12-8-15
This is something FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai has touched on before and he did it again last week a speech at the Annual Institute on Telecommunications Policy & Regulation. Pai said the Enforcement Bureau is no longer even accountable to FCC Commissioners. “Commissioners are denied even basic information about what the Bureau is doing, and important enforcement decisions are made without the approval of (or even in consultation with) Commissioners.”
Pai also said instead of applying the law to the facts, the Commission’s enforcement process is focused on issuing headline-grabbing fines regardless of the law. “This has led to a dramatic increase in the number of party-line votes on enforcement matters. In fact, there have been significantly more party-line enforcement votes in the past 14 months than in the prior 43 years. The FCC’s current enforcement process sets the wrong priorities and is less productive than it used to be. The Commission is issuing fewer Notices of Apparent Liability (NALs) and forfeiture orders than it had previously. It is neglecting the enforcement of important rules, such as the Commission’s do-not call regulations.”
