American Action Forum Director-Technology and Innovation Policy Will Rinehart told us that he and his group are providing "outside guidance" to the Donald Trump transition team but he isn't formally part of the transition team or its FCC "landing" team, as some said (see 1611170041). He said AAF recently put out a tech policy agenda and has been gearing up for the transition, but the group is "more focused on policy than the politics." Also as of Friday, Jeff Eisenach's status on the team seems in limbo, two knowledgeable people told us, a day after speculation and rumors circulated widely that he might have been removed. "It's not so much that he's been definitely dumped," said an industry source, who noted it's unclear if Eisenach will be removed as leader of the Trump transition's FCC team. There does appear to be a short "pause" in the FCC transition team's effort as some sort of review is conducted, the industry source said. An attorney agreed: "There is a pause and review going on. After the pause and review, nobody knows what will happen." Eisenach didn't comment. The Trump transition team didn't comment to us on Eisenach or its FCC team. The Trump team is expected to announce its economic policy landing teams Monday, and those dealing with domestic policy and independent agencies Tuesday, transition officials earlier said (see 1611180020).
Libraries are an important resource for small businesses to consult on IP issues, the American Library Association said Thursday in a policy paper aimed at influencing President-elect Donald Trump’s administration. IP “considerations are integral to many business ventures, and even more so in the digital economy,” ALA said. Most college and university libraries have at least one copyright specialist on staff “providing expertise and resources,” the library group said. Libraries also serve as Patent and Trademark Resource Centers under the Patent and Trademark Office’s auspices, ALA said. Patent specialists at libraries “help entrepreneurs determine whether someone else has registered a trademark or obtained a patent,” ALA said. Libraries also provide public programming on patent issues, the group said.
President-elect Donald Trump was sent advice from the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation about how his administration can boost competitiveness, innovation and productivity in 2017. ITIF proposed 36 policies that can be achieved via executive authority and legislation in a 14-page open memo to Trump, the group said in a Wednesday news release. President Robert Atkinson said it means going beyond "outdated" economic theories and addressing "quarterly capitalism." He said it proposed "relatively easy, bipartisan steps" that Trump can take. For example, ITIF said Trump should create a digital infrastructure council of federal agency representatives to discuss how artificial intelligence, data analytics and the IoT can improve power grids, roads, water systems and other infrastructure. The group said that the Department of Agriculture's rural broadband support mechanisms should be updated and that access, permitting and leasing of federal land for fiber and wireless network buildouts should be streamlined.
Technology Policy Institute President Scott Wallsten questioned the merits of President-elect Donald Trump’s $1 trillion infrastructure spending proposal. “An appropriate adage here is, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is,” Wallsten said in a blog post Friday. “The real question for the infrastructure plan is whether the benefits are worth the costs, regardless of how it is financed. But claiming that this plan is necessarily revenue-neutral is misleading because to the extent these projects replace any others that would have happened otherwise, the tax revenues, as well, only replace other taxes that would have been paid.” He questioned the assumptions undergirding the plan so far. Trump has said he wants to advance such a stimulus before Congress in the first 100 days of his administration. “Increased investment in infrastructure may be good, as long as money is allocated in ways that emphasize cost-effectiveness and a focus on projects that would not happen without this additional spending,” Wallsten said. “But hopefully future planning will consider economic concepts more seriously.”
It's good that the presidential transition “is already off to what appears to be a fairly smooth start,” Disney CEO Bob Iger said on an earnings call. “It looks like there's cordiality, which we've not seen in a long time, and there's an attempt by both sides, the incumbent and the president-elect, to approach this in a rational, cordial” and polite way, he said Thursday. “That can only be good for business and for the country." If Trump’s election means U.S. tax policy is “likely to be addressed sooner rather than later, that's obviously a good thing,” Iger said. Disney has been “exhorting” President Barack Obama and Congress for years “to take a look at the current tax policy of the United States, particularly the corporate tax rate, and to close more loopholes, but lower the corporate tax rate,” he said. In company news, there's “an inevitability” to the launch in the U.S. of a direct-to-consumer Disney-branded over-the-top service in the mold of the OTT service that debuted about a year ago in the U.K., the CEO said. "We want to learn as much as we possibly can, which is what that was designed to do before we bring it out in any other market.” Costs of launching an ESPN-branded OTT service for live sports with BAMTech in 2017 (see 1609220053) will be small, said Iger.
The transition team for President-elect Donald Trump includes two members of the House Commerce Committee, the team said, starting what it calls its implementation phase. It named Commerce Committee Vice Chairwoman Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Rep. Chris Collins, R-N.Y., to its executive committee Friday. Blackburn has been active on telecom and copyright policy for years and told us earlier this year that a 2017 telecom rewrite should “clear up the net neutrality situation” and “make certain that the FCC understands where their lanes are and that they’re in those lanes” (see 1607220053). Collins has focused on pirate radio during FCC oversight hearings. Other lawmakers named to the Trump transition executive committee include House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., and House Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee Chairman Tom Marino, R-Pa. Peter Thiel, a Facebook board member who co-founded PayPal, also formally joined. Rick Dearborn, chief of staff to Trump transition executive committee vice chairman Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., took over as transition team executive director, replacing Rich Bagger.
The Internet Association released a policy road map to President-elect Donald Trump to help his incoming administration focus on the industry's priorities. In a Monday letter to Trump, IA CEO Michael Beckerman wrote that his group "looks forward to working with you on policies that encourage this kind of growth, innovation, and consumer choice." The internet sector is responsible for 6 percent of the economy, or about $1 trillion of gross domestic product in 2014, he wrote. Among the policies listed in the 12-page letter are copyright, intermediary liability, the on-demand economy, an open and accessible internet, patent changes, privacy and data security, trade and global internet policy and workforce issues.
The transition team for president-elect Donald Trump has staffers tracking different government agencies, according to a chart circulating among industry officials. Jeffrey Eisenach, a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is the staffer listed as tracking the FCC, as expected (see 1611090034 and 1611090038). Eisenach defended Trump’s telecom stances on C-SPAN’s The Communicators this month (see 1611040057). Bill Walton and David Malpass are the transition staffers listed as overseeing the transition’s advisers on economic issues, including Eisenach and Ray Washburne, a Texas investor who’s tracking the Commerce Department. Washburne has been vice chairman of The Trump Victory Committee. Michael Torrey is the transition staffer eyeing the Agriculture Department, which includes the Rural Utilities Service, and Kevin O’Connor is tracking the Justice Department. The Trump transition didn't confirm the authenticity of the circulating chart. “My No. 1 priority in the coming two months is to try to facilitate a transition that ensures our president-elect is successful,” President Barack Obama said Thursday after meeting with Trump. Trump has created a website and Twitter account for his transition effort. “We’ve got a lot of really great priorities,” Trump told reporters Thursday at the Capitol, expressing interest in “big-league jobs.” Great speculation has surrounded Trump’s leading advisers and surrogates and what positions they could receive in the incoming administration. “I’d love to be the person that comes up with a solution to cybersecurity,” Trump backer Rudy Giuliani, former mayor of New York City, told Fox News Thursday, declining to comment specifically on a possible administration role as attorney general or Homeland Security chief. “Now, I’d like to invent the real overall holistic solution to cybersecurity.” Giuliani, who chairs the cybersecurity practice at Greenberg Traurig, is listed as taking a leave of absence currently.
The Software & Information Industry Association urged President-elect Donald Trump Wednesday to recommend tech and IP policy legislation that will “promote the availability of data and the development of improved analytics techniques to extract value from information.” SIIA policy recommendations “will be a useful roadmap for policymakers throughout your new Administration, enabling them to promote software and information technology to create broad-based growth, reduce social and economic inequality, and secure America’s global leadership,” President Ken Wasch said in a letter to Trump. SIIA emphasized the need for policies “that promote the use of data and analytics while protecting privacy and data security.” Rules that “protect people from harmful uses of information encourage the trusted disclosure of the information that is the fundamental input into data-driven innovation,” SIIA said. The Trump administration and Congress should “continue and expand efforts at the Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) to improve the quality of patents and should work with Congress to ensure carefully crafted balances in our copyright laws, which create the flexibility and strong protections necessary for innovation and creativity,” the group said.
Hogan Lovells sought to break down the details of the telecom plans for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump as part of the firm’s 2016 election report. “Although Trump might agree with Clinton that more spectrum should be made available for commercial use, he has generally eschewed the type of government spending proposed by Clinton as wasteful, and has instead argued that a vigorous new round of tax cuts and regulatory relief will better spur growth in the sector,” the firm said. “These views are generally shared by his base.” A Clinton administration “would likely appoint an FCC chair and commissioners who support the major consumer protection initiatives of current FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, including robust net neutrality, cable set-top box, and Internet privacy rules” and “also likely appoint people who support Wheeler’s efforts to reduce the cost of business data services (previously called 'special access') provided by incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs) and speed-up the local zoning and siting processes for small cell wireless networks.” A Trump agenda would deviate from Wheeler’s, the firm predicted, also pointing to Trump’s objections to AT&T buying Time Warner (see 1611080023). “Trump’s appointees would likely be more focused than Clinton’s appointees on reducing overall government regulation ... of the communications industry,” it said.