Tom Miller

Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller today joined a group of state attorneys general in a federal lawsuit challenging the Federal Communications Commission's December decision to repeal net neutrality regulations.

 

The 21 states, plus the District of Columbia, this afternoon filed a petition for review in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, formally commencing the lawsuit against the FCC and the federal government.

 

"By repealing these rules, the FCC changed the so-called 'Internet of Things' to the internet of kings," Mr. Miller said in a statement. "The FCC shouldn't let providers be internet kingmakers through pay-for-play digital on-ramps. Consumers and small businesses alike should expect no less than equal access to internet content."

 

The rules, approved under the Obama administration in 2015, barred internet service providers (ISPs) from slowing or blocking the digital flow of content and applications, and from offering paid faster data channels, or lanes. The repeal enables ISPs to preferentially treat sites they designate, and block or reduce data speeds for others. The repeal also enables ISPs to charge users to access specific content.

 

Under the Administrative Procedure Act, the FCC cannot make "arbitrary and capricious" changes to existing policies, such as net neutrality. The FCC's new rule, the attorneys general argue, fails to justify the commission's departure from its long-standing policy and practice of defending net neutrality, while misinterpreting and disregarding critical record evidence on industry practices and harm to consumers and businesses.

 

Additionally, according to the states, the rule wrongly reclassifies broadband internet as a Title I information service, rather than a Title II telecommunications service. Finally, the rule improperly and unlawfully includes sweeping preemption of state and local laws.

 

"In our rural areas, where many consumers may have only a single internet service provider at best, the FCC's repeal means that provider now gets to pick winners and losers by choosing what content you can load fast, slow, or not at all," Mr. Miller said. "I'm concerned that this could widen our existing urban-rural digital divide."

Will Monk is shaking things up at the Pig and Porter in the NewBo District with a winter Tiki party. It's part of a weekly series of themed cocktail events the restaurant is hosting throughout January and February to draw business in the cold months when it's lacking. "You go into the winter and it's negative temperatures out, and no one wants to leave the house," said Mr. Monk, co-owner and general manager of the Pig and Porter. "So you have to be creative, make some events, things like that to get people to come out." The restaurant is in its second winter since opening in June of 2016, and Mr. Monk says the it slows down so much in the winter months that the staff is cut in half. But with flaming drinks and even a weekly costume contest with a bottle of champagne as the winning prize, the staff that is on hand hopes to see more customers. In Marion, the co-owner of Ramsey's Wine Bistro has another way of getting people out of the cold and into his restaurant: live music, four nights a week. "Last Saturday, it was the musician that was here," said Conrad Ramsey, the co-owner and cook. "It could've been 30 below zero, they would've come in." On Tuesdays, they host an open mic night which Mr. Ramsey says brings people together and rids them of cabin fever. Read the full story here.