The Senate scheduled a roll-call vote for confirmation of Elaine Chao as transportation secretary for 12:20 p.m. Tuesday. Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., initially hoped the Senate could vote on the confirmations of Chao and commerce secretary nominee Wilbur Ross this week before Republicans left for their retreat in Philadelphia (see 1701240059). He said he expected a Chao vote before one on Ross.

The reintroduction Tuesday of the Local Radio Freedom Act got renewed praise from NAB and opposition from music industry stakeholders. The resolution, like its previous iterations, opposes new performance fees, royalties, taxes or other charges aimed at local broadcast radio stations. Music licensing stakeholders viewed the resolution as aimed at scuttling attempts to advance the Fair Play Fair Pay Act and other music licensing legislation (see 1504160050 and 1605110059). Reps. Michael Conaway, R-Texas, and Gene Green, D-Texas, sponsored a House version of the resolution (House Concurrent Resolution 13). Sens. Michael Barasso, R-Wyo., and Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., filed the Senate version (Senate Concurrent Resolution 6). “America's broadcasters are deeply grateful to the scores of lawmakers who recognize radio’s unparalleled role in promoting music," said NAB President Gordon Smith in a statement. MusicFIRST Coalition Executive Director Chris Israel urged Congress to see H.Con.Res.13/S.Con.Res.6 “for what it is -- a P.R. play by Big Radio -- and instead tackle the injustices affecting our nation’s music creators.” The resolution’s sponsors “are rolling out the exact same non-binding resolution, defending the same government subsidy they have been protecting for decades,” Israel said in a statement.

Microsoft spent $2.4 million on Q4 lobbying, about 2.8 percent less than the same period in 2015, on issues including broadband spectrum, child and student privacy, copyright and patent changes, cybersecurity, data breach notification, encryption, internet governance and trade agreements, said the company's filing that was due Monday. Like other tech companies (see 1701230044), Microsoft has been a strong backer of updating the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (see 1701090017), supporting the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield and limiting government surveillance and access to Americans' information. In other filings it was revealed that Amazon spent $2.66 million in Q4, a 11 percent dip. Lobbying on many of the same issues as Microsoft, Amazon, which is developing fleets of drones to deliver packages, also focused on unmanned aircraft-related policies and legislation (see 1610130040) and the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority transition. Yahoo spent $560,000 on lobbying, 19 percent less. The company, which last year divulged two major data breaches that occurred in 2013 and 2014 involving about 1.5 billion records, lobbied on data breach notification legislation and other related matters. Yahoo is in the process of being acquired by Verizon, which is reconsidering the deal in light of the breaches. In an SEC 8-K filing Monday, Yahoo said it's continuing to work with Verizon on integration planning but the transaction is now expected to close Q2 rather than the current quarter. "The company is working expeditiously to close the transaction as soon as practicable in Q2," said the filing. Cisco spent $460,000 in Q4, a 34 percent drop, on many similar tech industry issues. Uber spent $390,000, up 179 percent. Among its issues, the ride-hailing company lobbied on "possible anti-competitive activities that could limit consumers' access to app-based technologies," development of app-based tech related to self-driving cars and expanded consumer choice.

Several groups urged Senate leaders to oppose the Midnight Rules Review Act (HR-21), the Regulation from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act (HR-26) and the Regulatory Accountability Act (HR-5), all of which cleared the House in partisan votes this month. Common Cause, Fight for the Future, the Media Mobilizing Project, National Hispanic Media Coalition, OpenMedia, Public Knowledge and United Church of Christ joined to send the letter Wednesday. The measures would hurt federal agency enforcement powers, the groups said. “Nowhere is this more dangerous than in the media and communications sector,” they said. “Paralyzing the consumer protection agencies in this sector would likely increase the prices consumers pay, undermine citizens’ health and safety, and bring enormous legal and regulatory uncertainty to one of our country’s most critical pieces of infrastructure: the nation’s communications network.”

The Senate Commerce Committee should delay its confirmation hearing for Wilbur Ross as commerce secretary, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said on the chamber floor Tuesday. Ross’ hearing initially was scheduled for last week, but Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., and ranking member Bill Nelson, D-Fla., postponed the hearing to this Wednesday due to the lack of paperwork from the Office of Government Ethics (see 1701110004). That paperwork was delivered to the Senate only Monday, Schumer complained. “They’re rushing forward,” Schumer said. “The committee needs some time to review those. … I’m hopeful we can move it back.” Ross is “a billionaire in a cabinet loaded with billionaires,” he said. The Office of Government Ethics posted Ross’ paperwork, dated Sunday and running 57 pages. The records show assets and income from Apple and Neustar. The paperwork shows “noticeably no ethics agreement,” tweeted the Center for Responsive Politics, which also compiled the political donations that Ross gave. A Republican spokesman for Senate Commerce told us the paperwork arrived at the committee Sunday evening and the hearing is still scheduled for 10 a.m. Wednesday. A Nelson spokesman didn't comment on whether Nelson shares Schumer's opposition to proceeding to the hearing as scheduled. Sean Spicer, a spokesman for President-elect Donald Trump, defended the transition’s efforts on ethics paperwork for the nominees generally. “Timing is out of our hands” once paperwork is given over to the OGE, Spicer said during a Tuesday media call.

Transportation Secretary nominee Elaine Chao told Senate Commerce Committee members at her Wednesday confirmation hearing she would work with Congress to get the government positioned "as a catalyst ... not as an impediment" to safely and efficiently integrate drones, self-driving cars and other new technologies into the U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's pick to head the Department of Transportation faced friendly questioning from Democrats and Republicans about a wide range of transportation issues, with little focus on emerging technologies and she offered few specifics. Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., asked her how DOT under her leadership will keep pace with evolving technology. She said the benefits of technologies like artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles and drones are known, but "there are also concerns about how they will continue to develop and I will work with this committee and the Congress to address many of these concerns. But we need to do so in a way that will not dampen the basic creativity and innovation of our country." Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., asked whether Chao has specific ideas about how federal policy can keep up with technology while maintaining safety of self-driving vehicles. He said accidents "will have a tremendous public blowback" but innovation needs to be allowed to continue. Chao replied "it behooves all of us as a country, as a society, to bring greater familiarity and greater comfort for those who are passengers and other stakeholders who will be eventual users of this technology to understand the benefits, the limitations and also what it means going forward in the future. So it requires a national discussion." DOT has 57,000 full-time employees with an operating budget of $75 billion. Chao, whose husband is Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., held cabinet positions in the George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush administrations (see 1701040063). Chao is “perfectly suited” to be the next secretary of transportation, said the National Retail Federation in a Wednesday letter to the Senate Commerce Committee backing her confirmation. NRF’s members “are among the nation’s largest shippers, moving hundreds of billions of dollars worth of merchandise through the nation’s ports, rail lines, and highways,” it said. “The condition of this interconnected supply chain and its ability to move freight quickly, efficiently and safely are vital to retailers’ businesses, as well as those of American manufacturers, agricultural producers and the millions of workers they employ.” With Chao’s previous experience at DOT, including as deputy secretary under President George H.W. Bush, she has “the background and experience to address some of the key supply chain issues facing our nation and our global competitiveness,” NRF said.

The Project on Government Oversight tallied donors to Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., that he would oversee as attorney general if the Senate confirms him. “An analysis of Senator Sessions’ campaign contributions raises several matters that pose conflict-of-interest and ethical concerns if he assumes the post of Attorney General,” the group said, citing 12 donors that have pending antitrust or competition matters before DOJ. AT&T gave $54,000, it noted, noting “AT&T’s proposed merger with Time Warner is currently under review by DOJ” and “AT&T’s fully owned subsidiary DirecTV is the subject of an antitrust lawsuit brought by DOJ.” It cited $27,000 from DirecTV separately. Comcast gave $27,700, it said, citing a DOJ civil investigative demand to Comcast on cable advertising business practices. The donations are legal but “indicate financial and professional relationships between him and his donors -- entanglements that could suggest the appearance of bias,” said the project, proposing that Sessions “could commit to a bright-line rule where he will recuse himself from any matter involving a donor from the last two years or any donor who gave more than $5,000 in the last decade” and “commit to an independent written and public review of this matter by DOJ’s Ethics Office and the Office of the Inspector General,” taking action “publicly in accordance with that review and recuse himself (or not) based upon the report’s recommendation.” A Sessions spokesman didn’t comment on the tally of donations. Sessions faces Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings Tuesday and Wednesday. American Civil Liberties Union National Legal Director David Cole will testify on a second panel of witnesses, slated for Wednesday. The ACLU produced a report on Sessions’ positions overall, stating: “Since its inception in 2001, Sessions has supported nearly every iteration of the USA Patriot Act. Sessions has long supported government surveillance efforts including bulk meta data collection.” Free Press opposes confirmation for Sessions and in a blog post last week referred to his views on surveillance. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., predicts the Senate will have “six or seven” confirmations of Trump administration nominees, particularly those focused on national security, by Day 1 of the new presidency, he said Monday, speaking to reporters at Trump Tower in New York. “It’s obviously going to be a big week on Capitol Hill,” said Trump spokesman Sean Spicer on a journalists' call Monday about the many confirmation hearings. Spicer said Trump’s team is in regular contact with McConnell’s about the busy nominations schedule.

Reps. Kevin Yoder, R-Kan., and Jared Polis, D-Colo., reintroduced legislation Monday updating the three-decade-old the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) that unanimously passed the House last year, but stalled in the Senate. The bill, which had more than 300 co-sponsors last year and wide support among privacy and technology organizations, would close a loophole in ECPA that currently allows agencies to search people's emails stored by a third party such as Google and Yahoo without a warrant if those emails are more than 180 days old. "After the unanimous passage of our bill last year, I see no reason why we can’t get this done right away,” said Yoder in a joint news release with Polis. “Let’s give the Senate ample time to act, because more than 30 years has been long enough for Congress to wait on this." In April, the House passed the bill 419-0 (see 1604270067), but its main supporters in the Senate, Sens. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Pat Leahy, D-Vt., withdrew the legislation after Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, introduced a controversial amendment that would widen FBI access to Americans' sensitive data online (see 1606090007). Lee and Leahy said they couldn't "in good conscience" include that amendment. The SEC, among other agencies, expressed concern about the Email Privacy Act because its commissioners said the agency wouldn't be able to get criminal warrants as required by the legislation, hindering investigations (see 1605250022 and 1511300009). "As a result of Congress’s failure to keep pace with technological developments, every American is at risk of having their emails warrantlessly searched by government agencies," said Polis. He said the legislation would protect people's "Fourth Amendment privacy rights, whether they’re communicating through pen-and-paper mail or email." The release said the bill's other co-sponsors are House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., and ranking member John Conyers, D-Mich.; Doug Collins, R-Ga.; Judy Chu, D-Calif.; Suzan DelBene, D-Calif.; Will Hurd, R-Texas; Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y.; and Ted Poe, R-Texas.

Investor Wilbur Ross, President-elect Donald Trump's pick for commerce secretary, said in a Senate Commerce Committee questionnaire the department faces three challenges: increasing its "responsiveness" to the committee's and users' needs; expanding U.S. exports while reducing the trade deficit; and integrating technology to improve its efficiency, timeliness, depth and breadth of data while better protecting intellectual property. The Senate panel released Ross' answers to the questionnaire Tuesday. In response to a question about why he wants to serve, the 79-year-old Ross said he has been a leader with more than 100 businesses over the past 55 years, and understands how technology can drive U.S. businesses and create "job dislocation" in certain sectors. In response to a question of whether he ever was investigated, arrested or held by law enforcement, Ross said he was charged in 1991 for "driving while ability impaired by alcohol" in New York. His license was suspended for 90 days and he paid a $400 fine, he wrote.

Uber should revise its privacy policy to restore customer control over their location information and provide more clarity in what data is being collected, used and shared, said Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., in a Wednesday news release. In a letter to CEO Travis Kalanick, Franken wrote that Uber's November app update forces users to either "always" allow the company to access their location even when the app isn't being used and running in the background or "never" allowing their location to be accessed. The app update may provide consumer benefits, Franken wrote, but "renewed allegations" of Uber employees' past abuse of customer data underscore the need for users themselves to decide whether they want their information shared -- and when and with whom -- and to expect data to have the "utmost protection." The senator recommended Uber update its policy to say location data is collected only when the user is interacting with the app. Uber should make it clear that data are used only for the stated justifications for the app update, which is to improve service and safety and prevent fraud, he said. Users should get details on how to disable location tracking or get a link to a page that provides a good understanding of how location data is collected, treated and shared, he said. Franken said Uber also needs to notify users via the app or by email when it makes significant changes to data collection and use. Two weeks ago, the Electronic Frontier Foundation had an in-depth blog post about the app update. An Uber spokeswoman emailed that the company received Franken's letter and will respond. She pointed to a statement the company made when the changes were announced in November. At the time, Uber said when the app was open on a user's home screen, it "created challenges" with pick-ups regarding the rider's exact location and drop-offs. Collecting the data will help improve service and safety, it said, and riders can opt out and still use the service.