Hill Staffers Split on Permitting, Spectrum and Broadband Expansion

WASHINGTON, Sept. 30, 2025 – Aides to some of Congress’s most influential telecom legislators sparred Monday over how to streamline broadband permitting, shape spectrum policy, and advance federal funding for Internet access.

For Duncan Rankin, senior policy adviser to Senate Commerce Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, permitting reform was overdue. “Infrastructure is painfully slow to get deployed in this country,” he said. “It's going to take our Democrat colleagues coming to the table,” in order to reform permitting this Congress. 

That drew response from Sierra Fuller, commerce aide to Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., who said there would likely be “a lot of bipartisan interest” in a process to speed permitting on federal lands.

Nearly 87 percent of Nevada is federally managed, she noted, forcing broadband projects to navigate overlapping reviews from agencies including the Bureau of Land Management, the Forest Service and the National Park Service. Those agencies “don’t really talk,” Fuller said, which can drag projects out for months.

Rankin pointed to reform efforts like the Building Chips in America Act, a measure brought by Cruz and Rep. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., which he described as “modest, thoughtful streamlining for NEPA and the Historical Preservation Act.” Though it cleared the Senate unanimously, Rankin noted, the bill repeatedly stalled in the House.

On how to improve pole attachment disputes, “there's a lot of different thoughts,” Rankin said. 

“One I've had,” he said, “is should we create some sort of monetary incentive for a dispute resolution process, so that disputes are brought in good faith and the parties really are coming to the table to negotiate.”

Spectrum management proved another flashpoint

As federal agencies, tasked by July’s reconciliation package, work to identify 800 megahertz of spectrum to bring to market, Parul Desai, Democratic chief counsel for the House Communications and Technology Subcommittee, said congressional oversight will be central.

“We want to have oversight over the Federal Communications Commission and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration to see how the studies are going and what will be proposed when it comes to the bands,” said Desai. 

Spectrum was “one area to be bipartisan,” added Giulia Leganski, chief counsel for House Energy and Commerce Committee Republicans. She pointed to a letter from C&T Subcommittee Chair Richard Hudson that pressed the Senate to protect the CBRS and 6 GigaHertz (GHz) bands from being auctioned off as part of the 800 megahertz Congress directed.

“Hudson did send a letter reiterating what the House voted on in H.R. 1 – to protect the 6 GHz band,” Leganski said. “Ultimately, that did not become law, but I think House Republicans are committed.”

From the Senate side, Rankin recalled that Cruz “fought very vigorously” to avoid carve-outs in the reconciliation bill. “In our philosophy, it's the most efficient way to do spectrum policy management,” he said.

Fuller noted that the Defense Department in particular has shifted from a closed-door stance to a more collaborative one, engaging in working groups and testbeds that let commercial players demonstrate interference protections. 

She said that shift shows “a lot of built trust” and marks progress in how agencies and industry now sit at the same table. “We don’t have any greenfield spectrum left,” Fuller said. “You have to build that trust so we can have a dynamic and smart spectrum policy.

Democratic staff say BEAD changes threaten U.S.’s poorest communities

The Hill staffers also clashed over the Trump administration’s handling of the federal Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program.

Congress initially designed the program to distribute $42.45 billion for broadband infrastructure. Under the administration’s revised rules, however, only about $27 billion will likely go to getting people online, according to NTIA estimates thus far.

Desai argued the Commerce Department under Trump had restructured BEAD in ways inconsistent with the law, stripping states of flexibility, watering down Congress’s statutory priority for fiber, and rescinding funds allotted for workforce development, digital literacy skills, and other non-deployment initiatives.

She pointed to Louisiana, where the poorest communities lost fiber upgrades under the new guidance. The state had its BEAD proposal approved by the Biden administration in January, just to have it rescinded by the Trump administration in March. The state went from planning 90 percent fiber builds to only 80 percent after the revised rules took effect.

“Where's that 10 percent that will no longer have fiber deployment,” Desai posed, “it's the poorest areas in Louisiana.”

“Louisiana determined that these areas deserve fiber,” she said. “Under the new guidance, NTIA has decided that they don't.” 

“I do think oversight… is important. We should make sure that we're using these funds for – not the cheapest technology – but an investment that is going to be long-term,” Desai said. 

“I am concerned,” she said, “that it's low-income rural areas that this program is supposed to build out to, and those are the areas that will most likely lose out – again.”

The debate took place Monday at the SCTE TechExpo, and was moderated by Paul Kane, senior congressional correspondent The Washington Post.