Broadband Spared as Ernst Urges $2 Trillion Cuts

WASHINGTON, Oct. 6, 2025 — A year after urging Elon Musk to “pull the plug” on BEAD, Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) left broadband off her new $2 trillion spending-cut plan.

On Friday, the third day of the federal shutdown, Ernst sent a letter urging Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought to slash what she described as non-essential federal programs. Her list cited overlapping defense grants, vacant federal buildings, and California’s high-speed rail, which she said remains billions over budget.

The letter, released through her office, referred to the ongoing stalemate as the “Schumer Shutdown.” It called for more than $2 trillion in reductions to what Ernst described as “out-of-control” federal spending.

The plan made no mention of the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program, a notable omission from Ernst’s list of programs she had previously criticized.

In a Nov. 25, 2024 letter to Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, then co-chairs of the Department of Government Efficiency, Ernst labeled the BEAD initiative a “boondoggle” and pointed to it as a case study in federal waste.

“President Biden’s so-called infrastructure program provided $7.5 billion to build a nationwide network of electric-vehicle chargers and $42 billion to expand broadband,” she wrote. “Three years later, just 17 EV stations are completed and not a single person—not one—has been connected to the Internet yet.”

The Commerce Department, through the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, has since cut about $20 billion from BEAD’s deployment budget, said Fiber Broadband Association President and CEO Gary Bolton.

BEAD, created under the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, provides grants to states for broadband deployment and related initiatives.

Its funding comes as part of a larger spending fight, with Vought, Trump's budget chief, outlining plans to withhold nearly $30 billion from blue states and cities, according to Fox News.

Ernst said the goal of her proposal is to save “more than $2 trillion” and “put taxpayers first” while reducing what she called wasteful spending across the federal government.