(Photo by VINCENT FEURAY/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images)
Democrats are concerned that the Trump administration is poised to funnel billions to SpaceX’s Starlink at the expense of fiber broadband installations.
The Wall Street Journal this week reported that the Commerce Department is looking at changing the $42.5 billion Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program to make it easier for Starlink to receive as much as $20 billion in BEAD funding, up from $4 billion.
On Wednesday, Democratic lawmakers pushed back on that plan in a House subcommittee meeting focused on fixing problems with the BEAD program, which has been in the planning stages since President Biden signed the funding into law as part of 2021’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
“I’m also deeply concerned by attempts to divert funding from fiber to Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite service,” said US Rep. Doris Matsui (D-Calif.). “Unlike satellite, fiber is the gold standard and future-proof technology that will grow with consumers’ data needs over time. Granted some areas may be better served by non-fiber alternatives, but existing BEAD guidance already recognizes this.”
Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) added that SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, a major Trump ally, is "salivating over the prospect of steering BEAD dollars to his companies.” Starlink service is already available across the US, so "anyone who wants to sign up can do so without a dime of taxpayer’s money,” Pallone added.
(Credit: Olegda88 via Getty Images)For now, the Commerce Department has only confirmed it's considering an overhaul to the BEAD program, which is designed to expand high-speed internet access in the US, especially in rural areas.
“The department is ripping out the Biden administration’s pointless requirements,” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said today. “It is revamping the BEAD program to take a tech-neutral approach that is rigorously driven by outcomes, so states can provide internet access for the lowest cost.
“We will work with states and territories to quickly get rid of the delays and the waste. Thereafter we will move quickly to implementation in order to get households connected,” he added.
Other Republicans agree. During Wednesday’s subcommittee hearing, Rep. Brett Guthrie (R-KY) said: “As a first step, the program needs to be reformed to be technology-neutral so states have the ability to choose what technologies are appropriate for them.”
Although the slow execution of the BEAD program has long been a complaint, a former Biden Commerce Department official told the committee that the BEAD program was on cusp of distributing the funding before the Trump administration began pausing the work.
“To halt progress now—or worse, to force states to redo their work would be disastrous. It would delay broadband deployments for years and waste taxpayer dollars,” said Sarah Morris, former senior advisor and deputy administrator for the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA).
“The reality is that states are almost finished with the 14-step process that Congress designed. All 56 states and territories have completed key planning steps, and most are in the final stages of selecting providers and approving project funding,” she added. “More than half are already reviewing bids from ISPs.”
According to Morris, BEAD’s rules were designed to subsidize “fiber out as far as economically possible,” while allowing alternatives, such as satellite connectivity, to fill the gap where fiber installations would be too costly.
The looming dispute comes as the Federal Aviation Administration is reportedly considering canceling a $2.4 billion contract with Verizon to upgrade its network with fiber in favor of distributing the funding to Starlink. But on Wednesday, SpaceX dismissed the reporting as false.
“Starlink is a possible partial fix to an aging [FAA] system. There is no effort or intent for Starlink to 'take over' any existing contract – that’s just FUD [Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt],” the company said in a tweet.