An effort to fund an internet subsidy program just got thwarted again

Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo from Getty Images

Don't hold your breath for a resurgence of government internet subsidies. Republicans and Democrats can't seem to agree on a way forward to fund the program, and passing such bills will only get more difficult as Election Day inches closer.

Democrats and Republicans have introduced dueling bills to reauthorize the Federal Communications Commission's spectrum auctions, where the agency doles out access to frequencies that can be used to carry wireless signals. But the Democratic bill that has been repeatedly delayed in committee specifically seeks to fund a now-defunct internet subsidy program, while the Republican version does not. While some Republicans supported earlier efforts to extend the subsidy program, those efforts did not go...

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