Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton again touted her ambition to address broadband deployment in the first 100 days of her administration as part of her infrastructure plan. Her administration is “going to connect all American households to high-speed, affordable broadband,” Clinton said Monday during a Q&A on the social network Quora. “A recent survey showed that 70 percent of teachers assign homework that requires students to use the internet, but 5 million of our children don’t have access to high-speed internet. So, even at their earliest ages, kids are being left out and left behind. We can’t allow that.”
The White House released what it termed an impact report on transforming government services through tech and innovation. President Barack Obama “has led a transformational era of change through technology and innovation that is producing a smarter, savvier, and more effective government for the American people,” the administration said Tuesday. “On August 11, 2014, the President directed his Administration to accelerate efforts to improve and simplify the digital experience between individuals, businesses, and the government through the creation of the U.S. Digital Service. … In addition to building these important services, the Administration has created a pipeline for top technology talent from the private sector to participate in tours of duty with the Federal Government and partner with top civil servants to ensure a lasting culture of innovation that will serve the American people for years to come.” It included references to federal IT procurement and the launch of the digital services playbook.
GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump “will issue a temporary moratorium on new agency regulations” upon taking office, he said Monday in Detroit. Regulatory overhaul was a major feature of his speech on the economy. “This will give our American companies the certainty they need to reinvest in our community, get cash off of the sidelines, start hiring for new jobs, and expanding businesses,” Trump said. “I will also immediately cancel all illegal and overreaching executive orders. Next, I will ask each and every federal agency to prepare a list of all of the regulations they impose on Americans which are not necessary, do not improve public safety, and which needlessly kill jobs. Those regulations will be eliminated.” Last month in accepting the nomination at the Republican National Convention, Trump outlined hostility to what he believes is excessive regulation (see 1607220052). His campaign issued a news release promising Trump would “remove bureaucrats and replace them with experts who know how to create jobs” and “initiate targeted review for regulations that inhibit hiring.” Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga., lauded the speech and said “to reinvigorate our economy, we must reduce redundant programs, roll back Washington’s regulatory regime.” Aides to Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton issued a memo Monday saying a Trump presidency would hurt the economy. Another Clinton campaign news release touted some business stakeholders including investor Mark Cuban, Bloomberg CEO Michael Bloomberg, Hewlett Packard Enterprise CEO Meg Whitman and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos questioning Trump’s business savvy.
The economic advisers to GOP presidential nominee include one aide with a connection to the content industry. Donald Trump unveiled Friday the names of 13 men comprising his economic advisory council, including Trump campaign finance chairman Steven Mnuchin, CEO of private investment firm Dune Capital Investment. The campaign touts his “extensive management and investment experience especially in” media and technology industries. He was named to his Trump campaign role in May. In 2014, Mnuchin was named co-chairman of the board of Relativity, a media company involved in content and distribution. He lauded its efforts “to build a global media company that is redefining what it means to be a content creator in the 21st century,” a news release then said. Relativity filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last year after Mnuchin’s departure. None of the other members of the council, who include a Heritage Foundation economist and Senate Budget Committee staffer, show any apparent ties to telecom or media policy.
The Democratic Party’s prioritization of antitrust enforcement in its 2016 platform (see 1607290051) “was made possible in part by the Bernie Sanders movement, but it's also the product of years of advocacy by scholars and activists who believe that high levels of concentration in banking, retail, agribusiness and other sectors are ravaging our economy and democracy,” said Stacy Mitchell, a senior researcher at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, in a Wednesday opinion piece for Truthout. The platform positions “do say something about the mood of the party and where its future direction might lie,” she said. Mitchell lauded the inclusion and pointed to a recent speech by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who “named names,” including Comcast's. “But the boldest part of her speech, the part that Democrats most need to hear, focused on a new breed of ascendant monopolies: Amazon, Google and Apple,” Mitchell said. “Led by socially liberal executives, these companies donate much more to Democrats than Republicans, but they also oppose the idea of government intervening in the markets they control.” Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton “would have plenty of leeway to act,” Mitchell said of antitrust. “Our powerful antitrust laws were never repealed; [former President Ronald] Reagan simply changed the framework that guides their enforcement. This means Clinton could go after concentrated power without help from Congress.”
At least some telecom and media industry officials donated to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's campaign, the latest Federal Election Commission filings show. Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton captured attention from many leading company executives and establishment figures in the last year, attention that the Trump campaign still largely lacks (see 1606270078). Brandon Spencer, chief financial officer of Klas Telecom, donated $2,700 to Trump June 26, as did Alliant Tech CEO Richard Crawford June 23 and American Cyber President Gary Winkler May 27. SatCom Direct founder and CEO Jim Jensen donated $1,000 June 29, and OptiNet CEO Mitchell Wade gave $1,000 June 23. Pulse Electronics CEO Mark Twaalfhoven gave $1,000 in May and $2,000 in March, the same month that CenturyLink-owned Cognilytics Chief Data Officer Andrew Clyne donated $1,400 and M2M Spectrum Networks Chairwoman and owner Carole Downs gave $1,000. But some Republicans denounced Trump’s campaign. “I urge all Republicans to reject Donald Trump this November,” Hewlett Packard Enterprise CEO Meg Whitman said in a Facebook post Tuesday, announcing her backing for Clinton despite calling herself a “proud Republican.” The Trump campaign touted an uptick in its fundraising Wednesday.
Sens. Chris Coons, D-Del., and Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., urged Judiciary Committee Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, to hold an oversight hearing into possible Russian government involvement in the hacking of Democratic National Committee servers. Coons is the Oversight ranking member. DNC-hired investigators said the hack, which resulted in WikiLeaks’ publication last month of almost 20,000 emails from seven top DNC officials’ accounts, had Russian government backing (see 1607270061). The FBI has been investigating the DNC hack and has avoided implicating Russia. An oversight hearing on the DNC hack should be used “to determine whether existing federal criminal statutes and federal court jurisdiction sufficiently address conduct related to foreign entities that could undermine our elections,” Coons and Whitehouse said in a letter to Cruz. Coons and Whitehouse also raised concerns about GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump’s comments on the DNC hack, which the senators said are an “unprecedented call for a foreign government to spy on a U.S. citizen and interfere with a U.S election.” Trump told reporters last week that he hopes Russia is “able to find the 33,000 emails that are missing -- I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.” Trump later claimed he was being sarcastic. Trump’s comments “implicate U.S. criminal laws prohibiting engagement with foreign governments that threaten the country’s interests, including the Logan Act and the Espionage Act,” Coons and Whitehouse said. The comments also invite Russia to “engage in conduct that would violate the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and, if performed by the U.S. government, would contravene the Fourth Amendment.” A cybersecurity lobbyist told us it’s unlikely a hearing on the DNC hack would focus on Trump’s comments, particularly if Cruz chaired it because the longstanding feud between Cruz and Trump would make a focus on the comments appear to be “unseemly.” Cruz’s office didn’t comment.
Integration of drones in the national airspace, their innovative commercial and government uses, the role of R&D in drone policymaking, and privacy and safety concerns will be topics at a White House workshop Tuesday, 9-11 a.m. Hosted by the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the live-streamed event will feature remarks by Michael Huerta, head of the Federal Aviation Administration, U.S. Chief Technology Officer Megan Smith and Intel CEO Brian Krzanich, who co-leads the FAA's Drone Advisory Council (see 1605040017). Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International CEO Brian Wynne will moderate a panel on the technical progress of drones at the event, which will convene a number of other academic, federal and industry experts. Following the White House event, a live flight demo of a drone will be at the Newseum at 1:30 p.m. In June, the FAA finalized new rules for the commercial use of drones weighing less than 55 pounds (see 1606210025).
Political convention attendees used massive amounts of wireless data last month, Verizon said in a news release Monday. Verizon Wireless customers at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia used more than 9.3 TB of wireless data over the four-day event in the Wells Fargo Center, Verizon said. Data use peaked on the fourth day with 2.65 TB consumed, it said. At the Republican National Convention one week earlier, customers consumed more than 28.5 TB over four days on the Verizon network at the Quicken Loans Arena and across downtown Cleveland, the carrier said. As in Philadelphia, data usage peaked on Day 4, with a total amount estimated at 7.3 TB, Verizon said.
Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton touted her planned infrastructure investment package, which will include a focus on broadband deployment (see 1607280047), both Thursday during her Democratic National Convention speech and Friday during a campaign speech, both in Philadelphia. “Within the first 100 days of my administration, we’re going to break through the gridlock in Washington and make the biggest investment in new, good-paying jobs since World War II,” she pledged Friday, saying “we’re going to do it in infrastructure, technology,” among other areas. Clinton would “work with both parties” to advance this package, creating jobs in “technology and innovation,” she said in her convention speech. “If we invest in infrastructure now, we'll not only create jobs today, but lay the foundation for the jobs of the future.” An American Enterprise Institute scholar criticized the broadband policy efforts the Clinton campaign laid out. “Clinton’s broadband plan is largely a subsidy program,” said Mark Jamison, visiting fellow with AEI’s Center for Internet, Communication and Technology, in a blog post Friday. “The agenda says it would grow broadband by expanding and extending to new government institutions the subsidies currently provided under the Department of Commerce’s Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP) and the FCC’s E-rate program, growing the FCC’s Lifeline program, continuing the Rural Utilities Service program for broadband, and providing broadband grants to governments from a $25 billion Infrastructure Bank that she intends to create. All of these elements of the plan allow significant political discretion regarding who receives money. If experience is any guide, these initiatives will be replete with failed and uncompleted projects, political favoritism, and little if any positive impact.” The path would “create waste,” Jamison argued.