Commerce Official Gives Elon Musk Middle Finger Over Starlink
A top official at the Commerce Department warned in a scathing resignation letter that Elon Musk intends to get rich at the expense of rural Americans.
Evan Feinman, the former director of the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment Program, or BEAD, which provides grants to expand internet access across the country, condemned the efforts of the billionaire bureaucrat—who also happens to own a satellite internet constellation that might directly profit from his dismissal.
'Stranding all or part of rural America with worse internet so that we can make the world's richest man even richer is yet another in a long line of betrayals by Washington,' Feinman wrote Sunday in a lengthy email to his colleagues, obtained by Politico.
The BEAD program, overseen by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, which is housed within the Commerce Department, was granted $42.5 billion in 2021 by Joe Biden's Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to provide fast internet connection to millions of Americans. As of yet, no internet expansion projects have actually begun, though some states are closer to the finish line than others.
In a statement earlier this month, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick claimed that the Biden administration's 'woke mandates, favoritism towards certain technologies, and burdensome regulations' had prevented BEAD from connecting a single person to high speed internet.
Lutnick promised an overhaul of BEAD that would include 'ripping out' the 'pointless requirements' imposed by the previous administration, but did not specify what steps that would include, or what regulations he intended to remove.
The potential changes could offer a bigger piece of the pie to Musk's Starlink by adopting 'technology neutral' policies that will make way for the use of satellites in addition to fiber-optic cables. Starlink was expected to haul in around $4.1 billion under the existing rules but could rake in anywhere from $10 billion to $20 billion if Lutnick's changes are accepted.
Feinman seemed to agree that the Biden administration had inserted some language for 'messaging/political purposes, and were never central to the mission of the program.' But he was concerned that Lutnick's changes could set the program back even further, as three states, Louisiana, Delaware, and Nevada, are currently trapped in limbo as they await approval from the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
'Shovels could already be in the ground in three states, and they could be in the ground in half the country by the summer without the proposed changes to project selection,' Feinman wrote.
Feinman was concerned that the Trump administration would undermine BEAD to turn a profit, against the best interest of rural Americans, lawmakers, or even the telecommunications industry.
He urged that officials 'NOT change it to benefit technology that delivers slower speeds at higher costs to the household paying the bill.'
'Reach out to your congressional delegation and reach out to the Trump Administration and tell them to strip out the needless requirements, but not to strip away from states the flexibility to get the best connections for their people,' Feinman wrote.
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