- Details
- By Chez Oxendine
- Economic Development
The Biden administration this morning announced new commitments from major internet service providers (ISPs) to maintain low-cost connectivity plans for the rest of 2024. That may be cold comfort for hundreds of thousands of Native Americans, however, as many of the ISPs don’t serve tribal communities.
The announcement coincided with today’s expiration of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP). That program provided a $30 per month subsidy to qualifying non-tribal households, and $75 for tribal households, toward their internet bill. In many cases, the subsidy made access to the Internet free.
As the program concludes May 31, much of that access will evaporate, Commissioner Geoffrey Starks with the Federal Communications Commission said during a press call on Thursday. The administration hopes provider commitments to keep costs low will mitigate some of that damage. That still falls short of a full extension of the ACP, however, they noted.
“I cannot strongly emphasize enough that this is a program that has to be re-funded and is helping Americans right now,” Starks said during the call.
The list of committed providers includes national giants like Cox Communications, Comcast, Verizon, Spectrum, and Verizon. Smaller rural providers, such as Allo Fiber, Alta Fiber, Astound Broadband, Medicom, Starry, and Vermont Telephone company have also pledged $30 plans for the rest of the year.
That list doesn’t do much for Indian Country, however, says tribal broadband expert Matthew Rantanen.
Rantanen serves as vice president for Golden State Network, a project of the Corporation for Education Network Initiatives in California. He says many of the listed broadband providers concentrate their services in urban areas.
“I don’t know some of those names, but the majority of this list is not in Indian Country,” Rantanen said. “The majority of this list is urban or suburban footprints only, so that will eliminate the majority of tribal clientele.”
More than 320,000 tribal households were signed up for the Affordable Connectivity Program. Its expiration threatens to disconnect Native American families from internet access to telehealth providers, educational resources and essential resources.
A May 10 story in Tribal Business News notes that many of those households are on fixed incomes. That makes even low-cost plans, without subsidized support, impossible to figure into a monthly budget. During the Thursday press call, a senior White House representative speaking on background acknowledged that “even $30 monthly is too much.”
“I think expansion of accessible, affordable broadband in Indian Country is of great importance to this administration,” the official said. “These voluntary commitments from a number of providers will provide some help in this regard. But we are going to need Congress to provide that supplemental support for us to get back to where we were fully.
The president has called on Congress before to extend the ACP, and he’s repeating that call now.
Legislation to extend the ACP has been introduced in both the House and Senate as of January this year. In the House, the bill — the Affordable Connectivity Program Extension Act, or H.R. 6929 — was introduced by Rep. Yvette D. Clarke (D-NY.) In the Senate, an identical bill was introduced by Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vermont).
Both bills commanded significant, bipartisan co-sponsorship: 230 such cosponsors, including 24 Republicans, in the House, and 31 in the Senate. Both bills were referred to the respective Appropriations committees. Aside from Republican co-sponsors, however, the bills have faced stiff Republican opposition, per prior Tribal Business News reporting.
Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas,) vice chair of the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee, said the ACP was wasteful and inefficient.
In a statement published to the committee’s website, Cruz said the ACP was oversubscribed and responsible for raising prices for unsubsidized customers. He pointed to the fact that only 22% of ACP-subscribed households didn’t have internet prior to the ACP’s introduction.
“This means that for every household that didn’t subscribe to premium internet, the federal government is subsidizing four households that did,” Cruz wrote. “[T]he Affordable Connectivity Program is not working as Congress intended: to assist those for whom cost was the barrier to gaining internet access.”
Director of the Office of Public Engagement Stephen Benjamin said during Thursday’s press call that ACP “has made a real difference for people.”
“We’re calling on Congress to restore the ACP,” Benjamin said. “It’s past time for Republicans to step up for families across this country by extending the program.”
