Members of Congress are seeking ways to pay for an extension of the payroll tax holiday approved in December of last year. Some have suggested that spectrum auctions may help...
Posted on December 9, 2011While year-end battles are underway in Washington’s corridors of power, signs of Christmas are in the air. Indeed, national trees at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue...
Posted on December 9, 2011Members of the Senate Commerce Committee this week had a chance to get answers on the record from two nominees to be Commissioners of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Senators took the opportunity to...
Posted on December 2, 2011The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has hit a roadblock in the Senate. While it has been a voice for over a decade on behalf of those oppressed for their faith...
Posted on December 2, 2011A House subcommittee this week advanced the “Jumpstarting Opportunity with Broadband Spectrum (JOBS) Act,” which would authorize a voluntary auction of television broadcast spectrum for broadband use. This bill differs from several previous proposals...
Posted on December 2, 2011The White House honored National Adoption Month this week and hosted a panel of adoption experts, including a representative of Focus on the Family. This celebratory event organized by the White House...
Posted on December 2, 2011Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) this week highlighted a very important border issue: spectrum. In a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Senator Schumer pointed out that ongoing deliberations in Congress regarding a possible re-purposing of 120 MHz of television broadcast spectrum for wireless use could have significant consequences for broadcasters...
Posted on November 18, 2011The Congressional-Executive Commission on China held a hearing on Capitol Hill to scrutinize human rights and trade concerns with China’s censorship of the Internet and new media platforms. Among the panelists called to testify by Commission Chairman Christopher Smith (R-NJ) was Pastor John Zhang, who was imprisoned after the 1989 Tiananmen Square...
Posted on November 18, 2011Led by Senators Roy Blunt (R-MO), Kelly Ayotte (R-NH), and Marco Rubio (R-FL), a total of 27 Senators co-signed a letter to Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius requesting an explanation for her department’s action to decline a grant to a religious organization. Earlier this fall, the HHS Office of Refugee Resettlement...
Posted on November 18, 2011The Communications and Technology Subcommittee of the House Energy & Commerce Committee approved two bills aimed at improving FCC operations by “increasing transparency, predictability, and consistency,” according to a committee statement. Among other reforms, Chairman Greg Walden’s (R-OR) FCC Process Reform Act (H.R. 3309) ...
Posted on November 18, 2011