The FCC’s final order addressing rules for the AWS-3 reauction, approved 3-0 by commissioners Thursday adds several sentences on tribal sovereignty to a section denying a tribal priority window for the auction. Commissioner Anna Gomez said Thursday she had asked for the language (see 2507240055). Gomez voted to approve the order with a partial concurrence. The order was posted Friday.
An FCC order couched as being about deleting outdated rules but outlining a new agency process that does away with notice-and-comment drew Anna Gomez’s first dissent as a commissioner. The direct final rule (DFR) order was approved at the agency’s open meeting Thursday over her objections, 2-1. The commissioners also approved items on auctioning AWS-3 spectrum, georouting 988 texts, and slamming rules. “The way we do things matters,” Gomez said. “The fact that the process adopted today effectively evades review by an informed public is a feature not a bug.”
EchoStar, parent of Dish Network, said the FCC should use the same designated entity rules in the reauction of AWS-3 that it employed in the original 2014 auction (see 2504020017), according to a filing Tuesday in docket 25-70. EchoStar representatives met with aides to Commissioners Anna Gomez and Olivia Trusty. The agency is slated to vote on auction rules Thursday. Many of the licenses for sale were returned to the FCC by Dish. “If EchoStar will owe deficiency payments as part of the reauction, then the reauction should proceed under the same designated-entity rules as Auction 97,” the company said. “Doing so would avoid impermissible retroactivity and violating EchoStar’s due process rights while encouraging greater participation.”
Despite pressure from tribal and public interest groups, the FCC appears unlikely to change rules for the AWS-3 auction to allow a tribal window, industry officials and observers said Friday. With Olivia Trusty, a second Republican, joining the commission, Chairman Brendan Carr probably has the votes to approve auction rules regardless of opposition from Democratic Commissioner Anna Gomez, officials said. The agency is scheduled to vote on the order Thursday.
Representatives of public interest and tribal groups met with an aide to FCC Commissioner Olivia Trusty to ask that the FCC change course and create a tribal window prior to the AWS-3 reauction (see 2507140042). Commissioners are to vote July 24 on auction rules (see 2507030049). Attending the meeting were representatives of Public Knowledge, X-Lab, the Navajo Nation and the Southern California Tribal Chairmen’s Association.
CTIA President Ajit Pai met with new FCC Commissioner Olivia Trusty to discuss spectrum issues, particularly the upcoming AWS-3 reauction and a proposed auction of the upper C-band. CTIA made similar arguments in a recent meeting with an aide to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr (see 2507110023). The FCC has regained auction authority following enactment of the reconciliation package (see 2507070045).
Public Knowledge and the National Congress of American Indians are asking the FCC to rethink draft rules for the AWS-3 reauction, which don’t include a window giving tribes a first shot at spectrum. They met with an aide to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, according to a filing posted Monday in docket 25-70. Commissioners are slated to vote July 24 on auction rules (see 2507030049).
Oliver Semans, executive director of the Coalition of Large Tribes (COLT), asked the FCC to reconsider its plan not to offer a tribal priority window for the AWS-3 auction (see 2507030049). “I understand it is late in the process for the AWS-3 auction, which is fast approaching, but I write to express the importance of spectrum access to the COLT member tribes,” said a filing posted Tuesday in docket 25-59. The 2.5 GHz priority window was “a great success among" them.
The FCC on Thursday released draft items scheduled for votes at its July 24 open meeting, the second with a Republican majority in this Trump administration. Chairman Brendan Carr sketched out details of the meeting in a wide-ranging speech Wednesday (see 2507020036). The main focus will be cutting regulations and streamlining copper retirements and the pole attachment process. Among other items, the FCC would decline to adopt a tribal priority window prior to the AWS-3 reauction. Another draft order requires text providers to support a text-to-988 georouting requirement.
Now with a Republican majority, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr on Wednesday laid out policy priorities that range from accelerating and easing broadband infrastructure deployment to tackling blue-collar workforce issues.