Jeffrey Westling: 5G Panic Is the Last Thing America’s Tech Strategy Needs

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy claimed in a recent interview with USA Today that radiation from 5G towers poses a serious health risk, citing “more than 10,000 studies” allegedly showing harm. This scare is hardly new. Every generation of wireless technology has sparked fears about radiation. 

What is new is who is spreading them. The science and the historical record are clear: there is no credible evidence that everyday use of modern wireless networks endangers human health. Yet in the viral age of 5G, claims once confined to conspiracy circles are now being amplified by the nation’s top health official.

That Kennedy would embrace these claims is troubling enough. But spreading the myth that 5G harms health carries real policy costs. It also undercuts the administration’s own technology agenda, particularly its push to secure U.S. leadership in artificial intelligence. AI, now and in the future, depends on fast, reliable broadband networks. Expanding advanced wireless infrastructure is not optional; it is a prerequisite for innovation, competitiveness, and national leadership. Casting doubt on 5G puts all of that at risk.

Expanding connectivity requires building towers and deploying radios. That work is expensive, and local permitting reviews often pile on delays and added costs. Those barriers can turn viable projects into money losers, especially in rural and low-income communities. When deployment stalls, the digital divide widens, and national tech ambitions stall with it.

To address these barriers, the Federal Communications Commission has moved to speed up permitting and cut unnecessary costs. In 2018, then-Commissioner Brendan Carr led an infrastructure reform that set firm shot clocks for local permit reviews and capped fees for deploying small wireless facilities—a backbone of 5G networks. Two years later, the FCC went further, ruling that local governments may not block minor upgrades to existing towers by invoking vague aesthetic objections, contrary to federal law.

Those reforms, however, may not be enough. The 2018 order applied only to small wireless facilities, not the macro towers providers now prioritize. And courts later overturned much of the FCC’s 2020 ruling on aesthetics, holding that the agency needed to use formal notice-and-comment rulemaking. As a result, local barriers remain, costs stay high, and deployment slows where it is needed most.

The FCC is now preparing to act again. In a notice of proposed rulemaking issued last year, the agency proposed extending shot clocks and fee caps to macro towers, where today’s deployment is concentrated. It also moved to clarify that local governments may deny tower upgrades on aesthetic grounds only when a change actually defeats a facility’s concealment design, such as turning a “tree” tower into an obvious pole. These targeted reforms would remove lingering barriers, accelerate deployment, and expand connectivity across the country.

One of the biggest obstacles to the FCC’s broadband agenda now comes from revived fears linking 5G to cancer, despite the absence of credible evidence. Had similar fears stalled 4G deployment, the United States might never have seen the wave of innovation that wireless networks made possible.

American leadership in 4G helped fuel the rise of today’s dominant tech firms and cement U.S. economic leadership. Elevating fringe theories about 5G risks repeating old mistakes at exactly the wrong moment. By lending official weight to these claims, Kennedy undercuts a core priority of the Trump administration and risks ceding America’s technological edge to overseas competitors.

Scientists have studied wireless technologies for decades, and the evidence shows no link to human harm. But the real danger is clear. If conspiracy theories slow deployment, Americans will pay the price—and so will U.S. technological leadership.

Jeffrey Westling is a senior scholar of innovation policy with the International Center for Law & Economics (ICLE). This Expert Opinion is exclusive to Broadband Breakfast.

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