Washington Watch

Grassley Will Lift Hold on FCC Nominees

WASHINGTON — The Federal Communications Commission could get two new
members by Memorial Day.

Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), who had placed a hold on the nominations of Republican
Ajit Pai and Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel to fill two vacant commission
seats, said last Friday afternoon (April 27) that while he is not yet satisfied with the
FCC’s handling of a waiver issued to LightSquared — which had sought to build a
wholesale terrestrial broadband network, but whose technology interfered with GPS
systems — now that a process is in place for him to get the documents he wants
from the FCC, he is ready to let the nominees proceed to a floor vote.

“The documents I’ve seen so far raise more questions than I had before,”
Grassley said Friday in a statement. “However, since there is now a process in
place to obtain all of the relevant documents from the FCC, I intend to lift my
hold on the two FCC nominees.”

Ajit Pai and Jessica Rosenworcel are two veteran Senate advisers with FCC experience
and bipartisan support of legislators. They were the consensus picks of
Senate Republican and Democratic leaders for the two FCC seats vacated last year
by commissioners Michael Copps and Meredith Attwell Baker. They sailed through a
confirmation hearing in the Senate Commerce Committee last December.

Grassley was and is concerned the FCC might have initially rushed the waiver
approval in its push for broadband competition, and said he is not done
vetting the waiver process.

FCC Extends MVPD Comment Period

WASHINGTON — The Federal Communications Commission last week extended
the initial comment deadline on the definition of an “MVPD” — multichannelvideo
programming distributor — from April 30 to May 14.

The National Association of Broadcasters had asked for a 30-day extension,
citing the deadline’s nearness to the organization’s annual convention in Las
Vegas, which would be occupying many broadcasters’ attention. The FCC split
the difference, though, as it did with the media ownership rule comment
deadline several weeks ago.

The FCC wants to know whether an MVPD that offers “programming over
the Internet without providing any of the facilities that carry programming into
viewers homes is an MVPD under the Communications Act,” Media Bureau
chief Bill Lake explained in a luncheon speech to the Media Institute in Washington.

The implications are wide-ranging, including whether over-the-top video
providers, such as Netflix’s instant streaming service, would be subject to
program-access or carriage rules, PEG channel requirements or retransmission-
consent and must-carry obligations. If an MVPD requires a transmission
path but an OVPD (online video programming distributor) does not have one, it
would ostensibly not be subjected to those rules and regulations. That would
give online distribution a competitive advantage over traditional cable and
could hasten the migration of cable operators to online distribution.

Parties Will Fight Net-Neutrality Rules in Court

WASHINGTON —The legality of the Federal Communications Commission’s network-neutrality rules will likely be debated through the end of the year in federal
court filings.

The parties to the Verizon Communications/MetroPCS/Free Press challenges
to FCC network-neutrality rules, which have been consolidated into a single
case, have agreed on and submitted to the court a schedule for briefs before
the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. If the court agrees, the
first briefs will be filed July 2 and the final briefs not until Nov. 21 (Thanksgiving
is Nov. 22, so it will be a busy Turkey Day run-up for communications lawyers).

According to one attorney familiar with the court, if it accepts the schedule, “oral
argument might be in late November or December, with a decision by spring.”