WASHINGTON — Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, responded Tuesday to the news that a federal appeals court upheld President Obama’s net neutrality rule, allowing the government to regulate the internet.
“It is unfortunate that a split D.C. Circuit panel failed to recognize the severe Administrative Procedure Act shortcomings with the FCC’s open internet rule as outlined in my committee’s report, ‘Regulating the Internet: How the White House Bowled Over FCC Independence.’ This will certainly be appealed to the Supreme Court. In the meantime, investment will continue to slow and innovation will lag, as businesses respond to this silent killer of economic opportunity.
“As Judge Williams concluded in his dissent: ‘The ultimate irony of the commission’s unreasoned patchwork is that, refusing to inquire into competitive conditions, it shunts broadband service onto the legal track suited to natural monopolies. Because that track provides little economic space for new firms seeking market entry or relatively small firms seeking expansion through innovations in business models or in technology, the Commission’s decision has a decent chance of bringing about the conditions under which some (but by no means all) of its actions could be grounded—the prevalence of incurable monopoly.’”
Read Chairman Johnson’s report, “Regulating the Internet: How the White House Bowled Over FCC Independence,” here.
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