Senate to Look at Network-Neutrality Rule

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee will hold a hearing April 20 on federal rulemaking and the "administrative state."

Among the topics being addressed is the FCC's network neutrality rulemaking, which Republicans have been highly critical of, including the perceived pressure from the Obama Administration to reclassify ISPs under Title II common carrier regs.

Witnesses at the hearings will be:

Jonathan Turley, professor of public interest law at George Washington University; Randolph May, president of the Free State Foundation; Bradford Campbell, counsel, Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP; William Kovacs, SVP, technology & regulatory affairs, U.S. Chamber of Commerce; and Robert Weissman, president, Public Citizen.

Elsewhere on the network neutrality front, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit released a trio of decisions Tuesday, but still no sign of a decision on ISP's challenge to the Open Internet order, which was argued Dec. 7.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.