Capito ‘Frustrated’ with NTIA’s Handing of BEAD Program

May 13, 2025 – Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., continues to voice her concerns with how the Trump administration is handling the BEAD program. Capito’s state is waiting on $1.2 billion in broadband funding allocated in 2023 by the Biden administration.

Capito met with West Virginia media Metro News on Wednesday, expanding on her response to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. Capito said, “It’s a digital inequity that we have in our state,” adding that her state’s BEAD money “should have been out the door; it’s not.”

Capito said her state should have received its BEAD money by now.

“We were six weeks away from having our application approved, so that we could begin to work; turn the door to get these last broadband connections to everybody. I’m very frustrated,” Capito said.

More than 100,000 locations in West Virginia do not have robust internet access 

The West Virginia Broadband Enhancement Council met last Friday, where Director of West Virginia Office of Broadband Kelly Workman spoke in support of fiber deployment, the Metro News reports. 

 “It would set us back tremendously and likely increase our costs across the board,” Workman said. “Don’t delay — deploy. Let’s get going.”

Workman urged the federal government to work with states on expanding broadband. 

“The most important concern for all of us is that West Virginians continue to lack broadband. You know, this is a situation that we’ve all worked very hard to try to remedy. So the longer that is delayed, the longer it delays our ability to compete,” Workman said.