U.S. Supreme Court justices peppered both sides with questions on Tuesday as the court heard McLaughlin Chiropractic Associates v. McKesson, a Telephone Consumer Protection Act case with broad implications for the FCC and other agencies. Lawyers representing TCPA defendants fear that a decision overruling the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals could mean any district court might decide whether a regulatory action is valid, leading to a bonanza for TCPA plaintiffs, who could seek alternative interpretations in different courts (see 2410170015).

President Donald Trump signed a host of executive orders Monday that could affect FCC policy going forward and have already led newly minted FCC Chairman Brendan Carr to scrub the agency’s processes of references to diversity, equity and inclusion and scrap the FCC’s diversity committee. The executive orders include a pause on the TikTok divestiture rule, a freeze on new regulations, a return of the Schedule F rule making it easier to replace federal workers with political appointees, and policies requiring information sharing with the new Department of Government Efficiency. Another order issued Monday officially designated Carr as chairman.

O-RAN Alliance reelects board chair Abdurazak Mudesir, Deutsche Telekom, and elects board directors and alternate directors for two-year terms: Yigal Elbaz (director), Brian Daly (alternate director), AT&T; Eben Albertyn, Jingyi Zhou, Boost Mobile; Yuhong Huang, Chich-Lin I, China Mobile; Yue Wang, Qingtian Wang, China Telecom; Abdurazak Mudesir, Petr Ledl, Deutsche Telekom; Takuya Sawada, Masaaki Koga, KDDI; Takaaki Sato, Masafumi Masuda NTT DOCOMO; Claire Chauvin, Atoosa Hatefi, Orange; Sharad Sriwastawa, Awn Muhammad, Rakuten Mobile; Ryuji Wakikawa, Alex Jinsung Choi, SoftBank; Enrique Blanco, Jose Luis Espla, Telefonica; Andrea Calvi, Marco Caretti, TIM; Michael Irizarry, Narothum Saxena, UScellular; Steven Rice, Edward Diaz, Verizon; Nadia Benabdallah, Francisco Martin, Vodafone.

Eight former FCC commissioners filed an amicus brief at the U.S. Supreme Court last week urging the justices to overturn the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ 9-7 en banc decision invalidating part of the USF program. Meanwhile, likely Senate Communications Subcommittee leaders Deb Fischer, R-Neb., and Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., led an amicus brief with 27 other House and Senate lawmakers defending the funding mechanism.

Federated Wireless CEO Iyad Tarazi expects relative stability on spectrum issues with the change in administrations, though he noted there are always questions. In a wide-ranging interview with us, he predicted that sharing in some form will be part of the rules for the lower 3 GHz band, one of the top focuses of carriers for exclusive, licensed use. A former Sprint executive, Tarazi became CEO of Federated in 2014.

Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo names to Commerce Spectrum Management Advisory Committee: Reza Arefi, Apple; Andy Bater, American Farm Bureau Federation’s National Technology Committee; Donna Bethea-Murphy, Inmarsat; Mary Brown, Salt Point Strategies; Hilary Cain, Alliance for Automotive Innovation; Michael Calabrese, New American Foundation’s Wireless Future Project; Stephen Devine, APCO International; Thomas Dombrowsky, T-Mobile; Michele Farquhar, Hogan Lovells; Mark Gibson, CommScope; Kalpak Gude, Amazon; Tim Harrington, Ultra-Wideband Alliance; Carolyn Kahn, Mitre; Colleen King, Charter; Jennifer McCarthy, consultant; Amit Mukhopadhyay, Nokia Bell Labs; Karl Nebbia, Huntington Ingalls; Aspasia Paroutsas, Qualcomm; Louis Peraertz, Wireless Internet Service Providers Association; Brian Regan, Quadra Partners; Dennis Roberson, Illinois Institute of Technology; Andrew Roy, Aviation Spectrum Resources; Jesse Russell, incNetworks; Sanyogita Shamsunder, NextNav; Jeff Stewart, AT&T; Christopher Szymanski, Broadcom; Rikin Thakker, NCTA; Bryan Tramont, Wilkinson Barker Knauer; Jennifer Warren, Lockheed Martin; and Robert Weller, NAB.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., voiced support Thursday for extending ByteDance’s Jan. 19 deadline to divest TikTok after Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., unsuccessfully attempted to advance his Extend the TikTok Deadline Act (S-103) delay proposal Wednesday night by unanimous consent. S-103 and House companion HR-391 seek a 270-day extension of the divestment deadline (see 2501140075). “We aren’t against TikTok,” Schumer said on the floor Thursday. “We want TikTok to keep going. But we are against a Chinese company that is in cahoots with the Chinese Communist Party owning TikTok.” Schumer said TikTok “as it exists today has too many security risks that cannot be ignored,” but it’s “clear that more time is needed to find an American buyer and not disrupt the lives and livelihoods of millions of Americans, of so many influencers who have built up a good network of followers.” It’s “stunning” that Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton, R-Ark., objected to Markey’s bid to move S-103 by UC because “time is running short,” Schumer said: “We will continue to work to find a responsible solution to keeping TikTok going, protect American livelihoods and protect against Chinese Communist Party surveillance. We must and can do all three.”

House China Committee Chairman John Moolenaar, R-Mich., urged that the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. review Skydance Media's proposed $8 billion purchase of Paramount Global because of Tencent’s investment in Skydance. The Center for American Rights argued earlier this week that Tencent’s status as part of DOD’s list of Chinese military companies operating in the U.S. warrants an FCC probe of Skydance/Paramount (see 2501140048). “We’ve heard from multiple Hollywood executives about rampant self-censorship designed to curry favor with the Chinese Communist Party,” Moolenaar said in a statement Wednesday night. DOD’s recent classification of “Tencent as a Chinese military company” means “CFIUS should closely scrutinize the proposed merger to ensure the Chinese Communist Party is not further solidifying its hold on the American entertainment industry.” Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner, D-Va., in a separate statement, said the “potential for a [People's Republic of China] national champion like Tencent to hold a significant financial stake in a major US content conglomerate raises serious concerns and should absolutely prompt CFIUS scrutiny.”

The FCC’s bureau-level rejections of four content-based legal challenges against network-owned TV stations Thursday could complicate future agency moves against broadcasters over their reporting but won’t prevent it, attorneys and free speech advocates told us. When he becomes chair next week, Commissioner Brendan Carr could quickly reverse the Media Bureau and Enforcement Bureau decisions rejecting challenges against ABC-, Fox-, NBC- and CBS- owned stations. However, doing so could require the agency to defend upending decades of precedent, broadcaster and public interest attorneys told us. The decisions “draw a bright line at a moment when clarity about government interference with the free press is needed more than ever,” said Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in a release Thursday. “The FCC should not be the President’s speech police.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) announced a statewide public broadband network during her state of the state address last night. The Excelsior Broadband Network will build and connect public broadband assets throughout the state. A new fiber line will run the full length of the New York Thruway, according to Hochul's plan. American Association for Public Broadband Executive Director Gigi Sohn welcomed the news. The investment is a "significant win" and "clearly illustrates a positive trend" of states "committing to broadband access."