FCC Looks to Regulate Internet Rates (After It Said It Wouldn’t)
“There will be no rate regulation,” he wrote in a Wired magazine op-ed days before the FCC vote. “That means no rate regulation,” he repeated in a speech a few days later.” A fact sheet by Wheeler about the same time (points out Daniel Lyons of the American Enterprise Institute) repeated the pledge three more times.
That seems pretty airtight.
But, to make sure, Rep. Dan Kinzinger, R-Ill., wrote up the “No Rate Regulation of Internet Access Act” (H.R. 2666) forbidding the FCC from regulating rates. But, with the bill heading for the House floor as early as Friday, Wheeler has changed his tune, arguing now that the legislation would undermine his agencies ability to enforce the new net neutrality rules, as well as a variety of other FCC rules. The Obama administration shares his (current) views, issuing a veto threat against Kinzinger’s bill on Tuesday.
Wheeler argues that when he said “no rate regulation,” he meant no ex ante (“before the fact”) rate regulation, of the sort traditional applied to public utilities. He says he didn’t mean price controls applied in individual enforcement actions under net neutrality and other rules.
