FCC Nominee Sohn Faces Third Hearing As Democrats Dawdle, The GOP Obstructs, And A Sleazy Telecom Industry Smear Campaign Continues

Telecom and media giants have been working overtime to block Gigi Sohn from being seated at the FCC. That has involved a sleazy smear campaign, seeded in the press by non-profits linked to companies like News Corporation, AT&T, and Comcast, falsely accusing Sohn of being a radical extremist who hates Hispanics, rural Americans, cops, puppies, and freedom.

With Sohn freshly re-nominated by the Biden administration, the attacks recently began anew, with industry seeding homophobic attacks in friendly press outlets, and News Corporation, one of several companies behind the attacks, feebly trying to falsely frame Sohn (genuinely popular across both sides of the aisle) as an unhinged radical in its opinion section.

After fifteen weeks of this bullshit, Sohn today faced an unprecedented third hearing before Congress, during which she was more blunt about exactly why her confirmation remains stuck in DC purgatory (hint: it's not because she lacks experience, isn't qualified, or isn't popular):

[I have faced] 15 months of false and misleading attacks on my record and my character. My industry opponents have hidden behind dark money groups and surrogates because they fear a pragmatic, pro-competition, pro-consumer policymaker who will support policies that will bring more, faster, and lower-priced broadband."

She's correct. The GOP is effectively a hand puppet for telecom and media giants terrified of the FCC having a functional voting majority. They're desperate to keep all the mindless handouts they received during the Trump administration, whether that's the gutting of the FCC's consumer protection authority, the repeal of net neutrality rules, or the removal of media consolidation limits.

Democrats carry their own share of the blame. President Biden's nomination of Sohn was inexplicably delayed nine months. Chuck Schumer has consistently failed to whip the votes necessary to get Sohn over the finish line. Maria Cantwell has continually pandered to GOP demands for unnecessary, additional show trials. Senators Mark Kelly, Joe Manchin, and Catherine Cortez Masto have dragged their feet on providing necessary votes, even at times parroting baseless industry claims without fact checking.

The great irony here is that even if Sohn gets confirmed and seated I'm highly doubtful that the Rosenworcel FCC has the political backbone to do even a quarter of the things industry is worried about. This idea that the FCC, an agency that has been under industry's thumb for more than a generation (with only brief, fleeting exceptions), will be dramatically reformed via the addition of one actual reformer is grade school thinking and scare mongering.

Keep in mind, the FCC for four years under Trump was little more than a mindless rubber stamp for industry. And for nearly two years under Biden, telecom (Comcast, AT&T) and media (News Corporation) giants have managed to keep the FCC stuck in partisan purgatory without the votes necessary to take any actions deemed remotely controversial by industry or the right wing.

That's six straight years that the nation's telecom and media regulators haven't been able to do their jobs... because the nation's biggest media and telecom giants don't want them to.

That's a stunning and embarrassing level of corruption and regulatory capture any way you slice it.