The Federal Communications Commission yesterday voted to end funding for two programs designed to help schoolchildren and library patrons access the Internet.
FCC Chairman Brendan Carr claims that Biden-era orders to establish the programs exceeded the FCC's authority. The FCC voted 2-1 to kill the programs, with Republican Olivia Trusty voting with Carr and Democrat Anna Gomez dissenting.
In the previous administration, the FCC expanded the Universal Service Fund's E-Rate program in 2024 to let schools and libraries lend out Wi-Fi hotspots and services that could be used off-premises. The FCC separately decided in 2023 to let the E-Rate program pay for Wi-Fi service on school buses.
With yesterday's decisions, the Universal Service Fund administrator will deny requests to fund off-premises use of Wi-Fi hotspots and Wi-Fi equipment on school buses. Carr said that Congress temporarily authorized the hotspot program during the pandemic, and the FCC didn't have authority to bring it back when the congressional authorization expired.
"When that program ended, so did the FCC's authority to fund Wi-Fi hotspots," Carr said. "Nonetheless, the Commission unlawfully chose to keep funding hotspots in plain violation of the limits Congress imposed. Specifically, Section 254 [of the Communications Act] limits the FCC's E-Rate authority to enhance the access of telecommunication services in 'classrooms and libraries'—not any remote location at which people might want to learn."
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Carr complained that the program imposed "no limit on where hotspots could be used," allowing "unsupervised Internet access." As for the school bus Wi-Fi program, Carr said that "E-Rate funding is meant to enhance access to telecommunications services in classrooms and libraries. A school bus is neither. We cannot simply reinterpret 'classrooms' to mean any place where learning might occur."
Carr argued that "giving kids unrestricted access to the Internet while riding the school bus is bad policy. Children are among the most impressionable members of our society. Parents have a right to decide when—and how—their kids access the Internet. Wi-Fi on school buses removes both the supervision that helps keep kids safe and the parental control that protects them from harmful or inappropriate content."