FCC chair teams up with Ted Cruz to block Wi-Fi hotspots for schoolkids

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr is teaming up with Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) to block funding for Wi-Fi hotspots for schoolchildren.

Cruz convinced the Senate to kill the FCC’s hotspot program in May. While Cruz’s proposal didn’t make it through the House of Representatives, Carr is now taking action to stop the program’s implementation.

“Today, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr asked his commission colleagues to vote on two items that would reverse the agency’s unlawful, Biden-era decisions to expand COVID spending programs,” Carr’s announcement said. “Those FCC decisions spent scarce taxpayer dollars on funding unsupervised screen time for kids without accounting for the significant attendant risks.”

Carr coordinated with Cruz ahead of the announcement. The press release included a statement from Cruz, in which the senator alleged that “the Biden FCC hotspot program endangered kids, duplicated existing federal funding, and violated the law.”

Cruz’s Senate proposal was a resolution of disapproval, which would have forbidden the FCC from adopting a similar rule in the future. By contrast, Carr’s action to end the program wouldn’t prevent a future FCC chair from reviving it. Cruz still wants the House to vote on the resolution to ensure that the Wi-Fi hotspot program can never be revived.

“Kudos to Chairman Carr for moving to undo the Biden hotspot program and protect children, but now it’s time for Congress to step up and codify this change,” Cruz said in the FCC press release. “In May, the Senate passed my Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution overturning the illegal Biden hotspot rule. I urge the House to act on the resolution and prevent this or similar harmful rules in the future.”