{"id":8653,"date":"2025-04-29T23:33:12","date_gmt":"2025-04-29T23:33:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/senators-warming-to-spectrum-deal-in-gop-megabill\/"},"modified":"2025-04-29T23:33:12","modified_gmt":"2025-04-29T23:33:12","slug":"senators-warming-to-spectrum-deal-in-gop-megabill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/senators-warming-to-spectrum-deal-in-gop-megabill\/","title":{"rendered":"Senators warming to spectrum deal in GOP megabill"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Key Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee say there’s been headway in recent weeks on reaching an agreement to auction off wireless spectrum, expressing renewed hopes for attaching a telecom deal to the party\u2019s massive bill to enact swaths of President Donald Trump\u2019s domestic agenda.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s progress, we\u2019re almost there,\u201d Senate Armed Services Chair Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) said in an interview Tuesday. \u201cWe\u2019re at a place where almost everyone is comfortable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reauthorizing the lapsed spectrum auction authority of the Federal Communications Commission and facilitating the direct the sale of airwaves to the private sector could net tens of billions of dollars in revenue \u2014 an attractive offset for the party-line legislative package.<\/p>\n

The plan has run into obstacles, however, with allies of the Pentagon worrying about protecting the military\u2019s vast store of spectrum, which the Pentagon uses for technology like radar.<\/p>\n

Wicker has been negotiating with Senate Commerce Chair Ted Cruz (R-Texas), whose panel also has jurisdiction over the issue. Cruz has emerged as perhaps the party\u2019s most aggressive proponent for freeing up spectrum for the wireless industry, and talked directly about the issue with Trump. He has suggested that spectrum provisions could raise as much as $100 billion in revenue, although the exact amount may shift depending on the nature of any deal.<\/p>\n

Asked about recent talks, Cruz said in an interview Tuesday, \u201cwe continue to have very positive conversations.”<\/p>\n

Other staunch Pentagon allies also seem more open to the possibility of including a spectrum deal in the GOP megabill.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a possibility,\u201d Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), a senior Armed Services member, said in an interview. \u201cI think we\u2019re moving in the right direction to protect significant areas that I\u2019ve always been concerned about. Nevertheless, I think we may have some opportunities for that agreement. But it\u2019s got a ways to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), who has long shared Rounds\u2019 concerns, also signaled new headway. She sits on Armed Services and chairs Senate Commerce\u2019s telecom subcommittee.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not going to make any comment until things are finalized, but yeah, I\u2019m hopeful that the needs we have for national security are going to be recognized, understood and met when we have any kind of discussions on spectrum,\u201d she said Tuesday, declining to elaborate on recent negotiations.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Key Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee say there’s been headway in recent weeks on reaching an agreement to auction off wireless spectrum, expressing renewed hopes for attaching a telecom deal to the party\u2019s massive bill to enact swaths of President Donald Trump\u2019s domestic agenda. \u201cThere\u2019s progress, we\u2019re almost there,\u201d Senate Armed Services Chair […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8653","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8653"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8653\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}