Harris' Lead Seen Helping Administration's Broadband Spending Push

Vice President Kamala Harris’ new role shepherding the $100 billion broadband spending component of President Joe Biden’s infrastructure proposal shows that part of the plan is a priority for the administration and will help smooth talks on the path forward, lawmakers and observers told us Thursday. Democrats are preparing to advance an infrastructure package via a budget reconciliation process if talks on Senate Republicans’ counterproposal, which includes $65 billion for broadband, don’t progress in coming weeks.

“I’m asking” Harris to lead the broadband push “because I know it will get done” with her at the helm, Biden said Wednesday during his speech to Congress. The connectivity proposal would "create jobs connecting every American with high-speed internet, including 35% of the rural America that still doesn't have it," Biden said. "This will help our kids and businesses succeed in a 21st century economy."

Biden also touted the infrastructure proposal as a way "to develop and dominate the products and technologies of the future," including semiconductors and AI. "We’re in a competition with China and other countries to win the 21st century," he said. “We will see more technological change … in the next 10 years than we saw in the last 50. That’s how rapidly [AI] and so much more is changing.”

Harris “understands the importance and urgency of getting the country connected,” said Senate Communications Subcommittee Chairman Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M. “It’s something that [Harris] was an advocate for” while a senator, “and it’s something she committed to when she was running” for the Democrats’ 2020 presidential nomination. Harris proposed $80 billion for broadband during the Democratic primary campaign and last year co-sponsored the Accessible, Affordable Internet for All Act, which proposed $100 billion for connectivity (see 2007010071). Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., and House Majority Whip James Clyburn, D-S.C., refiled the measure (HR-1783/S-745) in March (see 2103110060).

“In big cities and urban settings,” broadband is “still unaffordable and inaccessible to so many,” Lujan said. There are challenges to “getting it to parts of the country like New Mexico, where we’re more rural,” and tribal communities face additional obstacles. Harris "understands the dynamics," he said.

“Any help we can get” from Harris “is welcome,” said Senate Public Works Committee ranking member Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, one of the Republicans leading the infrastructure counterproposal, in an interview. “I hope she has enough time to focus on it,” since Biden placed several other high-priority matters in her portfolio. It’s clear Biden wanted Harris to lead the charge because he’s “trying to place emphasis on” broadband as a type of infrastructure “that’s very lacking in a lot of areas,” Capito said. “No better way than to put the vice president in charge.”

The Senate waded further into the infrastructure debate Thursday, passing 89-2 the Drinking Water and Wastewater Infrastructure Act (S-914). On the Senate floor, Capito called the measure a prime example of bipartisanship that lawmakers should follow “as we move forward with our work on other infrastructure priorities.” Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., Jon Tester, D-Mont., and other lawmakers told reporters they’re in the early stages of assembling a potential bipartisan compromise infrastructure proposal separate from the Capito-led GOP counterproposal.

"Republicans support everything you think of when you think of infrastructure," including "high-speed broadband," said Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina in Republicans' response to Biden's speech. "We’re in for all of that. But again, Democrats want a partisan wish list. They won’t even build bridges to build bridges."

"No decisions have been made" on whether Democrats will seek to advance a partisan measure via reconciliation, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said on the floor Wednesday before Biden's speech. “We will look for bipartisanship wherever we can, but the No. 1 goal is the big, bold plan along the lines of what" Biden "has proposed."

Harris’ leadership presence in future broadband talks “elevates the level of discussion and the level of importance” that connectivity matters will have in the overall infrastructure debate, NTCA CEO Shirley Bloomfield told us. It "really puts the weight of the White House” behind pursuing major broadband spending. Harris has “really solid relationships” on Capitol Hill from her time as a senator, which she can leverage in shaping how Congress translates the Biden administration’s “thoughts and goals” into legislation, Bloomfield said. Harris will be a facilitator in coordinating the disparate broadband priorities from the FCC, NTIA and Agriculture Department, Bloomfield said. “It’s time to coordinate” proposals under debate, because there are a “lot of things at play,” she said. That’s “going to go a long way in accelerating” the process.

“It’s unusual” to task a vice president with leading talks on a specific part of a larger plan, especially when, in the case of the Biden proposal, it’s 5% “of the overall infrastructure package,” said Brookings Institution Senior Fellow Blair Levin. Telecom is “the infrastructure of infrastructure,” and Harris’ leadership “reflects the oversized importance of broadband, not just in the rest of the infrastructure package, but also to the way” it affects daily U.S. life.

Broadband is one of the infrastructure areas on which Democrats and Republicans are closest to agreement, so Harris will be able to ease work toward a compromise, Levin said. The parties are “within a range of compromise,” with Democrats’ existing connectivity proposals between $80 billion-$100 billion and Republicans’ baseline being $65 billion. “I don't think Republicans will support any proposal” that “spends a material amount of money funding new entrants where you already have a cable provider” or offers “more than” 1 Gbps download (see 2104290009) “and a lot of speed up.”