— Less than 24 hours before the Federal Communications Commission votes on a landmark Internet proposal, Republicans who oppose the regulations used a last-minute hearing on Wednesday to declare that the battle is far from over.
“What the FCC is most likely going to vote on tomorrow is ‘net nonsense,’” said Rep. Joe Barton, R-Tex., at the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee hearing Wednesday. “It’s not going to work. It is going to be tested in court, and it’s going to fail in court.”
The agency’s controversial new rules seek to protect net neutrality, the equal treatment of all Internet content, by regulating the Internet like a public utility. This would give the FCC the authority to ensure that Internet service providers don’t block or slow down traffic to websites or allow companies like Netflix to pay providers extra for “fast lanes” that guarantee smoother streaming for their users.
Large telecom companies including Comcast, AT&T and Verizon have already threatened to sue over the regulations, which are expected to pass on Thursday when the FCC votes 3-2 along partisan lines.
Republicans have proposed their own bill that would protect net neutrality rules, while stopping the FCC from exerting its regulatory powers over the Internet.
Opponents of the agency’s proposal argued that Chairman Tom Wheeler bowed to pressure from the White House after President Obama came out in favor of strong net neutrality regulations last November.
"The closer we get to the FCC rubber-stamping President Obama's Internet grab, the more disturbing it becomes," the subcommittee’s chairman, Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., said in a statement. "Consumers, innovators and job creators all stand to lose from this misguided approach."
Republicans were forced to postpone a second hearing on Wednesday, this one before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on whether the White House inappropriately influenced the proposal, after Wheeler declined to testify.
"So long as the chairman continues to insist on secrecy, we will continue calling for more transparency and accountability at the commission," the committee chairman, Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, and House Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., said in a joint statement.
"Chairman Wheeler and the FCC are not above Congress. This fight continues as the future of the Internet is at stake."
Upton echoed that sentiment in Wednesday’s hearing.
"Tomorrow’s commission vote does not signal the end of this debate," said Rep. Upton. "Rather, it is just the beginning.”
As expected: "I'm voting no." - @AjitPaiFCC http://t.co/J7R7XODnL5 pic.twitter.com/rqLMuRZ7t3 #OpenInternet #NetNeutrality
— Alex Howard (@digiphile) February 25, 2015
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