Biden's FCC Nominee Is Being Held Up By Big Telecom

The renomination of Gigi Sohn gives the public another chance to be heard.

by Julie Hollar, FAIR

Media democracy advocate Gigi Sohn, nominated to the Federal Communications Commission in October 2021 (FAIR.org, 4/19/22, 6/15/22, 10/28/22), still awaits a confirmation vote in the Senate—which means the public still awaits a functioning FCC that can protect its interests.

This month President Joe Biden renominated the highly qualified Sohn, whose confirmation has now been stalled for a record-breaking amount of time. With a 50/50 split in the Senate, Democrats had failed to muster enough support for a vote in the face of strong opposition from deep-pocketed big media corporations like Comcast.

U.S. Federal Communications Commission Headquarters in Washington, DC on February 15, 2015.

The FCC has been operating without a fifth member for well over a year, which has left it deadlocked with two Democratic and two Republican members. That’s great news for the telecom industry, which is enjoying the FCC’s inability to do things like restore net neutrality (which was implemented under Obama and repealed under Trump), ensure equal access to broadband, prevent further consolidation of big media, and crack down on wireless carriers’ abuse of private user location data.

Sohn’s renomination, and the record-breaking delay on her vote, have been met with virtual radio silence in news media. Only a small handful of newspapers and online news outlets have covered the nomination; FAIR could find no mentions on TV news in a search of the Nexis news database.