Three challenges to FCC business data services rules were filed in three different circuits, the commission told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in a letter (in Pacer) Thursday. An attached "notice of multicircuit petitions for review has been filed with the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation of Multicircuit Petitions for Review," said the letter, which listed the cases: Ad Hoc Telecom Users Comm. v. FCC, No. 17-1153 in the D.C. Circuit, CenturyLink v. FCC, No. 17-60439 in the 5th Circuit and Citizens Telecomms Co. of Minn. v. FCC, 17-2296 in the 8th Circuit. A brief D.C. Circuit order (in Pacer) Thursday consolidated an earlier Sprint and Windstream challenge to the BDS rules with the Ad Hoc challenge. The FCC asked the D.C. Circuit Tuesday to remand an AT&T challenge to a 2016 BDS tariff investigation order for further agency consideration (see 1706140012).

U.S. policy is moving toward more deregulation and reliance on antitrust enforcement to address market abuses, said American Enterprise Institute visiting scholar Jeffrey Eisenach, a member of then-President-elect Donald Trump's FCC transition team. In a speech at an FCBA event Wednesday, Eisenach gave a big thumbs-up to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, and he singled out William Kennard, chairman from 1997 to 2001, for laying a deregulatory foundation. “What is the path forward? I think Chairman Pai is on it," Eisenach said. "He’s not only insisting on and promoting debate around the facts, the issues, and analysis, but also ... cheerfully using communications skills.” Eisenach is "especially enthusiastic" about Pai's proposal to create an Office of Economics and Data. He credited Kennard for devising a strategic plan in the late 1990s that envisioned an agency transition from industry regulator to market facilitator as the internet and other innovations eroded distinctions between market segments. He said that plan was the "touchstone" of the Trump FCC transition team. “After many delays and detours, we seem to be back on a path that … will lead to the replacement of ex-ante regulation in the communications sector with a framework ultimately grounded in antitrust," he said. Eisenach said President Jimmy Carter and Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., collaborated on airline and trucking deregulation in the late 1970s, and President Bill Clinton and House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., collaborated on the 1996 Telecom Act: “It’s far too much to hope that President Trump and Senator [Al] Franken [D-Minn.] will appear together at some point endorsing the same piece of legislation, but we have to hope." Government still will be needed, Eisenach said, such as in managing spectrum and providing subsidies and incentives to build out broadband; the question is how best to do it. He said there's a role for government to fund some broadband infrastructure efforts in remote rural areas. "Far and away, not the biggest waste of government money by any stretch would be to just do some direct spending in conjunction with incentives," he said, while warning against overdoing it. Eisenach congratulated and joked about ex-Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, whom Trump said he would nominate to another term at the FCC (see 1706140046 and 1706140065). "Better late than never, but better now than sooner. So, I can’t resist. I’m happy she’s coming back to the commission and I’m so happy she’s been gone. Sorry,” he said, drawing some laughs.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai told the National Congress of American Indians Wednesday he's fully committed to working with the tribal governments on siting and other issues. Pai said he has had a number of meetings with tribal officials since becoming chairman in January. Tribal approvals are seen as a potential stumbling block, especially for wireless infrastructure approvals (see 1706020053). “I honor and embrace that trust relationship and my responsibilities as the Chairman of the FCC,” Pai said in written remarks. “Those responsibilities include a commitment for the Bureaus and Offices across our agency to work collaboratively with our Office of Native Affairs and Policy (ONAP). This will allow ONAP to seek input through all available means -- including consultation with Tribal leaders on a government-to-government basis.” Pai noted he just completed a weeklong trip with meetings from Milwaukee to Casper, Wyoming. The focus was on the digital divide and helping communities catch up, he said: “Rural Americans, including many in Indian Country, disproportionately find themselves on the wrong side of the digital divide.” Pai said one of the most "meaningful" meetings was with tribal representatives in South Dakota. Much is at stake, he said. "We don’t bemoan the digital divide in Indian Country because some people can’t play online games like Candy Crush," Pai said. "We focus on these issues because Internet connectivity has become vital to full participation in modern life."

NTCA and USTelecom asked the FCC to give rural telcos broadband USF contribution relief while the agency seeks to revise the subsidy system's assessments of industry for funding. The commission should provide "targeted, temporary forbearance from the application of USF contribution requirements ... with respect to broadband Internet access transmission services provided by RLECs pending the completion of comprehensive USF contributions reform," they said in a petition Wednesday in docket 06-122. The groups sought the USF contribution relief for such RLEC broadband services until the commission decides whether any and all broadband services "should be required to contribute to support of federal USF programs or completes some other form of contributions reform." They said regulatory forbearance would have a "de minimis effect" on USF contributions. RLECs are being subjected to "discriminatory and anti-competitive treatment" under a 2005 wireline broadband order that allowed them to offer broadband on a common-carrier basis -- to recover costs for such service via access rates and USF -- but only if they agreed to make USF contributions, NTCA and USTelecom said. Other providers haven't been required to make USF contributions, even under the 2015 net neutrality order that reclassified broadband as a Communications Act Title II telecom service because the agency provided USF contribution forbearance, they said. A federal-state joint board is looking at USF contribution issues in an effort to make recommendations to the FCC for possible changes. The FCC, CTIA, NTCA and Public Knowledge didn't comment.

The FCC approved the first grants of licenses purchased in the TV incentive auction and will let “phase zero” low-power TV stations and translators displaced far ahead of the special LPTV displacement window move to temporary channels or temporarily channel share. Among those 2,317 licenses in the wireless band OK'ed were licenses bought by T-Mobile, Dish Network through ParkerB, Comcast through CC Wireless Investment, and AT&T -- 52 pages of licenses in all -- said a public notice by the Incentive Auction Task Force and Wireless Bureau. Fifty bidders paid $19.3 billion in the auction for a total of 2,776 licenses. The licenses approved cover some of the largest U.S. markets, including New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. “We have received information from T-Mobile USA, Inc. (T-Mobile), one of the recipients of the licenses granted today in the 600 MHz Band, indicating that it may commence operations or conduct FFA [first field application] testing using some of its 600 MHz Band licenses later this year,” the PN said. The displacement window for LPTV and translators likely won’t open until Q1, which could leave some LPTV and translators in the cold, said filings from the LPTV Spectrum Rights Coalition, T-Mobile and NAB (see 1706050066). To address a gap, the IATF and Media Bureau will allow low-power broadcasters that are notified by the new owners of 600 MHz spectrum that they have 120 days to cease operations to request a waiver of the current freeze on displacement applications and apply for special temporary authority (STA) to operate on a temporary channel or seek a temporary channel sharing arrangement, another PN said. The temporary channels requested must be in the bands allocated for TV and can’t interfere with existing broadcasters, the PN said. “In considering the STA request, we will assess whether the proposed displacement facility complies with our technical and interference rules.” For temporary channel sharing, “two or more eligible LPTV/translator stations may each request a waiver of the Displacement Freeze and submit a displacement application that proposes to share a channel with the other eligible LPTV/translator,” the PN said. “Relief, if granted, will be temporary.” The Media Bureau meanwhile gave special permission for KCRA (DT) Riverside, California, a winning bidder in the incentive auction, to consummate a transaction before disbursement of incentive auction payments, said another PN. Under incentive auction rules, stations that were winning bidders would have to wait until the auction payments went out, the PN said. KCRA sought to “consummate a pro forma intra-corporate reorganization” before the payments are disbursed, the PN said. The timing is sensitive and “tied to the maturity of certain notes and a new bond offering,” the PN said. Since the deal is pro forma and won’t change the holder of the license, the bank accounts or the FCC registration number involved, the Media Bureau granted the request, the PN said. “Our decision is limited to the specific facts and special circumstances before us.”

The FCC asked a court to remand a business data service investigation case in which AT&T is challenging a 2016 order that found certain incumbent telco BDS tariff provisions were unlawful (see 1604280057). In its statement of issues to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, AT&T had said the order is contrary to the court's 2006 BellSouth v. FCC ruling that vacated a previous commission tariff order. "The Order on review did not address BellSouth," said an FCC motion for voluntary remand Tuesday in AT&T v. FCC, No. 16-1166. "Because that case, like the Order on review, addresses the lawfulness of BDS tariff terms, the Commission believes that it would be appropriate to consider the extent to which the reasoning in the Order is compatible with the BellSouth decision." The FCC said DOJ and intervenor CenturyLink consent to its motion; intervenors Sprint and Incompas are studying it; intervenor Ad Hoc Telecommunications Committee doesn't consent; and the agency discussed the motion with a counsel to intervenor Level 3 but the company didn't respond. Sprint, Incompas, Ad Hoc and Level 3 didn't comment Wednesday.

Beyond implementation of the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act, FCC efforts at expanding digital opportunities for people with disabilities included improving video relay services and implementing rules to improve video captioning quality, Chairman Ajit Pai said Tuesday at the M-Enabling Summit in Arlington, Virginia, according to provided material. The FCC announced winners of the Chairman's Awards for Advancement in Accessibility: the Ava app for transcribing multiparty conversations on smart phones; Facebook's automatic alternative text feature, which describes on-screen images for people with visual impairments; Accessible Media's Integrated Described Video Best Practices Guide; and Amazon's VoiceView feature, which speaks on-screen text as a user navigates menu options.

The FCC's proposed USF contribution rate for Q3 is 17.1 percent of carrier revenue from interstate and international telecom service end users, said the Office of Managing Director in a public notice Tuesday in docket 96-45. That would be down from Q2's 17.4 percent and the same as what industry analyst Billy Jack Gregg recently projected after Universal Service Administrative Co.'s latest revision to its estimates for USF demand and industry revenue (see 1706050008). If the FCC doesn't act within 14 days, the proposal will take effect.

Cause of Action Institute (CoA), which represented LabMD in its FTC fight (see 1701050044), filed an amicus brief Tuesday in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, backing AT&T Mobility against the FTC (see 1705090068). In September, the full court will review the case, which could decide whether the agency has authority to regulate ISPs (see 1705100063). In its filing (in Pacer), CoA said the court's decision in the case could directly affect the nonprofit's ability to protect businesses from the agency in litigation in the circuit. "CoA is concerned that the FTC would weaponize, misinterpret, and exploit any dicta on matters not directly within the scope of the narrow issue presented (even if not briefed) in other ways to extra-statutorily expand its powers, as it has done before," the filing said. CoA said it's concerned about the "emerging pattern" of the FTC not waiting for legislation to allow the commission to regulate broad areas "that not only flips basic administrative law on its head but threatens the separation of powers vital to liberty." CoA said its brief provides a "different account" of the FTC's enforcement activities in privacy, data security and technology than offered by those supporting the commission. The FTC declined to comment. In the LabMD case, the agency alleged the medical-testing lab was liable for lax data security practices and exposing sensitive patient information. That case is now in the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals (see 1701050044).

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai is expected to tap people from outside the agency to lead the Wireless Bureau and possibly the International Bureau, industry lawyers said, as he promoted acting Chief Lisa Fowlkes to permanent Public Safety Bureau chief. Pai has promoted a number of other longtime officials in recent weeks, including Kris Monteith as Wireline Bureau chief, Michelle Carey as chief of the Media Bureau and Timothy Strachan as director of the Office of Legislative Affairs. Donald Stockdale, an economist and lawyer formerly at the Wireline Bureau, is seen as likely choice as Wireless chief (see 1706070059).