Nearly Half of Rip and Replace Projects Done, FCC Tells Congress
The agency granted deadline extensions to most providers that had not yet finished work
WASHINGTON, June 17, 2026 – Nearly half the projects funded by the Federal Communications Commission’s Rip and Replace program are complete, the agency told Congress Monday.
In the agency’s semiannual status report, it said carriers confirmed they had completed the required work in 53 of the program’s 126 projects. That’s compared to 13 in the agency’s December 2025 report.
The FCC’s Wireline Competition Bureau was “pleased to report” the improvement, it wrote. Providers conducting the 53 projects have “permanently removed, replaced, and disposed of all covered communications equipment and services that were in their networks,” according to the agency.
That work was supposed to be done May 8, 2026, but the agency said it gave deadline extensions to most companies that weren’t finished to address factors outside their control. Those ranged from three to six months.
Rip and Replace reimburses smaller wireless carriers for replacing network gear from Chinese firms Huawei and ZTE, which are deemed security threats by lawmakers.
The program, officially known as the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Reimbursement Program, was stood up by a 2021 law with $1.9 billion in funding. The FCC quickly received funding requests for closer to $5 billion, creating a shortfall that left participants receiving smaller reimbursement checks for their work.
That led to repeated delays and the FCC granting many extensions. The agency borrowed from the Treasury extra cash to fully fund the program in April 2025, after Congress authorized a one-off spectrum auction to pay the money back. That set in motion the May 8 deadline.
In recent weeks the agency granted about 30 deadline extensions for Rip and Replace participants, for reasons ranging from supply chain issues to migratory bird nests.
Supply issues are the most common setback, the FCC told Congress in its biannual report on the program Monday. The agency said 35 percent of participants reported some challenges securing replacement gear, up from 17 percent in its December report.
The agency received status updates from 80 of the 85 participating ISPs in its March filing round, the agency said, and used those reports to calculate the numbers in its June report. Some ISPs are conducting multiple projects
The delays reported were the same as in its previous report, the agency said, including shipment delays, unexpected price hikes, and increased demand making it hard to find certain parts or services.
Labor shortages and severe weather challenges were also more common, with 15 percent of participants reporting challenges with each. That’s up from nine percent and four percent respectively.
When the agency granted its latest deadline extensions, it said that because of the full funding it didn’t anticipate granting more extensions.
The agency’s re-auction of AWS-3 licenses is ongoing, and as of Wednesday afternoon had cleared the $3 billion the FCC borrowed to shore up Rip and Replace.
The report also noted that in April 2025, the agency granted some funding requests that had been previously denied for lack of funding. Those projects, from Level 3 Communications, will have to be done by May 27, 2027.
