Court Declines to Stay 4.9 GHz Order on FirstNet
The FCC is looking to give AT&T's FirstNet access to more public safety spectrum.
Jake Neenan
WASHINGTON, March 20, 2025 – Judges declined Wednesday to pause the Federal Communications Commission’s order giving AT&T’s FirstNet access to portions of the 4.9 GigaHertz band.
“Movants have not satisfied the stringent requirements for a stay pending court review,” a three-judge panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit said in a unanimous order.
The National Sheriff’s Association and San Francisco’s public transit agency, Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), had asked judges to put the October 2024 order on hold while legal challenges play out.
The order would allow FirstNet to access unassigned parts of the 4.9 GHz band, currently set aside for local public safety users, after the selection of a band manager who would be authorized to enter a sharing agreement with the nationwide first responder network. Other wireless carriers and consumer groups had pushed back against the plan, arguing in part that it would effectively hand billions of dollars to AT&T, which can use dormant FirstNet spectrum as part of its contract.
The 4.9 GHz band has useful characteristics for 5G networks, and the carriers have been starved of additional airwaves since the FCC’s ability to hold spectrum auctions expired in March 2023. AT&T supported the sheriffs and BART had asked for a stay in part because the FCC is asking current 4.9 GHz users, which both groups are, to change their existing geographic licenses in the band to site-specific licenses by June 9, 2025.
The groups argued that wasn’t enough time to marshall the time and manpower necessary for the required engineering studies at every tower site a user operated, and that taking all currently unassigned airwaves off the table interfered with planned expansions.
“This would strand the public’s investment, while also likely putting several state and local public safety entities back near square one in achieving their emergency communication capabilities,” the sheriff's association wrote in its motion.
BART claimed it would have to delay and potentially restart its ongoing construction of a new train control system.
The FCC argued in a reply brief that the conversion of licenses “will not affect the scope of incumbent licensees’ existing operations.”
As for BART’s case, “the Commission has made clear that it will entertain waiver petitions in ‘special circumstances,’” the FCC argued. “BART, to date, has not asked for a waiver.”
BART had acknowledged the potential for a waiver in its filing, but said it didn’t believe the agency would “meaningfully consider” its concerns.
The order that got the process of allowing FirstNet into the band came down under previous FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, but current Chairman Brendan Carr supported them at the time.
Both the Coalition for Emergency Response and Critical Infrastructure, backed by Verizon and T-Mobile and opposed to the plan, and the Public Safety Spectrum Alliance (PSSA), led by a former FirstNet executive and in favor of the plan, sued the FCC over its order.
CERCI wants it scrapped, arguing the FirstNet doesn’t have legal authority to operate in bands outside its initial charter, and PSSA wants FirstNet to get access to the airwaves even quicker.
Correction: A previous version of this story misstated the name of the court in which the case is being heard. It is the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, not the D.C. Court of Appeals. The story has been corrected.
