Clyburn, Tristani Slam Pai on Wide Range of Issues in Unusual Attack

Clyburn's last year at the FCC was "among the most painful in my regulatory career," she said during a joint interview with Tristani Thursday on SiriusXM's Michelangelo Signorile Show. It's now online (subscription). There was "a shift when it comes to philosophy, that I just feel we moved from putting consumers first to having consumers be an afterthought in this regulatory arena." Clyburn also appeared to slam Pai for a comparison he made at a conference they both attended last week in Aspen, Colorado, where the chair said it was much worse for then-President Barack Obama to weigh in on an earlier net neutrality proceeding than for McGahn to privately call Pai for a status check on the broadcast takeover (see 1808210038).

Tristani was less sparing in her jabs at Pai. "He’s thrown the consumers to the dogs. He literally has discarded [them], not only on net neutrality, but on Lifeline, which Mignon so wonderfully protected," said Tristani, who left the National Hispanic Media Coalition earlier this summer and doesn't have a current affiliation. "Every single consumer issue he has dismantled or tried to dismantle" and in a way other past GOP FCC chiefs like Michael Powell didn't proceed, she continued. "I have never seen anything like this. There is no rhyme or reason. It’s very concerning but it’s of the same swath of everything the Trump administration is doing." The FCC declined to comment, and the White House didn't comment right away.

Pai is "one of the least transparent FCC chairs we’ve had, and he is very devious," Tristani said, even though he claims the opposite. She and Clyburn said it's disturbing McGahn's phone call didn't become public for weeks, and only at a second congressional hearing (see 1808160071). Pai "already had had the phone call, but he didn’t say anything until another hearing," Tristani said. "He does it with a smile, and he does it very nicely. But it's very disconcerting." She has "been snubbed by better people than him, but that’s Washington," Tristani said, noting a strained relationship over her earlier criticism on net neutrality. "He has thrown consumers to the dogs. ... We have to keep fighting him tooth and nail with legal strategies."

Tristani invoked dictators when talking about Trump and the FCC and about why officials like Pai haven't more publicly stood up to the president's attacks on the agency over issues like the Sinclair/Tribune hearing designation order, which led to Tribune killing the deal. "Trump has enabled this attack on the press," she said. "What's terrible is that his people, and Ajit Pai who won't answer, who won't give a straight answer, they all go like little soldiers following the Mussolinis, the Hitlers." She asked, "When are they going to start saying no more, this is not our country?"

Unusual Attack

Past commissioners and some others said some of the more critical of these remarks were unusual, since ex-FCC members don't usually attack current ones. No past Republican chairman or commissioner we queried would comment Friday. Tristani acknowledged to us that she was stepping up her criticism, and stood by it.

Tristani said she would like to find policy common ground with Pai, but for that to happen "you have to have a head of an agency that will listen, and for whatever reasons, he does not listen, and he has cut off the public interest folks for the most part. If you say something he dislikes, he won’t take meetings. He will send you to the minions." Asked later why the critique of Pai, she said, "Apparently saying it less vehemently and trying to be diplomatic gets you nowhere, so just say the truth." She hopes "people will start to get even more galvanized" amid such criticisms, "to continue to battle this and other agencies that are following the Trump agenda dismantling everything left and right without proper process."

On McGahn's call vs. Obama's YouTube video in favor of Communications Act Title II regulation of broadband service, Clyburn said, "It is one thing for a president who is a ... citizen to give his opinion on an issue." It's "another thing to cross the line or to make a phone call" that "isn’t disclosed" or "that we have to find out," she added. "A phone call that we find out only after the fact only because someone asked again, weeks later we find out." She called it "problematic."

Emphasis on infrastructure and net neutrality deregulation is accompanied by thinking about "what the businesses need and what the business entities are doing," said Clyburn, who stepped down in June and is on an Open Society Foundation fellowship. "It is what order you place people versus big businesses. With me, it left the consumer unprotected." Lacking common-carrier regulation of broadband service, for players like ISPs, "right now, there is no fear [of a god]. There is still a god, but there is no fear" about FCC oversight, she said: Consumers are "afterthoughts."

Although praising Pai for the Sinclair HDO, as did fellow show guest Free Press Policy Director Matt Wood, the ex-commissioners still worry about consolidation. "It's not like he has been concerned about diversity, concerned about local broadcasting," Tristani said. She was interrupted by Clyburn, saying he's also not "concerned about consolidation." Tristani said "he’s probably going to bless the T-Mobile/Sprint merger" unless grassroots advocacy "can stop him."

The HDO to Sinclair left Clyburn "the most shocked person on the planet." She said "I could not see how [Sinclair] could do any wrong" before the HDO announcement. But the company's apparent lack of truthfulness with the agency is "very troubling, because you’re talking about in essence the integrity of a licensee, and that’s something we need to look at," she said. "I don’t think [Pai] gets it right very often, but I think he cares about the building," Wood said. "He had no choice" but to circulate the HDO once staff said Sinclair was lying, she added: "It's hard to believe they were so arrogant and bullying about this that they could lose this deal even in this administration." Sinclair didn't comment.

Clyburn is "still mulling over" T-Mobile/Sprint "in part because No. 4 is not a strong No. 4," she said of the potential acquiree and its U.S. carrier ranking. The combining companies didn't comment. "Not all of the companies I have to say are created equal, and Sprint has had some issues over the years," Clyburn said. "There has been some talk in the ecosystem about how long they can last." She cited issues about Sprint's "viability."