AT&T plans to invest $2 billion over the next three years to “help address the digital divide,” the company announced Wednesday. AT&T said it will expand its services for low-income consumers and schools and is participating in the FCC's emergency broadband benefit program. “We believe that broadband connectivity is essential for all Americans,” said AT&T CEO John Stankey in a statement. The company also announced its Connected Learning initiative, a “multi-year commitment to help stem the tide of learning loss, narrow the homework gap, and create compelling educational content.” AT&T partnered with WarnerMedia to develop a digital learning platform and is launching 20 digital learning centers in underserved neighborhoods.

Despite concerns expressed by some 6 GHz incumbents (see 2103290028), the Wi-Fi Alliance said it has been active in the 6 GHz Multi-Stakeholder Group (MSG), in a call with an aide to FCC acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel. “Some 6 GHz stakeholders wrongly assert that Wi-Fi devices are urgently required to support interference testing,” the alliance said in a filing posted Wednesday in docket 18-295: “But the general issue of unlicensed device coexistence with incumbent services is not within the scope of the MSG’s work,” and the FCC addressed it in its April 2020 order.

President Joe Biden’s proposal to spend $100 billion on broadband (see 2103310064) pursues the goals of “expanding internet access and improving the quality of connectivity” in “a costly and heavy-handed way,” said American Action Forum Technology and Innovation Policy Director Jennifer Huddleston and Technology and Innovation Policy Analyst Juan Londono in a paper released Tuesday. “This new plan would have government direct deployment and pricing, diminishing market incentives for investment and innovation -- a marked shift from the current policy focusing on private-sector leadership in deployment and on targeted incentives for areas and individuals without service.” Biden’s “comments around the plan also suggest a potential move toward price controls on internet service,” AAF said. “Instead of engaging in these costly top-down programs with unproven success, policymakers should seek to work with the private sector and encourage further innovative solutions to improve access to high-quality, high-speed internet and encourage internet adoption.” Biden's effort to "future proof" broadband infrastructure (see 2103310064) would "increase inappropriately the costs of connecting unserved areas," blogged Andrew Long, Free State Foundation senior fellow. Biden's proposal to "reduce internet prices for all Americans" would also "disincentivize investment and innovation," Long said Tuesday. The FCC's current definition of broadband "unleashes the most efficient investment and innovation mechanism" to meet consumer demand, he said, but the administration's proposal would "render many viable distribution technologies ineligible to receive government subsidies simply due to their inability to deliver upstream speeds far exceeding the needs of consumers." Senate Commerce Committee Chair Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., praised Biden Monday for seeking bipartisan compromise on infrastructure, after a meeting she attended on the issue earlier in the day with ranking member Roger Wicker, R-Miss., and other lawmakers (see 2104120060) “No one disagreed” during that meeting “that we need a major investment in infrastructure,” Cantwell tweeted. "I hope our colleagues will continue to talk through the details because it’s clear that transportation, housing, and broadband need more investment.”

The California Senate Communications Committee cleared a broadband bill to set a goal of upgrading to at least 100 Mbps downstream as part of a California Advanced Services Fund revamp. The panel voted 11-1 Monday to forward SB-4 to the Judiciary Committee. “It is time to close the digital divide by providing the funding necessary to deploy broadband infrastructure in communities that need it the most and by empowering and enabling local governments and nonprofits to apply for these funds as well,” author Sen. Lena Gonzalez (D) said Monday. Bill sponsors joined FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel last month in backing more ambitious broadband speed standards (see 2103300070). Also at Monday’s hearing, the committee voted 14-0 to clear a bill (SB-28) to expand the California Public Utilities Commission's authority to regulate cable video franchises. It goes next to the Governmental Organization Committee. And the panel voted 14-0 to send to the Human Services Committee a measure (SB-546) to extend a California LifeLine pilot program for foster youth.

The FCC announced a mobile app for consumers to "test the performance of their mobile and in-home broadband networks" as part of its effort to create new broadband maps, a news release said Monday (see 2103230071). The app, FCC Speed Test, is available on Android and iOS devices and allows users to see their download and upload speeds, latency, jitter and packet loss. "Expanding the base of consumers who use the FCC Speed Test app will enable us to provide improved coverage information to the public and add to the measurement tools we’re developing to show where broadband is truly available throughout the United States,” said acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel.

An estimated 9.8 million housing units lack fixed broadband at the 25/3 Mbps speed threshold in served and unserved areas, blogged Joan Marsh, AT&T executive vice president-federal regulatory. The number grows to 16.4 million at the 100/20 Mbps speed threshold, Marsh said. "The FCC has always assumed that directing funding to areas that are particularly costly to serve would drive investment deeper into lower-cost areas," Marsh said Thursday: "While that might have occurred in some areas, the fact that there are still many Americans without adequate broadband service suggests that the assumption was incorrect." Address-level broadband mapping is "critical" for targeted funding, she said, and the FCC's anticipated new map "should be the definitive resource for distribution of all broadband deployment dollars."

A T-Mobile spokesperson confirmed a Raymond James report that it's using Nokia customer premises equipment in its fixed-wireless internet offering, as announced Wednesday (see 2104070047). T-Mobile is targeting 500,000 customers by the end of the year. “The size of the launch is encouraging, and includes an emphasis on rural/underserved areas that might make for low-hanging fruit,” said Raymond James in a Thursday note to investors.

Broadband “clears the definitional hurdle” of what constitutes infrastructure, but President Joe Biden’s proposal for $100 billion in broadband spending (see 2103310064) is a “blunder,” FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr said Thursday in an opinion piece in The Hill. It’s “not a good thing” that Biden’s proposal “tracks many of the ideas” contained in congressional Democrats’ Accessible, Affordable Internet for All Act. HR-1783/S-745 proposes $94 billion for broadband (see 2103110060). “At the outset, their efforts ignore” the $40 billion in existing broadband funding the FCC is working to distribute, including via the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund and the new $3.2 billion emergency broadband benefit program, Carr said. “Not one penny from this $40 billion tranche has been spent.” Price tag “aside, the Democrats’ approach is plagued with substantive flaws that will only make it harder to close the digital divide,” he said. “It dedicates funds to upgrade communities that already have high-speed Internet services so that they can receive the superfast ‘future proof’ connections of tomorrow.” Carr criticized the proposal for betting “on government-owned networks as the future of connectivity” and for putting “price controls squarely on the table” when “rate regulation would be a surefire way to scare off the private sector investment needed to bridge the digital divide.” He compared the current infrastructure effort to the rollout of broadband funding in the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, in which “waste, fraud, and abuse flourished.” Congressional oversight hearings “followed with vows of ‘never again,’” yet “here we are again,” Carr said. “Rather than appropriating additional dollars in blunderbuss fashion, we can administer the substantial funds already available to the FCC while unleashing additional private sector investment” by reducing regulatory barriers, as House Commerce Committee Republicans proposed in February (see 2102160067). USTelecom and others also criticized Biden’s proposal (see 2104070057).

President Joe Biden said Wednesday that “debate is welcome” and “compromise is inevitable” on how to pay for his $2.3 trillion infrastructure spending proposal, which includes $100 billion for broadband (see 2103310064). Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said Monday he would support increasing the corporate tax rate to 25% from the current 21% level but opposes a larger hike (see 2104050037). “I am willing to listen” to calls to seek a smaller increase than the proposed 28% level (see 2104010062), “but we have got to pay for this,” Biden said. “There are many other ways we can do this, but I am willing to negotiate that.” Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo told reporters she also believes "there is room for compromise" on the tax increase proposal. The Treasury Department cited the proposed corporate tax rate increase Wednesday, among others. Biden said good infrastructure includes “having reliable high-speed internet in every home.” Ask “folks in rural America, where more than 35% of people lack a reliable high-speed internet” connection, “whether investing in internet access will lead to better jobs, markets for farmers, better opportunities for their kids,” he said. The administration “won’t be open to doing nothing.” University of Florida professor Mark Jamison criticized Biden’s broadband proposal in a Tuesday opinion piece for The Hill. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said Wednesday that Republicans would be willing to back a “much more modest” infrastructure plan if it doesn’t seek to increase the corporate tax rate to pay for it. The rate was cut in 2017 from 35% to 21%.

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said Monday he opposes President Joe Biden’s proposal to raise the corporate tax rate to 28% to pay for new infrastructure spending (see 2104010062) but would support a smaller increase. Biden’s proposal includes $100 billion for broadband as part of a larger $2.3 trillion package (see 2103310064). “If I don’t vote” to get on board with the Biden proposal, “it’s not going anywhere,” Manchin said on WV MetroNews radio. He cited the 50-50 Senate split and the possibility that Democrats will have to move a bill using the budget reconciliation process. “This whole thing has got to change,” he said. “There are six or seven other Democrats that feel strongly about” not raising the rate to 28%, from the 21% rate enacted in 2017, but would back raising it to 25%.