The Trump administration chose an opponent of former President Joe Biden’s $42.5 billion broadband funding initiative to oversee that program, according to three people with knowledge of the matter, putting its direction in doubt.
Arielle Roth was nominated to lead the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, the arm of the Commerce Department that oversees the broadband infrastructure project as well as the federal government’s use and allocation of communications airwaves.
Roth has been tapped to recast a program designed to extend internet access to underserved communities, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing the administration’s internal deliberations. The effort, known as the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program, or BEAD, has been marked by slow progress and criticized for preferring fiber over other technologies.
Among its most vocal critics: Billionaire Elon Musk, whose SpaceX offers a satellite internet service called Starlink, and who has been tasked by President Donald Trump to cut government spending broadly. It’s also been criticized by conservatives who say it attaches a liberal agenda to internet infrastructure expansion across the country.
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Musk has publicly criticized the program for disadvantaging his Starlink service. Regulators had concluded it was too slow and unreliable to qualify for earlier subsidies. Musk prefers initiatives like the now-defunct Affordable Connectivity Plan, a Covid-era internet subsidy prgram that was neutral on technology, according to a person familiar with the billionaire’s thinking.
Roth is a Senate Commerce Committee saffer who wants to significantly reform the broadband program, according to the people. The initiative can’t be scrapped because Congress enshrined it in a statute, but Roth could revisit decisions like the current preference for fiber, according to one of the people.