{"id":25994,"date":"2022-02-02T16:20:18","date_gmt":"2022-02-02T21:20:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/?p=25994"},"modified":"2022-02-02T16:34:03","modified_gmt":"2022-02-02T21:34:03","slug":"opposition-to-biden-fcc-nominee-gigi-sohn-reaches-critical-mass","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/25994\/opposition-to-biden-fcc-nominee-gigi-sohn-reaches-critical-mass\/","title":{"rendered":"Opposition to Biden FCC Nominee Gigi Sohn Reaches Critical Mass"},"content":{"rendered":"

For months, CFIF has articulated<\/a> why the U.S. Senate must reject the Biden Administration’s nomination of hyperpartisan Gigi Sohn to sit on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), including our expression of support for Senator Roger Wicker’s<\/a> (R – Mississippi) demand for rehearing based upon potential ethical concerns regarding Ms. Sohn after reviewing the substance of a $32 million litigation settlement between television broadcasters and the defunct Locast streaming service following her nomination.\u00a0 Sohn sat on the board of Sports Fan Coalition, a nonprofit organization that operated Locast:<\/p>\n

As Senator Wicker rightfully notes, the FCC oversees and regulates companies that were party to the $32 million settlement in question. Accordingly, the possibility of Ms. Sohn\u2019s future financial liability to companies over which she would wield power if confirmed to the FCC merit immediate and full investigation. In addition, the timing of the settlement following her nomination by the Biden Administration offers additional reason for full public hearing to resolve any ethical questions.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Now, The Wall Street Journal<\/em> joins the accumulating chorus of opposition, bluntly asking<\/a>, “Does an independent agency nominee who has deceived Senators about her business conflicts deserve to be confirmed?”<\/p>\n

After the hearing Mississippi Sen. Roger Wicker followed up with a written question:\u00a0 ‘Where did the money come from for the payment of the $32 million settlement in connection with the Locast case?’\u00a0 If a company donated the funds, she might have to recuse herself from matters involving the donor.\u00a0 She responded that the ‘settlement funds come from amounts collected to fund [Sports Fan Coalition NY] after SFCNY pays its vendors.’\u00a0 SFCNY is the name of the nonprofit that operated Locast.\u00a0 This was an odd answer because SFCNY\u2019s IRS 990 form showed only $794,159 in assets and funds at the end of 2020.\u00a0 Where did the other $31 million come from?<\/p>\n

Ms. Sohn declined the Senate\u2019s request for a copy of the settlement, and now we know why.\u00a0 Bloomberg Law reported this week that the settlement was signed Oct. 27 \u2014 one day after President Biden nominated her.\u00a0 Locast only agreed to pay $700,000.\u00a0 We\u2019ve independently reviewed a copy of the settlement, which has Ms. Sohn\u2019s signature.\u00a0 In other words, on the day after she was nominated to her powerful regulatory position, broadcasters agreed to a settlement that cut the liability of her nonprofit by 98%. Interesting timing.<\/p>\n

Why didn\u2019t Ms. Sohn correct Mr. Wicker about the ‘$32 million settlement’?\u00a0 Even if there was nothing improper about the settlement agreement, her lack of candor is a problem.\u00a0 The settlement also creates the appearance of a conflict given her pending power over broadcasters, which she must pledge to avoid in an FCC ethics agreement.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Beyond her ethical failures as articulated by Senator Wicker and The Wall Street Journal<\/em>, Ms. Sohn\u2019s nomination gravely threatens America\u2019s thriving internet sector.\u00a0\u00a0 Specifically, she seeks to more heavily regulate that sector in the image of European internet service, which performed poorly throughout the Covid pandemic compared to the United States.\u00a0 Despite nationwide quarantines and surges in internet use, U.S. broadband speeds actually increased by\u00a091%<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0in 2020.\u00a0 Europe, in contrast, suffered service bottlenecks and overload, prompting regulators to ask content providers to throttle back.\u00a0 Ms. Sohn would undermine the private U.S. broadband sector and remake it in that demonstrably inferior European image.\u00a0 She has signaled support for rate regulation of broadband and is a staunch advocate of government-owned broadband, which would undermine private investment and network expansion, as well as the jobs that investment and expansion create.<\/p>\n

Sohn also favors radical reimposition of Title II so-called “Net Neutrality” regulations, which would regulate private internet service as a “public utility” under 1930s statutes aimed at copper-wire telephones.\u00a0 After the Obama FCC first imposed those regulations in 2015, the negative effects were immediate:\u00a0 For the very first time ever outside of an economic recession, private internet investment actually\u00a0declined<\/a><\/strong>.\u00a0 When the Trump Administration FCC under Chairman Ajit Pai subsequently reversed the Obama FCC\u2019s Title II regulation, private investment rebounded and internet service speeds\u00a0immediately increased<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Our internet service sector mustn\u2019t be subjected to the sort of disruptive overregulation that Sohn would bring if confirmed to the FCC.\u00a0 She\u2019s also notoriously weak on U.S.\u00a0intellectual property rights<\/a><\/strong>, and advocates imposition of consumer privacy laws in a crony capitalist manner.\u00a0 She’s simply too radical to be confirmed to the FCC at a time when Americans rely more than ever on a thriving internet service sector, and Senator Wicker is to be applauded for his leadership on this issue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For months, CFIF has articulated why the U.S. Senate must reject the Biden Administration’s nomination of hyperpartisan Gigi Sohn to sit on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), including our expression of support for Senator Roger Wicker’s (R – Mississippi) demand for rehearing based upon potential ethical concerns regarding Ms. Sohn after reviewing the substance of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[188,5155,2872],"class_list":["post-25994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts","tag-fcc","tag-gigi-sohn","tag-ip"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25994"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25994\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25999,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25994\/revisions\/25999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}