“The FCC has made clear its desire to launch new net neutrality rules, surfacing new ever-shifting rationales. The original justification for accessing sweeping Title II authority has become obviously thin. ISPs continue to invest heavily, build ever-faster networks, and have kept those networks open. For two decades, there has been only one two-year period in which the FCC applied Title II to the internet, yet the internet has been open throughout because it makes business sense to offer it that way.
“The proposed rules may complicate, if not deeply upset, our collective efforts to bring internet to rural and unserved communities. These rules set out very heavy regulations that complicate the calculus of deploying networks in expensive, risky, and hard-to-serve markets. The FCC’s actions only add to that burden, and we fear net neutrality will lead to net fatality.
“This will be a drawn out, messy proceeding with lots of wasted expense to get rules that might not survive the next election and are unlikely to pass constitutional muster when they reach the Supreme Court, which they inevitably will.”