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The Internet Communications Democrats Government United States

Senate Will Force Vote On Overturning Net Neutrality Repeal (theverge.com) 143

Posted by BeauHD from the long-road-ahead dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) has mustered the 30 votes necessary to force a vote on the FCC's decision to repeal net neutrality. Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO) announced that she's signed onto Markey's request to overturn the new rules, under the Congressional Review Act -- which lets Congress nullify recently passed regulations with a simple majority. Markey announced his intention to file a resolution of disapproval in December, just after the FCC voted on new rules that killed net neutrality protections from 2015. These new rules were officially published last week, and with 30 sponsors, Markey can make the Senate vote on whether to consider overturning them. If this happens, it would lead to a debate and final vote. That's not remotely the end of the process: if it's approved, the resolution will go to the House, and if it passes there, the desk of Donald Trump, who seems unlikely to approve it.
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Senate Will Force Vote On Overturning Net Neutrality Repeal More

Senate Will Force Vote On Overturning Net Neutrality Repeal

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  • The point is to make the Republican party (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Monday January 08, 2018 @06:27PM (#55888837)
    go on record opposing Net Neutrality. So far when the issue's come up they've mostly said they support it while putting 3 folks in charge of the FCC who are against it at all costs. The Republicans have been able to kill NN without much political fallout. This aims to end all that. If it doesn't pass it means the Republican lead Congress opposes NN, despite what they've said. If it _does_ pass it means their party head, Donald Trump, personally killed NN.

    Right now everybody's blaming Ajit Pai for the loss of NN. This aims to ship the blame where, I would argue, it rightfully belongs.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Khyber ( 864651 )

      No, Pai deserves 100% of the blame. He's the Verizon shill that carried this out. It could simply had not have happened were it not for his decision and greed. He could've turned around and given the corporations both middle fingers when he got into the FCC, instead he took all of their dicks up his ass and begged for more.

      • wanted him to be. Trump could have kept the FCC as is. The law only says 3 Republican _appointees_, it says nothing about the personal party affiliations of those appointees.

        And as for Trump, he was in favor of single payer healthcare [youtube.com] until the Republicans talked him out of it with what looks like one meeting. He's pretty obviously just doing what the party tells him.

        Bottom line, this _is_ a partisan issue. The Dems favor NN and the Republicans oppose it. To suggest otherwise is to ignore mountains

      • If he's really 100% to blame then we will find out soon enough when the vote passes.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Ajit Pai is the point man for the sellout of public domain to private property held by corporations. He is to blame. Trump is to blame. And the rest of the GOP is to blame. They have the power, they have the responsibility, they proposed and enacted it. They deserve the gallows - every last one.

    • Re:The point is to make the Republican party (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Tulsa_Time ( 2430696 ) on Monday January 08, 2018 @06:45PM (#55888985)

      Agreed.

      I am for rational NN. And i am 100% Republican.

      If Congress makes the law... all the better. The FCC does NOT have this power at this time.

      • Re:The point is to make the Republican party (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Darth Eletius ( 1133855 ) on Monday January 08, 2018 @06:55PM (#55889085)
        Correct, they stripped themselves of this power a few weeks ago by reclassifying internet service as Title I. That's the whole point here. They did have the legal authority, and they took it away from themselves to please their corporate overlords.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by Anonymous Coward
          It's cool that they did their reversal by removing their own power as it gives the states an excellent argument for telling the FCC to piss off when they try to prevent the states from enacting their own NN regulations on the last mile, which occurs within each state's boundaries.

      • I would agree with a law passing but this motion is to overturn the executive order that modified another executive order.

        These politicians want to be able to pass laws that they find convenient at any particular moment by the party in power at any particular time without any due process. Now they want to enshrine this practice by enforcing one executive order and not another.

        If they want it so bad, submit it as a law. There's a song about it.

        • These politicians want to be able to pass laws that they find convenient at any particular moment by the party in power at any particular time without any due process. Now they want to enshrine this practice by enforcing one executive order and not another.

          One EO was popular and benefited the people and small business, and the other is utterly unpopular and benefits large corporations and stifles competition. Even here on /. which is usually full of trolling Trump supporters you can't find an opinion against NN.

          Every president makes EOs. In his first year, Trump had 56. Obama had 39. Bush had 54. Clinton had 57. This is normal operating procedure. Ajit Pai was appointed by Trump. By all means, consider a president's EOs when you decide how to vote in 2020. No

          • Even here on /. which is usually full of trolling Trump supporters you can't find an opinion against NN.

            I've seen some. They seem to believe that there's enough meaningful competition between ISPs for the market to handle it. (I'm not completely sure that there are no unicorns. I know for a fact that there isn't enough such competition. Therefore, I'm more likely to believe in unicorns than in these people's ideas.)

        • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Re:The point is to make the Republican party (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Freischutz ( 4776131 ) on Monday January 08, 2018 @07:24PM (#55889333)

        Agreed.

        I am for rational NN. And i am 100% Republican.

        If Congress makes the law... all the better. The FCC does NOT have this power at this time.

        I'm a100% liberal and Im in favour of rational NN as well. The internet should be a place where even small players are able to grow into big players because they don't have to pay protection money to telcos just like a small trucking outfit should be able to grow into a big one because they don't have to pay protection money for access to 'fast lanes' on the nation's highways. All that charging for access to 'fast lanes' does is stifle competition because the big guys can afford to pay but the small startups cannot. It's nice that in an age of trench warfare we can still agree on something.

        • the big guys can afford to pay but the small startups cannot

          Exactly. The Netflixes and Googles of the internet love this. They have to pay, but in return they get protection against competition.

      • Re:The point is to make the Republican party (Score:5, Insightful)

        by farble1670 ( 803356 ) on Monday January 08, 2018 @07:51PM (#55889537)

        I am for rational NN. And i am 100% Republican.

        If your party votes no on NN, will you change your vote?

        • I am for rational NN. And i am 100% Republican.

          If your party votes no on NN, will you change your vote?

          I'm not the person you're baiting, but here's my answer: I will not. [Change my vote]

          I'm also 100% a Republican, but there are issues on which the party and I disagree.

          That being said, I try to sort the differences by importance to the country, and find other issues are of much greater significance. I believe that immigration is a road to disaster for our country, and needs to be reined in.

          National security is also high on my list, although of lesser importance than immigration.

          I'm a nerd who wants NN, but

          • immigration. Trump could have rescinded the Obama executive order allowing H1-B spouses to work in the country at any time with one stroke of a pen, and he did not. As soon as all eyes were off he let the guys at Carrier twist in the wind.

            I've seen zero movement from Republicans to meaningfully restrict the flow of cheap labor from overseas. Just a lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

            I suppose you might be more worried about immigrants committing crimes (MS-13 and the like), but statistically

          • I'm not the person you're baiting, but here's my answer: I will not. [Change my vote]

            And that's why we'll lose. What Trump does well is get people fired up over hot button issues like immigration so they'll never turn sides to vote on the real issues, like net neutrality. You've been suckered.

            BUILD THE WALL. Right?

        • I am for rational NN. And i am 100% Republican.

          If your party votes no on NN, will you change your vote?

          I'm not him, but no, I wouldn't (though I too am for NN). There are a few other issues out there, you know ...

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by mjwx ( 966435 )

          I am for rational NN. And i am 100% Republican.

          If your party votes no on NN, will you change your vote?

          And there in lies the problem. Not just with Republicans, but the US two party system in general.

          At least here in the UK when given two bad choices (as we were with Theresa May and Jeremy Corbin in the last election) we can vote for a third party and if enough people are dissatisfied with the major two parties, they depend on crossbenchers (third parties) to pass legislation. Currently the conservatives are relying on the two Northern Ireland parties (sinn fein and DUP) who hate each other. Its not perfe

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by WallyL ( 4154209 )

        Ditto. Registered Republican, but I want net neutrality. Some regulation helps a free market.

    • Right, this isn't going to succeed, it's only an attempt to make an election issue out of this for 2018... This is the silly season for 2018's midterms, when all the political clowns run around the two ring circus looking to get on the clown car that they think will get them noticed the most while throwing cream pies at the others.

      Personally, I don't think we will be discussing NN at all in about a month anyway. We have a show down on immigration reform with a government shutdown threat looming before the

  • This is dead folks.... Until the number of supporters allows a cloture vote to pass, this is dead. The Republicans, who currently control the Senate majority, cannot make things happen there, how would a democrat make it happen along partisan lines? This is dead, no way it manages cloture.

    So getting it to the floor isn't going to make anything happen here. Why bother with this? Why to map out a campaign issue of course... Nothing more... It's like the House passing an Obamacare repeal 20+ times, full know

    • Um, guy, there's two new Senators. Think before you type.

      • Um, guy, there's two new Senators. Think before you type.

        LOL, so much promise, yet not a clue about how the Senate works.. NN is dead in this congress.

        Cloture requires 60 votes. Democrats only have 49, plus any republicans they can get. If you don't have 11 republicans, it isn't going to happen...

        Unless the point is to just get everybody to vote so you can claim a campaign issue this is pointless....

        • That was 2017. It's 2018. Pay attention.

          • All that's going to happen here is the bill will be referred to committee and die there. The majority will make sure of it and it doesn't require a vote, just follow standard procedure and volia, the thing dies a quiet death free of political cost. Trust me, I've watched many bills die in the Senate exactly the same way.

            All this does is put a fund raising feather in the bill's supporters caps.. Nobody is going to run on this issue.

            • The Hill, a longtime newsletter, today (as in a few minutes ago) reported that the bill has sufficient votes to require a Floor Vote of the Senate.

              Nice try. It's 2018, not 2017. You need to learn how government works.

              • LOL... You better hope it's a roll call vote, because that's the only way you get "on record" votes to bash folks with. The ONLY motion being debated will be to send the bill to committee, for at most 2 hours. No amendments, no way to change committees, just send it or not. It will be sent to committee.

                My guess is that your "vote" will be after about 30 seconds of debate and will consist of a voice vote called by the chair to send it to committee to die. You might want to ready that quorum call to drag t

        • Re:Cloture won't happen, NN is dead (Score:4, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08, 2018 @08:07PM (#55889657)

          Your premise is incorrect.

          From the Congressional Review Act wiki page [wikipedia.org]:

          The law provides a procedure for expedited consideration in the Senate. If the committee to which a joint resolution is referred has not reported it out within 20 calendar days after referral, it may be discharged from further consideration by a written petition of 30 Senators, at which point the measure is placed on the calendar, and it is in order at any time for a Senator to move to proceed to the joint resolution.[10] If the Senate agrees to the motion to proceed, debate on the floor is limited to 10 hours and no amendments to the resolution or motions to proceed to other business are in order. The Senate may then pass the joint resolution with a simple majority.[10] A joint resolution of disapproval meeting certain criteria cannot be filibustered.[11]

          For a regulation to be invalidated under the CRA, the Congressional resolution of disapproval must either be signed by the President or be passed over the President's veto by two thirds of both Houses of Congress.[11][12]

          Under the CRA, cloture is irrelevant because filibustering is impossible. Democrats would therefore need only two Republican votes to pass the joint resolution of disapproval in the Senate. That said, it remains unlikely that they will manage a simple majority in the House, much less getting the President's signature, so your assertion that "NN is dead in this congress" still has merit, if not for the precise reasons you stated.

    • Why to map out a campaign issue of course... Nothing more...

      Good. Every politicians will have to go on record for or against. That will allow us to vote for the people that support it when their bid comes up.

      How is this bad?

      • You don't understand Senate procedure, that much is obvious.

        There will be no open debate or roll call vote.. Senate procedure allows this to be referred to committee, which will be done in about 30 seconds, likely with a voice vote called by the chair, where it sits until the next congress, at which point it dies in January 2019. There won't be any roll call vote to bash Senators with, it will hit the committee during the election season, when NOTHING happens that absolutely doesn't have to, especially par

        • You don't understand Senate procedure, that much is obvious.

          Pretty sure the title of TFA is:

          Key word: VOTE.

          I guess that could be a complete lie, but I really can't offer an opinion since I don't know. Maybe you could post an article here titled "Senate NOT Will Force Vote On Overturning Net Neutrality Repeal", then I can comment on that possibility.

          • VOTE? Yes. To refer it to committee. Usually a voice vote that takes about 30 seconds to complete as morning business. I doubt this will be different. Maybe you can have a quorum call in there so the C-SPAN viewers won't blink and miss the whole thing? If you think the majority leader will let this go to a roll call vote you can use to bash his members with, you are sadly mistaken. Without a roll call, all you have is a bill that dies in committee. Good luck!

            • VOTE? Yes.

              And that's public record, right?

              Good. Every politicians will have to go on record for or against. That will allow us to vote for the people that support it when their bid comes up.

              ^^^ This.

              Nice troll "nothing matters, give up, let them win" post though. A+ for effort.

              • What part of "voice vote" don't you get? There will be no record except the motion passed or failed.

                What happens is the chair calls a vote on the question and specifies it be taken by voice vote. He says "All in favor?".... "All opposed?" then judges by what he hears if the vote was in favor or opposed. The question will be to send it to committee "(insert the chair's choice of committees here)"....

                You won't have a record of who voted which way and pretty much EVERYBODY will vote to refer it to committee

                • So nice pointless maneuver by your side...

                  My side is the one where I want net neutrality. What's your side?

                  What part of "voice vote" don't you get?

                  Sorry, is this a sealed record? Of course it's not.

                  Good luck with your trolling. It was a nice attempt.

                  • The record will say "Motion carried" nothing more. Individual votes will not be recorded with voice votes, only the result. To get a record of each senator's vote requires a roll call vote.

                    Even if you manage to get a roll call vote, it's only a "send this to committee" action so any republican who thinks it will help them can easily vote for this motion then claim they just sent it to committee to die, much like the house voted 20+ times to repeal Obamacare, knowing it would die in the Senate, but they go

                    • Nobody else really cares about this issue but your side...

                      There you go. My side is one where net neutrality exists. I know you'd like to paint me as a bleeding heart liberal. That's why you'll lose. There're extreme trolls like you on both sides, and in them middle, there's the 90% of us that are capable of thinking rationally about issues for what they are, not whether the person that sponsored them are blue or red.

                    • Finally, you got my point on the Senate vote not giving you what you wanted..

                      NN doesn't matter to the middle as much as you'd like to think it does.. It only appeals to your base, but opposition to it appeals to the right so I call this a wash. That begs the question about the middle, where elections are decided. The middle is asking the "How's this NN matter to me and why are the left hyperventilating about it?" questions and not coming up with much. Their Netflix still works, so what's the big deal?

                      Y

    • TFS says Markey can bring it to the floor for a vote. I don't know enough about the Senate rules to know if that's correct, but I wouldn't dismiss it.

  • Forcing a vote. (Score:5, Informative)

    by quantaman ( 517394 ) on Monday January 08, 2018 @07:08PM (#55889219)

    For those of us, like me, who were confused how Democrats could force a vote when bills could only be brought to the floor for a vote by the House Majority Leader [senate.gov]. It turns out that the congressional review act [wikipedia.org] specifically allows a vote to be schedule by 30 senators sponsoring a bill, bypassing the House Majority Leader.

  • How about, instead of passing a bill telling the FCC to keep pretending the internet is a phone service and regulate it as such, pass a bill allowing the FCC to regulate the internet as a data service, ONLY for the purposes of equal access. The reason this is all happening in a round-about fashion is the FCC was never directly given the authority to regulate the internet directly. I'm for them keeping out of it as much as possible, but if you want net neutrality, pass a law saying the FCC can enforce net ne

  • Force elected officials to do their job. Congress has been a pack of cowards for the past few dozen years not wanting to be held accountable for actually doing their job by voting on important issues.

    Good luck getting the House to take up this issue.

  • Whatever the outcome, this is wonderful news! Lawmakers are back into, you know, making laws — instead of delegating the responsibility to the unelected "commissions" and "agencies".

    Though of questionable Constitutional standing, these issue "rules" and "regulations" that are no less binding than actual laws...

    Well, I say, if the would-be ordinance is too complex for Congress to properly discuss and vote on, perhaps, it should not be considered at all! That government is best, that governs least

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