Pre-Emption of Municipal Broadband Laws Would Put U.S. 'to the Left of Europe,' Campbell Says
President Barack Obama’s support for federal pre-emption of states’ municipal broadband restrictions, if enacted at the FCC Feb. 26, “would put [U.S.] broadband policy somewhere to the left of Europe,” said Center for Boundless Innovation in Technology Director Fred Campbell…
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
in a blog post Monday. The EU ruled last year that government-owned broadband networks harm competition when deployed alongside private networks, Campbell said. The EU subsequently issued a law that requires that broadband network investments “shall be undertaken primarily by the private sector, supported by a competitive and investment-friendly regulatory framework.” Municipal broadband networks like the one in Cedar Falls, Iowa, that Obama praised in January “would be presumptively illegal under EU law -- just as it would be under many of the state laws the President wants to overrule,” Campbell said.