguided title to reclassification of isps from the Previous Administration. We have recently taken a bipartisan step forward in reauthorizing the fcc for the for the First Time Since 1990. I also thank commissioner o riley for joining me in the district i serve in august for a 5g industry round table. I commend his leadership for infrastructure policies that will be important in our efforts to win the race to 5g. Thank you all for being here and i look forward to your testimony. Gentlemen yields back. Mr. Doyle, youre recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madame chair for holding this hearing and thank you to all the witnesses for appearing before us today. Let me just say that i really enjoy our time here together as im sure all of you do and i would encourage the chairman to continue to hold these get togethers far more often. Commission, welcome back. Your work on the homework gap has been missed. Commissioner carr, congratulations on your confirmation. I hope that as you establish your agenda that you remember that the guiding principle of the fcc is to act in the publics interest. Its a standard that i will hold you to as well. Chairman pai, many people around the country, including myself, and many of colleagues are deeply alarmed by your response to the president trumps threats against the media and specifically his tweet threatening nbc. In 2014 you wrote in the wall street journal that the government has no place pressuring media organizations into covering certain stories. You took six days to respond to the president s tweet and when you did, you did not directly address the president s threat at all or its chilling effects on the media. While the president and the administration can dispute the veracity of any story, even ones that are true, they cannot attack the free institutions that enable our democracy. As senator flake said yesterday, it is time for our complicity and our accommodation of the unacceptable to end. Besides this issue, the commissions agenda under your leadership has already had a profoundly negative effect on our country. From increasing costs on Small Businesses, driving up the cost of calls to family members in prison and claiming that wireless broad band is competitive even when people in Rural America know its not, it seems that in every fork of the road you have chosen the path that leads to higher consumer costs, fewer choices, and less innovation. And if it sounds as if the worst is yet to come, news reports suggest that you will unveil plans tomorrow to vastly alter the media landscape in this country clearing the way for more media consolidation including the sinclair that local news was gathered and reported locally. What good would a studio and reporters in new york have done for broadcast stations in houston or florida after the hurricanes . What good is local news if it isnt local . Other news reports suggest you will announce an order to repeal the fccs open Internet Order around thanksgiving. Madame chairman, i sincerely hope that if this is true that we have a chance to talk to the commission in advance of a vote on that order. The idea that such a significant order that would affect so much of our economy would be voted on without oversight is unconscionable and would be a dereliction of this committees duties. If the chairman is intent to act, i believe that his action should be done under the scrutiny of congress and in the light of the public. That concludes what i want to say and im going to yield the remaining part of my time. I thank the gentleman for yielding his remaining time to me. I want to society myself with our Ranking Members comments, particularly to what the president said that was a direct assault on the First Amendment and with all due respect to you, mr. Chairman, youre delayed and rather tepid response to that. I want to place verbally in the record the First Amendment of the constitution of our country. It was written without objection. Thank you. December 15th, 1791. It is as new and as important today as the day that it was adopted. Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. Or a bridging the freedom of speech or of the press. They were very clear. They were very clear. Or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. I hope you will choose to enlarge on the Public Statement you put out and i will yield back the remainder of my time. Gentle lady yields back. Gentleman yields back. At this time i recognize the chairman of the full energy and Commerce Committee mr. Walden who has been in the chair all day long with the hearing downstairs. Recognized for five minutes. Thank you. I want to welcome commissioner carr, welcome aboard. Were glad to have you here. Welcome back commissioner rosen. Its good to see you on the commission and we look forward to continuing our work with you and the other members, chairman pai thank you for being here and for your leadership. I couldnt agree with more with chairman blackburn that this commission has some very important work to do. The United States has weathered a large share of Natural Disasters including wildfires that have devastated hundreds of thousands of acres in my home state and we know the tragedies all across the west. These weather events have shown the importance of maintaining the most reliable Communication Systems possible and we certainly owe the work many of us are engaged in on first net going clear back to 2012 and we need to make sure that works as planned. I look forward to hearing updates on the agencys contributions, the federal relief efforts under way in these areas as well as those impacted by hurricanes irma, harvey and maria. Some of the affected areas are almost back up to speed, which is great thanks to a lot of hard work on both industry and government. We know were facing enormous challenges elsewhere in restoring essential services in placing like puerto rico and the Virgin Islands as well as others here on the main land. We appreciate the commissions efforts to streamline permitting, advance funding and provide much needed assistance in these situations. We also appreciate the commissions work to keep us informed through a briefing on fcc hurricane response efforts we requested and that the Chairmans Team quickly provided. Thank you for doing that. As 2017 draws to a close, we find ourselves waiting on a number of key items to emerge from the commission. In no way does this committee expect our oversight to delay the commissions important work. Rather hearings like this are vital to keeping open lines of communication and exposing commissioners and Committee Members alike to different perspectives, yielding better understanding and better decision making. We expect the commissions work to go on regardless just as it did under the Previous Administration. Subcommittee continues its work having just finished a markup on an fcc reauthorization bill for the first time in many years. Thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for their work on this effort. Last month we held hearing on the challenges and opportunities presented by the repacking process that the commission has embarked upon. I commend the commissions continuing efforts to release funding, work with every broadcaster to ensure their needs are being met as this transition evolves. Your input has been and will continue to be extremely important to this committee as we look at options to solve the remaining issues. We know there are some out there. Some of my colleagues may wish to use this opportunity as a form to rehash once again the arguments for dumping cutting edge broad band Internet Service into the steal musty bucket that is title 2. In any case, anyone if anyone was wondering, my position hasnt changed on that. I dont sense others have. This commission should not be dis which upended stacks of commission precedent, disregard reams of legislative history to achieve the results that were demanded by president barack obama. Its up to the commission to set the regulatory conditions. I hope to see a new bar set in this regard before the end of the year. Ultimately congress is the appropriate forum to settle the debate. I think you hear a little of that passion here on both sides. Ive been continuing my efforts to negotiate a compromise. Although my staff continues to engage the parties in discussions toward that end, my colleagues in the minority have unfortunately seemed largely uninterested in this point. Id love to see that change. The door remains open. Were willing to codify for providing certainty to all participants in the internet ecosystem. I dont think we need title 2 to do that. We have the same end goal. Preserving the internet as a free, open, dynamic environment while also doing everything we can to extend its benefits to every american. We should be able to Work Together to clear this issue off our plates. With that again i thank the commission for being here today. Were glad to see you fully constituted and confirmed and as you can imagine, we have a lot of issues to hear from you on and to have good discourse back and forth. Thanks again and with that i yield back. Gentleman yields back. Anyone seeking the remainder of the chairmans time . No one else. The gentleman yields back. At this time youre recognized. Thank you, madame chairman and Ranking Member doyle for holding this hearing today. I appreciate that youre maintaining the subcommittee of oversight of the fcc. I know some people here today would prefer you wouldnt. Congressional oversight is important because the fcc is on a path to take up a number of controversial issues in the next few months. Nonetheless its curious this hearing is scheduled for today in particular just one day before chairman pai is expected to make public at least one proposal that enriches a Single Company above others and that would clear out any last obstacles to the purchase of Tribune Media company. They would be buying the second largest. The chairman has claimed it is simply coincidence that has actions are timed to benefit sinclair. Now chairman pai has refused to respond to my questions about allegations about his relationship with sinclaire and this does not help put anyones concerns to rest. These moves are another example of how this fcc values Large Companies over small ones and always puts companies before consumers. The most glaring example of this of course is chairman pais commitment to eviscerate Net Neutrality protections. It protects consumers, Small Businesses and free speech and i hope the fcc is spending this time reviewing the millions of comments that have been filed including from the democratic members of this committee. I also hope the fcc considers the thousands of consumer complaints that have been made public since the Comment Period closed. These common straight that consumer problems with broad band providers much farther reaching than the fcc proposed rule making lets on. Together these items have the potential to remake the way americans communicate. And in taking on these issues the fcc must find a way to insulate itself from the political pressure from the president. Chairman pai has claimed that he has restored independence to the fcc yet he refuses repeatedly to put any distance between himself and president trump. Whether its neutrality, or even protecting a free press. That evasiveness does not inspire confidence. Ive said many times and i think ive told some of the Commission Members that i remember earlier this year when sean spicer was at a press conference and he said that the president would have the fcc repeal Net Neutrality before the fcc even addressed the issue. So again, it just seems that everything is whatever the president wants and theres really no independence at all on Net Neutrality or the other issues. The fcc has a long tradition of bipartisan ship, but unfortunately thats simply not the case today. Hard working American Consumers and future congresses are sure to take a dim view of the current partisan politics at the fcc and its time to restore that bipartisan tradition. I thank the chairman and the commissioners for all being here today and i have id like to yield a minute each to mr. Mcner the core of the fccs mission is in the Public Interest. In fact, the words Public Interest appear over 100 times in the Communications Act but by taking steps to limit access to information and content the commission has gone against what i think is the publics interests. This is evidenced by the commissions current efforts to dismantle Net Neutrality protections and by steps the commission has taken to undercut localism to eliminate the main studio rule. These and other actions signaling favorable treatment for sinclaire. Then there was the chairmans initial silence regarding the president s threat to revoke broadcast licenses on the basis of viewpoints followed by the chairman making a statement but one that was too late and insufficient. Im disappointed in these actions on the effect they will have. With that i yield. Thank you very much. Thank you for yielding. In order to expand broad band deployment its important we accelerate or work. Additional spectrum is necessary to expand coverage across rule america and capacity across all of america. We must also f