FCC Violated Due Process With AWS-3 Auction Denial, Northstar Tells SCOTUS
Due process at its most basic would have the FCC give fair notice to the Dish Network designated entities about what was forbidden or required in the AWS-3 auction, DE Northstar Wireless said in a cert petition last week (docket…
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22-672) urging SCOTUS to "reaffirm bedrock principles of fair notice and due process." Northstar is challenging the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit's upholding the FCC's denial of AWS-3 auction bidding credits for the DEs (see 2206210065). The FCC's de facto control rules "are anything but clear [and] do not even purport to provide any clear ex ante guidance," it said. With the AWS-3 auction, the agency dropped its traditional practice of giving a meaningful opportunity to fix specifically identified deficiencies in a small-business/investor arrangement, "replacing it with a meaningless opportunity to shoot at an unidentified target," Northstar said. It said the FCC "gave petitioner only a few perfunctory meetings -- devoid of information from the Commission -- and a similarly meaningless opportunity to attempt to cure supposed defects it refused to identify with any real specificity." The agency didn't comment Monday.