U.S. Reps. Renee Ellmers (R-NC) and Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) led legislative efforts on Friday to prohibit the FCC from regulating Internet service providers (ISP) retail rates.
The Obama administration and FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler promised that the FCC would not regulate broadband rates when Internet access was reclassified as a utility under Title II of the Communications Act. The No Rate Regulation of Broadband Internet Access Act, H.R. 2666, would codify that promise.
Ellmers, an original cosponsor of the bill and a member of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology, said that although FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler publicly declared that the FCC would not regulate broadband rates, there was too much at stake to take a chance.
“This is an important step to reining in the FCC’s ever-expanding scope and authority, and it is critical to providing certainty for businesses and consumers,” Ellmers said. “Conservatives know price-fixing doesn’t work, and Internet service is no exception. If we are to allow the FCC to interfere in the Internet marketplace in such a way, we discourage investment, intimidate innovators and could forfeit upwards of 43,000 jobs.”
Kinzinger, the legislation’s author, said that the Internet has “thrived” since its inception in an unregulated model.
“Both Chairman Wheeler and President Obama assured Congress and the public that any regulations that were adopted under the open Internet order would refrain from allowing the federal government to regulate rates of broadband Internet access,” Kinzinger said. “H.R. 2666 codifies both the president’s and Chairman Wheeler’s past promises and will allow innovative companies to do what they do best: create new products and better services to benefit consumers.”
U.S. Rep. Greg Walden (R-OR), the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology, added that the legislation was “an essential step in maintaining the robust and vibrant Internet ecosystem that drives our economy, powers innovation and promotes jobs and investments like no other service.”