Gomez Focused on Engaging Underserved Communities, Combating Misinformation

FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez wants to focus on empowering and engaging with underserved consumers and combating media disinformation, she said Tuesday during the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute’s inaugural Celebrating Latina Excellence event. A news release from her office called it “her first major speech.” Gomez was sworn in Sept. 25. In a news conference after her remarks Tuesday, Gomez said that her most immediate policy goals for the FCC are implementing continued funding for the affordable connectivity program and spectrum auctions authorization, both of which would require congressional action before the agency could act. “I am a firm believer in the power of competition to drive innovation that improves services and lowers prices for consumers,” Gomez said. “But competition only works when the market works”

Organizations such as CHCI have briefed Gomez about media disinformation as a growing problem in the Latine community, she said, but conceded during her formal remarks that it's “a complicated issue" that the FCC only has limited power to tackle. The agency “cannot dictate content or in any way censor or infringe on the First Amendment rights of individuals or the press,” Gomez said. “This includes a broadcaster’s selection and presentation of news or commentary.” She declined to comment on a pending petition to deny the license renewal of Fox’s WTXF Philadelphia over accusations of misinformation and a settled defamation lawsuit against the station’s parent company. Gomez said she doesn’t yet know how the FCC would act against disinformation but suggested media and information literacy education for the public could be a possible tactic. “My interest in educating consumers on how to identify reliable news sources is grounded in the FCC’s responsibility to the Constitution and First Amendment law.”

Asked for comment on Commissioner Geoffrey Starks' calls Monday for the agency to act on resurrecting equal employment opportunity data reporting requirements for broadcasters, Gomez said she would need to look into the item, noting she has been on the job only two months (see 2312110067).

In her speech, Gomez also spoke about her practice of occasionally delivering remarks in Spanish on items at FCC open meetings, saying it's part of an effort to reach out to underserved communities. “With the Safe Connections Act item, I wanted to ensure that farmworker women could learn about this important action in their own language, and also to invite organizations that serve them to help us get the word out,” she said. Gomez said she won’t translate her remarks for every item. “I think deeply about how each item will impact consumers and whether sharing a statement in Spanish can enhance our agency’s ability to reach them in a meaningful way,” she said.

Allowing funding for the ACP to expire in April would create a “trust rupture that may not be repaired” with the underserved communities that have come to rely on it for connectivity, Gomez said. “To put it starkly, trust in the bipartisan public-private partnership to address the digital divide will be shaken if the ACP is not funded going forward,” she said. The ACP, the broadband pieces of the Infrastructure Act, and efforts to eliminate digital discrimination have allowed the FCC to join with the private sector to help eliminate the digital divide, she said. “That is what is at risk.”