Blackburn Tapped to Lead House Communications Subcommittee
Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., will now chair the House Communications Subcommittee, according to Capitol Hill and industry sources tracking the process. She’s a key net neutrality opponent and ally to President-elect Donald Trump, serving as an executive vice chairwoman on his transition team. She was expected to have the edge in the contest for the position due to her influence within the House GOP caucus, although her rhetoric has concerned some public interest advocates.
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The Commerce Committee is expected to announce Blackburn’s position later Friday. An initial accounting for the subcommittee leaders circulated to at least some within industry earlier and was confirmed by a Capitol Hill source. The choices were not seen as certain leading up to the final listing this week. Rep. Bob Latta, R-Ohio, was initially believed to be seizing the gavel at one point.
The choices fell to new Commerce Committee Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., who led the telecom subcommittee for six years and focused on issues including federal spectrum use, FCC process overhaul and media ownership. A Walden spokesman didn't comment.
Latta will replace Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Texas, as chairman of the Commerce Manufacturing and Trade Subcommittee, which has held oversight of the FTC and certain data security issues. Latta has focused on the IoT and rural broadband and told us late last year he expected cybersecurity and issues surrounding data to be prominent this Congress. Burgess will now chair the Health subcommittee, a position he was believed to desire for many months. Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., a staunch telecom rewrite advocate who unsuccessfully fought Walden for the full committee seat in November, was earlier viewed as one of the few lawmakers who might overpower a bid from Blackburn for the Communications position. He will stay as chairman of the Environment Subcommittee, which he can do despite six-year chairmanship term limits if jurisdiction is tweaked. Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., the former Commerce chairman, will chair the Energy Subcommittee. Rep. Tim Murphy, R-Pa., will retain the gavel of the Oversight Subcommittee.
“I think you will see us address a net neutrality [legislative] fix early in the next Congress,” Blackburn told the Free State Foundation last month, calling a “starting point” the draft legislation from Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., Upton and Walden. That draft proposed codifying net neutrality rules into law while nixing reliance on Communications Act Title II reclassification of broadband. She also expects a focus on media ownership, spectrum policy and data security, she said. Blackburn told us this summer she backs overhaul of the 1996 Telecom Act, also a priority for Walden: “I would hope that we can do a couple of things with the Communications Act rewrite and one of ’em would be to clear up the net neutrality situation. I think people want a little bit of clarity. And the second thing is to make certain that the FCC understands where their lanes are and that they’re in those lanes.”