YouSaid · the spoken record

Neil Ipatel

lines on the record: 46
first: 2022-11-03
most recent: 2022-11-03
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Look, I don't know what's going to happen with Gigi's nomination. Obviously, it's too late to get it done before the midterms. They're just a few days away. But I do know that if no one fills the seat at the FCC at all, there will be no meaningful change to net neutrality. No push to close the digital divide, no emphasis on creating more competition for broadband access. There'll just be a lot of nothing. I also know that Americans pay more money for slower broadband than just about every other country in the world because we have utterly failed to regulate our ISPs. And that is a big problem.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, in some ways it's a very sad commentary on the outsized influence of a few multibillion dollar companies on our politics and our public policy. But on the other hand, I've really felt inspired by the amount of support that Gigi is getting because it's very rare that you see such a diverse coalition on anything right now. I mean, think about it. NewsMax, one of the most conservative news outlets in the United States, supports her. The communications workers of America, a labor union supports her, and thousands and thousands of individual Americans have gone out of their way to tell their senators. We support her. We like her. When's the last time you found an issue like that in today's Washington? It's rare. So it's inspiring to see how much support there really is for her. And I think she'll be confirmed because she's shown that she has the medal for it.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think we need a nationwide plan for addressing the digital divide. As a nation, we need a policy that addresses how we're going to connect all of us and what are the plans we want in place to make sure it happens.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So, with the FCC in its current state, Big Telecom isn't really being regulated. And that's by Big Telecom's design, as we've heard. But there are other consequences of this weakened FCC. One is that the FCC isn't at full strength to improve access to the Internet in rural and underprivileged areas. Craig Ahren from Free Press emphasized how the need to close the digital divide became even more urgent when the pandemic hit. The Federal Communications Commission is the place that sets the rules for how these companies are going to operate, whether they can rip you off, what your choices are going to be. Is there going to be real competition? The FCC has a big role to play. It actually has a lot of power over shaping the kind of internet we're going to have. Is it just going to be Facebook? Is it just going to be dominated by a few players? Or are we actually going to get back to talking about a kind of big open pipes that make anything possible that is the promise, the original promise of the internet? In fact, the current chair of the FCC herself”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Biden administration struck a deal with a bunch of telecoms, Comcast, Verizon, ATT to basically either lower their lowest broadband plans or make them cheaper. So low-income families would have better access to the internet. And that had nothing to do with the FCC, really. I mean, it's the affordable connectivity program that was passed through Congress, of course, but it was just deals that they struck with these companies and it was just a private market solution.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They really care about the most, right? Is why you keep it two to two is because if Biden has made it clear that he wants to restore net neutrality and you can't do that unless there's three Democratic commissioners at the agency”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So, I think there's a real aversion amongst these telecom giants. They really don't want a progressive reformer in there who's willing to shake things up in any degree. They enjoyed pretty much a captured FCC for four years under Trump, and now they've enjoyed an FCC for another two years that basically lacks the voting majority to do anything remotely controversial or anything that the public has demanded that their representatives do. So it's corruption. I mean, we can call it a lot of things, but what we're witnessing is just ordinary corruption. It gets justified and dressed up as something more intellectually complicated, but it is just corruption.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“There is no way she shouldn't be anywhere near the FCC as far as I'm concerned. Now, I know that you personally reached out to Fox News to offer your support, didn't you? I did. I called a couple of people over there that are very high and told them, I'm sorry, and that we'll try and straighten it out and that we should never have backed her.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Wouldn't discuss who I personally have chatted with or what particular agency. I can tell you that I have talked to both Democrats and Republicans, but we still support Gigi Soon for the SCC commission.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You know, the cable industry is a bit of a racket and the big broadcast companies are part of the racket and they benefit it. The people that get screwed are the consumers, the cable customers. And so, the way the record works is if you own a lot of television stations that a local cable company needs, your ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox affiliates, they basically have you over a barrel because if they don't give you your channel, people are going to go to another cable system, right? So Foxes really milk the system and they've been a big beneficiary and they just want to keep that system going. As a side benefit, they also reduce the potential of MUSMAX. Everybody's so afraid of Fox. They will seek to destroy you personally if you go against them. And so a lot of people just are quiet about it.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Not aware of that happening, but I think protections need to be in place. And so I'm basically in favor of a concept that's similar to net neutrality, but it became such a highly polarized issue, net neutrality. Conservatives actually should support it, but liberals were the ones to sort of back the idea. Again, not the full regulatory concept behind it, but a robust idea that everybody should have access to the internet and it should be like a utility.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think a lot of it is that she's been fairly progressive activists, so it's an easy target for Fox and this very highly polarized world. She's also been a very strong supporter of net neutrality. Now, I don't personally like the idea of regulating the Internet that the government should regulate the internet, but I do believe that it should be an open platform, and I do like the basic concepts behind net neutrality, which is that no company can squelch or limit other players on the Internet in their access and broadband access. And we've seen it happen on the internet where NewsMax is being limited or algorithms have been used against us by places like Facebook and Twitter and other places. And so it's very concerning to me that some major broadband provider could start squelching access to the newsmac stream.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I'm actually worried about speech issues, but I don't think that she's ever called for closing down any conservative or any other media that I'm aware of. You know, the criticism of Gigi is that she once said during the issues after the election, I think, in a tweet suggested there should be hearings about Fox News. Okay. And I think that she said it was Trump TV or something or other. Well, conservatives have said similar things about CNN and they've called CNN the Clinton News Network at one point I remember or state-run TV or whatever it is. So it's political rhetoric. She never ever called for two platforms. I know that when I had the issue after the election, people were calling for NewsMax to be deplatformed. We strongly, vigorously had to defend ourselves. And she was sympathetic to the view that even though she didn't agree with us,”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“A lot of commentary about Gigi in particular that says she is in support of speech regulations. It seems like you're more worried about competition issues. Are you at all worried about her speech or her tweets, I suppose?”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“A few years back, I opposed the merger of Sinclair Television stations with Tribune, which would have created a massive television channel station, a network that reached 80% and had control over the market of 80% of U.S. television homes.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Here's the thing though. Yes, the opposition to Gigi comes from both sides, but so does the support. Gigi has long worked with right-wing news networks that compete with Fox News to make cable systems like Comcast more competitive. She worked with Charles Herring, the president of right-wing OAN, to get his other channel Wealth TV onto big cable systems by filing complaints against them. And she worked with NewsMax CEO Chris Ruddy to oppose the merger of Sinclair Broadcasting with the Tribune Media Group, which would have consolidated broadcasting to 73% of US households. These are competition concerns, not speech regulations. So when Gigi was first nominated, NewsMax CEO Chris Ruddy offered his support for her nomination, you heard from him at the top. A reminder, Newsmax is one of the most conservative news outlets in the country. Here's more from our conversation with him.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Seen, you know, like Heidi Heidkamp. She's a former Democratic senator who I think is running a little pack that I think the telecom industry is feeding, spreading the idea that someone is really bad for rural America. So it's bipartisan. I think it's a little heavier on the right wing side since they pretty much have a unified blockade against her nomination. But it is bipartisan. The whole Heidi Heitkamp project is basically suggesting that she's terrible for rural America, which again is not based, I don't care how far you have to dig, it's not based on anything close to fact.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Carl told us that Comcast and other members of Gigi's opposition have specifically targeted Democrats in red or purple states who are worried about getting re-elected, spooking those vulnerable Democrats from supporting Gigi. So that's how Republicans and big telecom ground things to a halt. And there was some help from Democrats along the way.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So it sounds like passing that flurry of legislation was prioritized over Gigi's nomination. But we're not really sure. There was some noise that a vote might happen before the Senate's 4th of July recess, but now it's November and the midterms are in just a few days.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“From what I understand, there were some concerns that the nomination of Gigi Soan early on would have conflicted with their efforts to pass the infrastructure bill. I think they were concerned that any controversy around the nomination of a progressive reformer might cause some additional ripples in efforts to get the votes lined up for infrastructure. I'm not sure that's necessarily true, but that's what I understand some of the advisor thinking was that went into the delay.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Was Senators Dan Sullivan, Mike Lee, and Ted Cruz, by the way. Eventually, despite all of this, Gigi won the committee's vote, and her nomination went to the Senate floor. But there still hasn't been a floor vote to confirm her to the FCC, even though she was nominated over a year ago. So why didn't the Biden administration push for a floor vote that would have led to Gigi's confirmation? Well, they chose not to. At least not publicly. McKenna Kelly actually asked Senator Schumer at this earlier this month.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The nomination goes to the Senate floor, where a majority of all U.S. senators have to vote yes to get the nominee confirmed. But likely because of all of the lobbying in opposition to GG, the committee failed to advance her nomination to the floor for a confirmation vote, and her nomination expired. So then Biden had to re-nominate Gigi in January of this year, and she had a second confirmation hearing in February. As you might have imagined, the Republicans came out swinging in this one.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Page of the AF Smear website bidennoms.com. So while all of this external shadiness was going on to make noise about Gigi's nomination, a bunch of procedural stuff was happening inside the Senate chambers. Lots of boxes need to be checked for a nominee to be confirmed to the FCC. First, the president nominates someone. President Biden took office in January 2021, and he moved quickly on some progressive nominations, like the appointment of Lena Khan to the Federal Trade Commission. But he didn't move on the open FCC slot. So by the time he first nominated Gigi in October of 2021, the telecom-driven propaganda machine had had plenty of time to gear up, bracing itself to obstruct the confirmation. The Senate Commerce Committee held Gigi's first confirmation hearing in December 2021. You've already heard some clips from it. At these hearings, different senators on the committee interview the nominee, and then the committee votes on the nominee. If they vote yes,”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Another shady actor joining Comcast in the Murdochs on the anti-Gigi team was the American Accountability Foundation. The AAF is a whole other tangent we could go down. Jane Meyer did great reporting on them in the New Yorker, which we'll link to in the show notes. But basically, they're a totally mysterious dark money group. No one knows where their funding comes from, but their sole explicit purpose is to smear and obstruct Biden nominees. They come up with wild narratives, especially about lesser known nominees, and push them until they catch on with conservatives. You might have seen that Marjorie Taylor Green made the baseless accusation that then Supreme Court nominee Katanji Brown Jackson had been lenient on sex offenders during her time as a US district court judge. She even called her pro pedophile. Well, it was the AAF that started peddling that story. And GG is on the AAF's hitless too. Actually, she's on the front.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So referring to my tweets that are now pretty famous, I understand they're concerning to some. And anyone who knows me knows I'm pretty direct. But they were made in my role as a public interest advocate. They were made in the context, and I think context is very important, context of hearings, hearings and media reports. Maybe the tone was a little sharper. Maybe I should have doled it a little bit, but again, it was part of my job essentially as a public interest advocate.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Or EFF. You've already heard from the EFF's Catherine Trenda Costa. The EFF opposes tech companies turning user information over to the police, and the police don't like that very much. But what Senate Republicans have really grabbed onto are the tweets Craig mentioned. In 2020, Gigi tweeted, for all of my concerns about Facebook, I believe that Fox News has had the most negative impact on our democracy. It's state-sponsored propaganda, with few, if any, opposing viewpoints. Where's the hearing about that? ChiGi was asked about that one at her first confirmation hearing by Missouri Senator Roy Blunt, a Republican.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Craig mentioned a Wall Street Journal op-ed, but there have been several journal opinion pieces, including one by the editorial board, with headlines like, A media censor for the FCC, hyperpartisan ggsone doesn't belong at the FCC, and my favorite, Gigi Sown in the police, Democratic senators are at risk if they vote for Biden's progressive FCC nominee. The police thing is something else, by the way. The fraternal order of police published a press release about a poll it commissioned, claiming that when shown messaging about Gigi Soon's past actions such as Gigi Sone has publicly supported defunding the police. What they mean here is liking tweets. 61% of registered voters indicate they are less likely to support Ms. Sones' nomination. We asked for more information about the specific questions on this poll, but the fraternal order of police declined to comment. Another thing that's added fuel to the GG is anti-police fire is that she's also on the board of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh, I think the police are very concerned because Gigi once said something about encryption or sort of questioning her stance on rural America and like parsing quotes out of context and suddenly you see it in an ad and then it's on the Wall Street Journal editorial page and then it pops up over here and then all of a sudden a lot of people who literally live to take company money to smear people on their behalf start raising their hand and trying out and saying oh I could also say mean things about this candidate and and you start to get this noise floor that you know then reaches policymakers and decision makers”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Despite that reality, Fox News is out there saying, Watch out for a Democratic FCC commissioner. She'll censor your speech. And the smear campaign has extended across the rest of Rupert Murdoch's media properties. We did reach out to News Corp, the parent company of the Wall Street Journal, and in an email, News Despite this denial of a coordinated attack against Gigi Seon, the Wall Street Journal and Fox News are still attacking her.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“TV and the radio, those are public airwaves, that the FCC has granted people permission to use, and so they have certain rules about that because anyone could listen and it's a public space. However, as we all know, like if you're on cable, those rules don't apply because that's not a public airwave that has been licensed out. So it's basically that, right? It's the difference between something that is a publicly owned airwave and something that is privately owned.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“A long and complicated tangent we could go down here, but basically the Supreme Court has held that since the public owns the airwaves the United States, the government can regulate broadcast speech to make sure it's in the public interest. That's where you get the FCC doing things like indecency complaints, the seven dirty words, and fines for Justin Timberlake and Janet Jackson at the Super Bowl. Traditional broadcast networks like ABC and CBS are using the public's airwaves, and the government can tell them what's allowed and what's not. But cable networks like Fox and internet companies like Google and Facebook don't broadcast on public airwaves. So there's really no legal basis for the FCC to regulate what happens there.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That's not really its job, especially when it comes to telecommunications. The FCC doesn't tell phone companies that if you make a lewd phone call, they have to cut you off of phone service. That's the same bucket that the internet is under, right? So none of that is related to anything. The FCC is not involved in deciding what speech is or is not allowed on the internet at least.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Part of the argument on Fox News is that if Gigi is added to the FCC, she'll somehow censor Fox. But there's no evidence that she has any plans to do that at all. And even if she wanted to, it's not like she could, because that's not a power the FCC has. In fact, the more likely outcome is the opposite, that she would encourage Fox to say whatever they want.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“in January Comcast hired a lobbyist in Arizona named Kirk Adams of Concilium Consulting. And Adams filed a lobbying disclosure, which of course is required to do. And it listed on his very own disclosure that he expects to work on FCC nominations And then quickly recanted that and replaced it with telecommunications policy. Well, Comcast refused to comment, but I think the article in Arsenica points out that this was the attempt by Comcast to swing Senator Kristen Sinema's vote against GG Sone. So they've done it in Arizona. They've done it in West Virginia, and they're hoping that they can stave off enough Democratic votes in the Senate to stop her from being confirmed.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Comcast hired a lobbyist in West Virginia who used to serve as chief of staff to Senator Mansion back when Senator Mansion was governor. Senator Manchin has not said one way or the other which way he intends to vote. And that's because his former chief of staff was hired by Comcast to lobby him against Gigi.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Promised crisscrossed alliances, and here they are. Rupert Murdoch, who controls Fox News and the Wall Street Journal parent company News Corp., is on the same side as the Roberts family and Comcast, which owns MSNBC. These are not your usual allies. It's bizarre that Comcast and the Fox News machine have teamed up to obstruct Gigi. And David Goodfriend told us that Comcast is lobbying against her in two politically critical states.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“really two companies that have been literally financing a campaign to stop the Senate from confirming Gigi Zone. And those two companies are Rupert Murdoch's 21st Century Fox and Comcast. Those two companies have paid for lobbyists to actively court swing votes in the Senate against Gigi Son.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“When we first started looking at this story earlier this year, it seemed like the Biden administration and its slim Democratic majority in the Senate just couldn't get this done because at the time, it really couldn't get much of anything done. A lot of the Democrats' biggest policy priorities were stalling out. Then around the summer, things changed.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“She's been a consistent advocate for what's right time and time again, and also been someone who's shown she can work with just about anybody across the political spectrum, public interest, corporate interest, you name it, to get good things done. That's the kind of person you need at an agency like the FCC.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“GG is a lawyer by training. She's currently a fellow at Georgetown Law and the Benton Institute for Broadband and Society. She co-founded and ran public knowledge, an organization that advocates for consumers in the telecom industry. I've talked with lots of folks from public knowledge over the years. You've heard some of them on this show. Given that the FCC is supposed to advocate for consumers, she seemed like a natural choice to be a commissioner. Plus, she's worked at the FCC before. She advised former chairman Tom Wheeler during the Obama administration when the FCC adopted its strongest ever net neutrality rules. Here's the thing. Was McKenna Kelly? She's a politics reporter on the Verge team. Telecom lawyer David Goodfriend said something similar.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The radio was always on in my family kitchen, where reports from the front lines of the Vietnam War, Watergate, and other critical events of the sixties and seventies resonated. It was there that I learned the power of communications networks to inform public discourse and promote democratic values. A love of local broadcasting, and especially radio, led me to Boston University, where I studied communications law and policy. After school and private practice, I started what has been in over 30-year career as a public interest lawyer, advocating for policies that ensure that modern communications networks are available to everyone, regardless of who they are or where they live.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Thank you, Chair Cantwell, Member Wicker, members of the committee. I'm honored to be nominated by President Biden and to be considered by this committee for a seat on the Federal Communications Commission.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“This story ends up revealing corruption, but it starts with good old fashioned confusion. It makes no sense that this has been so contracted of a nomination process. That's Carl Bodhi again. He's talking about Gigi Soon. The thing that's funny to me is that if you talk to anybody in telecom policy on both sides of the aisle, she's extremely popular. You know, she's well qualified. We've seen people appointed to the AFCC that have a tiny, tiny fraction of the experience. I agree with Carl, and that's why I started tracking the story. I've interviewed Gigi before, and she's even written for The Verge in the past, always about making internet service better and cheaper for regular people. So I've been baffled as to why someone like Gigi Son couldn't get confirmed to the FCC. Gigi was nominated to the FCC over a year ago, and throughout her career, she's been popular with just about everyone. She's known as an incredibly talented telecom regulator who's been willing to work across the aisle.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Was Carl Bodhi. Carl's a veteran telecom reporter. I've known him forever, and he's one of many people we talk to for the story. We're doing something a little different with this episode of Decoder. You're going to hear from a bunch of in the know people about what happened to Gigi Sound's FCC nomination and why it matters. His story has some strange crisscross alliances, behemoth bad actors, shady politicking, and even some good old-fashioned family drama. But most of all, it reveals a lot about the huge problems plaguing politics and policy in the United States today. I've covered the telecom sector for, I think, 22 years that I've never seen anything quite as shady as this. Okay, the fight over Gigi-Sone's nomination to the FCC and Why It Matters. Here we go.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Full Senate vote to confirm her just hasn't happened. We've been digging into the story for a few months now and trying to figure out what's going on here. And we found a simple, really frustrating answer.”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And welcome to Decoder. I'm Neil Ipatel, editor in chief of the Verge and Decoder is my show about big ideas and other products. Today, we're just talking about a problem. And that problem is the federal communications commission or the FCC. It's currently short a commissioner, and the Biden administration and Senate Democrats just can't seem to get that seat filled, despite having nominated an amazingly qualified person. Her name is Chi Chi-Son. The inability to get Gigi confirmed at the FCC has left the commission deadlocked with two Democrats and two Republicans. That means the commission in charge of regulating all telecom in the United States, including how you get your internet service, is unable to get much done. And the Biden administration can't accomplish some of its biggest policy priorities, like rural broadband and restoring net neutrality. President Biden first nominated Gigi-Sun to the FCC over a year ago, but the”
2022-11-03 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · The mystery of Biden’s deadlocked FCC · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT