Email from Texas Senator John Cornyn
Dear Mr. Masters:
Thank you for contacting me regarding Internet regulation and commerce. I appreciate having the benefit of your comments on this issue.
Over the past two decades, Americans have relied increasingly on the Internet in their personal and professional lives and new technologies have played a central role in the Internet’s astounding advancement. Many of those technologies have been developed right here in Texas. As Texans and Americans, we all benefit from these advancements that encourage economic growth and make day-to-day life ever easier.
Technological advancement does not come without its difficulties, however, and we need laws that meet these evolving challenges. But lawmakers and regulators move slower than technology, and we must take care that the laws we pass do not stifle the very innovation we so value. A top-down regulatory approach can have this effect, unnecessarily constraining an industry’s ability to create and deliver new products and services to market.
In the Senate, I have supported laws that facilitate innovation and opposed those that threaten it. For example, I supported the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (P.L. 112-29), which modernized our outdated patent system by improving the application process and reducing litigation. I have also opposed efforts by the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) to impose “net neutrality” regulations on the Internet that would stifle innovation and enable federal regulators to impose their will over the free market. I was pleased to see the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit unanimously strike down these regulations in a 3 to 0 decision on January 14, 2014.
Despite the court’s rejection of the net neutrality regulations, it found that the FCC does have some general power to regulate broadband Internet service under Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. In response, the FCC cited Section 706 authority when it issued a May 15, 2014, Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (FCC 14-61) to reinstate net neutrality rules. I expressed my deep concerns about the FCC’s reliance on new and untested court-defined powers to propose these new rules in a June 10, 2014, letter to FCC Chairman Wheeler. However, in a 3-2 vote along party lines, the FCC voted on February 26, 2015, to regulate the Internet like a public utility, thus vastly expanding the federal government’s oversight of the industry. These new regulations are expected to face a series of legal challenges, and you may be certain that I will keep your views in mind as they continue to be discussed during the 114th Congress.
I appreciate the opportunity to represent Texas in the United States Senate. Thank you for taking the time to contact me.
Sincerely,
JOHN CORNYN
United States Senator
517 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Tel: (202) 224-2934
Fax: (202) 228-2856
Please sign up for my monthly newsletter at http://www.cornyn.senate.gov/
