ever you get your podcast. c-span has your unfiltered view of government. >> cox is committed to providing eligible families access to affordable internet through the connect to compete program. bridging the digital divide one connect and engaged student at a time. cox bringing us closer. a look at 5g technology, wireless innovation and broadband access with fcc commissioners at the free state foundation's anniversary luncheon.

>> okay. so we got four speakers and i'll ask them to come up one at a time and speak. and we'll do that, and also in addition to those speakers, i want you to hear from seth cooper when they're through. first up is commissioner brendan carr. it is true, he needs no introduction and i've introduced him so many times i have a tendency to shortcut it but i'll tell you a couple of important things. he actually brings -- he looks so young, but he brings 20 years of private and public sector experience in communications and tech policy to his current position as commissioner. commissioner, that's hard for me to believe, but i know it's true because i know it's on your website. he was confirmed to the senate,

his seat on the commission on august 2017 after having been appointed general counsel at the commission in january 2017, so august 2017, commissioner, general council, that's a pretty quick rise there to the top. and in fact, during law school, i discovered mr. carr served as an intern for then commissioner, kathleen tabernathy who we saw earlier on the video. i'm going to shortcut all of these, because i could go on and on, but just a couple more things about brendan. he was described by axios as, quote, the fcc's 5g crusader, close quote, and, you know, for those of us who follow the fcc's work, we are well aware and know how, the work you've done on spectrum, among other things. among the other things, of

course, work on infrastructure, deployment, which remains so important, and also telehealth which is much in the news now and deservedly so. so i'm going to stop there. his full bio is on the website and that's true of all the others and with that i'll ask commissioner carr to come up. >> thank you so much for the very kind introduction. the youthful look is not usually one i get, particularly with this hairline. most of the time people ask me how my confirmation process went to the federal radio commission, but i appreciate the accolades, it's great to see so many friends again. i don't know if it's just getting out of the house that

has drawn so many people together, or randy and the free state has done it, we don't really need to parse it, the good news is there are so many people here and it's great to see people in person again. i'm used to seeing people in their little boxes on the screen. the bad thing about that is it makes it very hard to figure out when people have fallen asleep in my remarks when we're on zoom.

it's difficult to find that out, but here, particularly after lunch, it will be very easy to see all the people that quickly nod off during these remarks. it's great to see o'reily here as well, you mentioned, randy, the good work the fcc got done in the last three or four years and truly was a team effort and some of those ideas spearheaded by commissioner o'reily, i think it was really unprecedented in terms of free market ideas that deliver for the american consumer. maybe we can talk about that. also celebrating free state kudos on 15 years, remarkable run, organization is known for

the discussion, the discourse, putting forward great ideas. my team did research and found that free state was mentioned in over 70 fcc dockets which is a tremendously prolific reach for the organization's site. something like 260 times in fcc decisions so definitely an influential voice and a fantastic run for 15 years so kudos to you and the organization, really an invaluable resource to us at the commission. and while we're reflecting, maybe i'll start back a few years ago if we look back to 2016 when it came to 5 g builds in this country, the outlook really wasn't that great back then. you had earnsten young, saying that 5g, the u.s. was on the verge of being completely left behind by china and other countries, saying china would release a 5g tsunami making it impossible for the u.s. to catch up and in some ways that i were right. back then, it took too long to build internet infrastructure, the u.s. was building about three new cell sites every single day at a time when china was putting up 460 new cell sites a day so what was taking us four years to build in terms of wireless infrastructure, china was to doing every nine days so we were in some trouble. on the spectrum front, virtually no mid-band spectrum available for 5g back then, so o'reily, and myself, rolled up our sleeves and got to work. tackled the infrastructure plan,

four or five decisions that eliminated red tape and tried to allow america's private sector to start building wireless infrastructure again. we freed up swathes of spectrum, moved forward on 2.5 ghz, o'reily led the way on 3.5, led on legato, we moved forward on 5.9 ghz, six, and the c-band, something like six gigahertz, thousands for unlicensed spectrum and that paid off. by 2016, seven, eight, new cell sites up in that country, after the reforms that number jumped, over 46,000 new cell sites. a leap in countries on the global mobile speed index, we were bridging the divide, speeds up 3, 4-fold, prices, despite pressures were down which is a good thing so some really good results and i was proud to be on the team that enabled the

private sector to do that. and of course we can't stop there, got to keep going forward and for that i laid out a spectrum calendar that shows how can we continue to build on the spectrum winds we got the last couple of years. at the end of the day, spectrum policy in this town right now is not limited to which organization has the best, governing agency, has the best engineering or the right policy call.

whether we like it or not, clearing spectrum for flexible commercial use right now requires fcc leadership that has political capital and is willing to spend it. i remember a couple years ago walking down the street and a city bus drove past me with a cspan advertisement on it and showed the face of the fcc then chairman ajid pai and in some ways is meaningless, but shows someone who accumulated political capital in that town, and shows how we get things done. why we're able to move forward on the l-band despite pushback from department of defense and why we kept holding line on

millimeter wave in the fighting pressure, such as it was, coming from noaa and other weather services and whether we like it or not, that is the model going forward, we need to make sure we have fcc leadership that is willing to stand up, have political capital and we able to spend it to deliver results for the private sector. as well as infrastructure we got to keep the winds going, i think what we got to do there is complete the broadband mapping process, i called to complete that map by sometimes this fall. very briefly in july, there was a rumor that popped up out of senate congress committee that suggested the maps would be done by the end of july and i put out a statement i was very pleased to see that, then august 1, very displeased to see that didn't take place, yet still have a black box as to when these spectrum maps will get completed. and there's no reason for it to be black boxed, let's just be honest with people, is it first quart you are, second quarter next year? because there's so much planning that can take place when we enthe maps will get done. it's the key obviously, to moving into the 5 g fund but also a key to all the infrastructure spending going on in this town right now. if you put the current discussion to the side of the 1.5 billion that congress may or may not get across the finish line, by my estimate, $800 billion over the last year or so that congress either appropriated or agencies

budgeted that could be spent on broadband infrastructure, or other infrastructure, but could be spent on broadband infrastructure, some people estimated it's $80 billion to finish the work of the bridging the divide, well we got 10 times that much money sitting in the pipeline at the fcc, commerce, department of education, treasury, and ag. in july, early july, i sent a letter to four of those agencies, skipped the fcc and asked where are you with the spending, are you going to use the fcc map when it's available? because my concern is we are about to see a repeat of the 2009 b-top level, waste and abuse on steroids.

b-top was some $8 billion, we have $800 billion. the response i got back from the agencies and a couple, you know who you r have not responded yet, it did not give me much comfort that we are putting guard rails in place to make sure the 800 billion is going to get spent going into the ground, connecting unconnected americans and avoid the waste, fraud and abuse we saw before. is it inevitable yet we saw a repeat of b-top, but it is pretty close to inevitable we'll see a repeat. and that is a problem, because we've never been in a situation where we have funding to fully bridge the divide, so shame on us if we don't actually get that job done, i think it's

increasingly likely if you flash forward, we'll be meeting and wonder where did that go, because we didn't bridge the divide, or get that money in there. now, in appropriating funds, to some extent, relieving pressure to some mechanism the universal service fund, but that fund is obviously under a lot of strain right now. we collect $10 billion a year from consumers by adding a 30% charge on the, to keep it simple, telephone portion of their bill, started 5 or 6%, now 30%, a new pay out, said it could go to 75% in the next couple of years and we need to do something about it so i put out an idea that would take that 30% charge, eliminate it from consumer's bills all together and look to some version of large technology companies to start paying a fair share.

you could target digital advertising revenues for instance, which is an area that would make it very difficult for that charge to make it back into a consumer's monthly bill given the way the digital ad market operates and other ways to big streamers, and other entities that use so much of the band width that is supported by the universal service fund so i think the fcc should get going on proceeding to do that and i've been surprised, frankly, at the bipartisan support in congress to share these ideas. there's been legislation just introduced a week or so ago testified in front of senate commerce in the subcommittee chair, luhan had some, i think really interesting favorable remarks for these types of ideas. if you missed it, i clipped it and tweeted it out to make sure you don't miss the remarks.

and with that, i think my filibuster is close to coming to an end but it is really, really great to get to join you again. i really enjoy these discussions. again, it elevates the discussion above the couple of characters we're usually limited to on twitter and other forums. it's really an important opportunity to have some more in-depth, more substantive on these issues and i'm really looking forward to the other speakers, thank you so much. >> thank you very much, commissioner carr. by the way, regarding your proposal to have big tech contribute in some way to addressing the shortage in support for universal service programs, that's something i thought was really a creative and interesting proposal and i've actually written about it as well. i'd like to see the commission start the proceeding as well. by the way, i want to, i didn't say this earlier, but i want to mention that cspan is here with us today, recording this event. it's going to be shown, you know, at cspan does, it will probably be shown many, many times over the next several days

and we're grateful they're here. we always appreciate that and, you know, i'm still a c-span junky myself, probably always will be. so, and the other thing i want to do, just quickly before i call commissioner simington up, we got a few people i just want to recognize that are here today, i wish i could do more, but former fcc chair dick wally is here, appreciate it. dick was in the video. we're going to watch some more of that later, too. also, rod mcdow is here with us. you know, i really still remember this, rob, i think you gave one of your very early addresses to the free state foundation. and we appreciated that.

and then, finally, my good friend, long-time friend, ambassador david gross. david always reminds me, properly so, that once you are an ambassador and have served in that capacity that you are always an ambassador. that's not even true of a commissioner, i think, you don't carry that title. so we thank all of you for being with us. next, i'll introduce commissioner nathan simington. nathan simington gave his inaugural address at the free state foundation virtual event, it's especially nice for him to be with us today to give the, an

address in person. again, so a short version of commissioner simington's biography, nominated to serve as a commissioner last fall by president trump. he was confirmed later in the fall, by the senate and took his seat in late 2020. he brings with him a wealth of both private and public sector experience before becoming an fcc commissioner, he served at ntia as a senior adviser where he worked on many aspects of telecommunications policy. commissioner simington holds more degrees, certainly, than i do, and i think more than many of us in this room, but it's always been interesting to me that a couple of those degrees

are in music theory, which at times i bet might be helpful over at the fcc if things ever get exciting. i don't mean that they're not always exciting at the fcc but it is true, isn't it, commissioner simington that since you been on the commission with this 2-2 deadlockets it may not be the same experience as in the future, however that goes, so we're pleased that you're with us and if you could come up

and deliver your remarks. >> thank you for the kind introduction and it's a pleasure to be here and speak with everyone today. as i always say, when music comes up, music is after all, with spectrum as well. so it's an honor not just to be here but to be in really, such a delight to speak in the shadow of the fsf's history and with the other distinguished speakers today. it's also a pleasure to join the free state foundation for the 15th anniversary, free state has served as an important venue for which policy professionals,

lawmakers, and others from across the aisle and aisles over and contributed to the free market and government. while the ideas are centraled within technology, the principles are diverse, and look forward to many free state events to come. so, as some of you may know, i selected the free state foundation for my maiden address, and directs toward the promise of deregulatory era, i looked with interest to the acts in that speech, now with almost a year of the commission in the rear view mirror i note it is probably not possible to utter a sentence where telecom will reasonably and at great length, object, if today i came out in support of chocolate ice cream, i would hear the opinion of van vanilla with the importance of beans from madagascar. today it's the anniversary so what could be more appropriate

than talking about radios and predictably that did ruffle a few feathers. i hear from some corners that building better receive ofs is an expense, that's true, guard rails are an expense too, interference due to intermodulation are expenses and don't have easy answers because they're not in control of the transmitting party. the transmitting party, to control those, would have to voluntarily withdraw from using the full capacities they're legally entitle to using their licenses. every bit, fundamentally, is an expense. operating our wireless future on the back of devices to interference, and a mid-band environment would be a large expense when these devices fail. i'm willing to bet it's smaller

than the implementation so i look to other corners. many of those same players serving in the federal bounds, and i'm not sure they made the same case to the ntia regarding federal receiver standards though it's natural for them to make, i'm sure the standards for performance are likely to stifle innovation, but one thing i'm not sceptical, it's easier to build a device with proper performance in china than here. do consumers pay a bit more? possibly, but do we define what constitutes the minimal viable product in a way that supports higher quality of service and exclude lower quality players coming from foreign manufacturers, potentially making it feasible for domestic manufacturers to compete to make

higher quality devices with better components? perhaps, some of these will even be made domestically. that sounds to me like it would have a protective effect on innovation and at a minimum, mitigate some of the dominance of foreign manufacturers in the domestic market. what's a more practical matter, industry already sets its own floors. so no one would say there aren't standards out there, instead, i think everyone's concern would be that the commission would have a hard time finding the right standards and i agree with that premise to a degree, because i was just looking at of at some of the membership rolls of the big trade associations and it occurred to me there are individual trade associations that might have two or three as many member companies as the fcc staffed. there's a vast wealth of knowledge we have to tap if we are to engage in the process in a way that promotes the public good. so i hear from still, other corners, and at this point i'm not sure what kind of polygon i'm talking about, about the transmission receivers. i tend to think our regularities are not so complex, we don't just regulate transmissions, interference experienced from a end user device takes place in a single transmission process, take cfi in half, traditionally

we haven't focused on receivers but that doesn't mean we face absolute bar and i think the commission agreed to that in task force in 2002 and a general level of support when the issue was raised before so there may be reasons we haven't acted yet, born from acting but i don't think those reasons would include discomfort or ambiguity over the regulatory authority to do so but to close on a free state foundation note, we are the free state foundation and i did not come here to argue for an arbitrary commission u-case on this subject. i hope the commission doesn't regulate receivers, after i gave the reasons it, i hope the bodies are in better position from the commission to do so without drawing fear from the actors as they lay out the benefits and harms. i'm sure commission staff would not thank the floor from the

massive heading of regulations covering innumerable services devices. instead, our best bet is to serve as industry house and it's perhaps not a bad thing if the spectrum of regulation looms out time to time, eventually the issue will be resolved and i'm sure the industry will do that. you know, the down side is one time the commission will find its hands tied by public opinion and forced to do thing. and the best thing to do avoid the necessity and come through the industry as one voice to address the problem before it manifests. i think that's the way to avoid strict controls that are unlikely to suit everyone properly and instead get to nuanced, thoughtful, capacious treatment of the issue so for the good of the american people and to deliver on our promise of wireless future, i deliver this message today. i appreciate everyone's interesting and patience in this rather obtuse issue and thank you again, for the invitation to attend today. it's been a pleasure and thanks

very much. >> thank you, commissioner simington as well. now, it's my pleasure to introduce my good friend, well, all of these people are my good friends, but i got to be careful there, but my good friend mike o'reily, serviced as, of course an fcc commissioner from november of 2013 through december, 2020, so of course, he served out of term and then was nominated and confirmed to another term. started to say commissioner o'reily, i'll probably keep doing that.

he's an esteemed fellow with hudson institutes center for economics of the internet and also has established a consultancy mp o'reily. as many of you know, i know mike knows this, i introduced him on monday occasions and the first few times, i would, you know, print out his bio and go down his long list of senate positions and there were about, when he served on the staff, over in the senate and there were about 12 or 13 of them, increasingly responsible, more senior positions. so mike, with your permission, i'm not going to do that today. but i do want to, instead of that, just say to those here and to our c-span audience as well, the work you did while at the commission really, in so many different areas was so important. infrastructure, spectrum, and others, but one you and i talked about a lot and that you've talked about with us at free state foundation events, has to do with fcc reform, what i call institutional reform sometimes

and you were really a leader in that regard and i've always been grateful for that work as well. so with that, please welcome mike o'reily. >> yes my good work on process reform, that got me a lot of

positive things. so good to see so many people, but thank you so much, randy, for having me here and being such an advocate for many of my past positions and endeavors at the fcc. it is a true pleasure to be included at such an event by the free state foundation. i estimate i attended an upwards of 20 free state events during my time at the commission, far exceeding my participation at any other engagement or conference, 20 times i jumped on a stage like this or this exactly and 20 times many of you

ignore every word i said. i see some of you nodding. people ask me, what's it like to be a former commissioner, one i'm not wearing a tie unless i absolutely have to and two, i'm taking this luggage tag and i'm not asking anyone's permission. when i look around the room to the telecom elders if you will that like me, have begun graying or balding, we know you saved the birthday parties for the important ones and recognize the difference between growing older and maturing. for think-tanks, especially those with a focus on telecom policy, still standing after 15 years to continue to make major contributions in the overall conversations and debates is actually an amazing accomplishment, and that is why we're all here today, to recognize the decade and a half of free state foundation's voice and comments and thoughts and proddings and reminders and legal challenges, supporting its view that adherence to free market principles is best for the contributors and communications sector. this organization has aged well and grown up to become an effective thought leader. thanks to randy, it's work is incredibly influential at the commission, the congress and the larger infrastructure community. i give thank to see the team for all the help over the years and look forward to the next 15

years. as previously promised to some of you, i want to raise substantive, issues, what else a the a free state conference and not talk about substance, that have gotten under my skin as a private citizen. i do not advocate or engage in any fcc proceeding. you got that? be clear on that. i am not. first i start with a simple question. what does made in the usa mean for telecom manufacturing? this question is posed on capitol hill repeatedly without context, so intended to protect national security and protect supply chain lines, it's also been considered by some as a way to facilitate open radio access networks or oram, the thought seems to be that limiting wasop to u.s. manufacturing or giving some companies some type of preferences supports these larger purposes, saiding aside the validity of these arguments

for a moment, what does it mean to be an american manufacturer? to date, some say the location of a company's headquarters is definitive, certainly feeds nationalistic urges. feeds natic urges as well as furthering the motto of american preeminence. a u.s. hq means company executives live in our communities, take their kids to local schools. workers live locally too. products are made, packaged, and shipped from u.s. located plants and services are offered, sold, and managed locally. what if that isn't a reality? let's face it, a company can have a u.s. hq and have little actual presence in the united states or farm out its manufacturing or software coding to be done overseas either by itself or a third party. if it is essentially a u.s. telecom manufacturer in name only, relying on heavy presence in asia to conduct all its

production, how does that support the larger policy goals? on the other hand, each of the global telecom manufacturing companies headquartered overseas have extensive investments in the u.s. in terms of massive manufacturing facilities and thousands of employees. if the bulk of equipment production network deployment morning or other essential services are being done by u.s. workers as part of a u.s. subsidiary, why exactly should these global telecom manufacturers be in essence punished by law? in fact, the location of a company's headquarters has proven time and time again through review of many sectors to be a very poor indicator for determining national security exposure or threats to supply chains. gm from detroit manufacturers and imports cars from numerous foreign countries. honda from japan has extensive manufacturing in 12 u.s. states. locally producing 5 million cars

and trucks annually. is honda usa a greater national security risk than gm? are its supply chain issues that much more different because of the location of its headquarters? the simple answer is no. moreover, for some of us, the principle of free trade which is somehow become passe recently, there are still valid reasons based on the comparative advantage theory and since-proven practice to have facilities in many locations. all of this is to say the real issue should not be headquarters location. global national security agencies generally eye telecom manufacturers operating worldwide minus a subset from china as trustworthy partners in minimizing potential threats or supply chain difficulties. trusted manufacturers, not corporate structure or location, should be the deciding factor.

second issue, and last, at least, for today, is the lack of sufficient mid-band spectrum for 5g services. great work has been done in the last commission, i believe. but it's not been enough. i recently read comments from a high ranking government official on the topic. they appropriately championed the work being done to implement and make operational this year the first tranche of c-band spectrum and prowl through the 3.45 auction. those are imperatives and congrats are due. they're also hints that some work was being done on the lower 3 gigahertz to further pry the band from the department of defense for both left hand and -- licensed and unlicensed purposes. lord knows i served as pied piper during my commission time. however, we as a nation are still hundreds of megahertz short compared to the 5g portfolios of the rest of the

world. simply put, the u.s. cannot successfully lead globally on 5g with substandard spectrum allocations. yet the u.s. is at best middle of the pack of wireless needing nations. where are the next 5g mid-bands coming from and when will they be available? as commissioner carr mentioned, changing policy is difficult, it ruffles feathers and shakes up norms. we wince at their shiny medals or flawed science. sound spectrum policy, one that recognizes the insatiable quest of consumers for more wireless services and the benefit it brings to the rest of the economy and consumer warfare, it will help decide the future success of our nation. call it calendar, game plan,

timeline, whatever, all terms are good from my purposes. it's also an area that congress needs to lead. this is a moment for leadership in the public and private sector to help address a national need. so i ask again, where are the next 5g mid-bands coming from and when will they be available? expect me to keep asking this until it's favorably resolved. is it time for cake yet? i was promised there would be cake. and that's just a joke because i've been told there was going to be cake and there's no cake. i want to thank randy and all of his work over the years. we've been incredibly good friends. we worked on many projects together. free state foundation has done a wonderful job and i really appreciate all the contributions you have made and look forward to the future. thanks so very much. [ applause ] >> you know what, i'm going to ask, i think maybe i didn't get

a good -- brendan, can you come up a second? >> i don't have a good side, but i'll try. >> okay. commissioner simington. thank you. you know, i think -- was it ronald reagan in the new hampshire debate in 1980? i know some of you are too young to remember this. but where they didn't -- decided not to have him speak and he said, i paid for this mic and i'm going to speak. well, i paid for this photographer here. i paid and we're going to get some photos. okay. well, mike -- we're going to do

that later. mike, thank you. when mick was speaking, i was thinking that, you know, you can take mike off the commission but you can't take the commissioner off of mike. that was good. you should get someone to post that on the fcc's website, i think. okay. and when you mentioned david ricardo and the theory of comparative advantage, you had me right there, as you know. okay. next, it's my pleasure to introduce deborah lathen. deborah, to be frankly with you, she has not spoken as many free state foundation events as the commissioners but she has spoken

previously. she's been a long time friend and someone that i've admired for a long time as well.she's b and someone that i've admired for a long time as well. and i thought it was important to have her here today because she has a perspective going back quite far. i'm going to give you, just, with her permission, just the brief highlights of her bioso we can get her up here. she established lathen consulting in 2001. that was after she left the fcc, serving as chief of the cable services bureau, where she started in 1998. in that position she led a team of 100 plus lawyers, economists, and engineers. that was at a time, really, just

to put a point on it, when we were beginning to talk about the digital convergence, the landscape was changing. and of course, importantly for the way in which we think about things at the free state foundation, what that would mean for changes in the regulatory policy. deborah served on the boards of major fortune 500 corporations, for example she's been a director at british telecom and held many other board positions. without further ado, if you would come up, deborah. [ applause ] >> thank you so much, randy. when i got your email inviting

me to speak, i was so thrilled and honored. and i know i'm the old person pulling up the rear guard. i said to myself, how did i get to be this old? but there are lessons that we learn as we age. and i'll talk a little bit about some of those. but first, i really, really want to say why i love your organization so much. i, you know, would always say that i was a yellow dog democrat. then i had to stop and think, my first vote was cast for the senator from illinois. what i feel when i come here, we are not democrats or republicans. we are people who come to discuss important telecom issues, and the discussions are very academic in a substantive way. there isn't what we see too much of in our country today, people talking and not listening to each other. and so that is one reason why i

cherish, i cherish being here and i cherish the many discussions that we've had. so i want to really congratulate you on doing something absolutely spectacular and necessary for us to have civil discourse in democracy. so let me just tell you, a quick, brief story. i always wanted to do civil rights although i did corporate stuff most of my career. so one day i called up bill canard and i said -- and i was living happily in california, riding my book along bch but i still had this commitment that i wanted to do civil rights. i called bill canard up and said, bill, can you get my resume over to doj because i want to go to the civil rights division there. and bill called me back and said, well, i really would like for you to come and work for me at the cable services bureau. and i said, bill, i really --

maybe you didn't understand me but i really wanted to do civil rights. and bill said, look, deborah, the next civil rights struggle will not be fought in the streets. it will be over who has access to the internet, who does not have access, who has access to information. it will be coming from the internet. this is 1998. bill was prescient when he said that in 1998. and that was really the impetus that got me to come to washington and fall in love with technology. so let me just give you a little retrospective on i think where we were in 1998 when i came and some of the issues that still -- and some of the lessons that were learned. when i first got here, it was all dsl. you kind of waited for the slow dial-up. and there was a big regulatory

fight going on called open access, many of you in this room might remember open access. and there was an argument about how the internet should be regulated. and i think what the fcc did right at that time was, we said we were going to take a light touch approach to this new thing called the internet. it is not the internet that we know today. we were not streaming video. people weren't wedded to their phones. it was basically dsl. and we got great, great pushback on not taking the old legacy regulations and applying them to this new thing called the internet. but i think we did right with the light touch regulation. i think we got the ubiquitous deployment we were hoping to get at the time. and clearly there is still a very long way to go. but my point here is, i think government has to be flexible

when it comes to regulating things. flexibility and looking at things for what they are now as opposed to trying to put them in buckets that were left over from legacy regulations. one of my big issues right now that sort of strikes my heart and my passion, it is health equity. and i think that that is one thing that became so blatantly apparent when this covid crisis, was what inequity looks like in the american health care system. and i think we've read lots and lots about it. but it became very clear that is one of the pressing issues of our time in this country, is to ensure that all americans have access to good health care. and that ties into telehealth. and i think one of the good things, if we can say good, that

came out of the pandemic, was an understanding of the importance of telehealth. when regulations were waived to allow telehealth to be more widely used, we saw usages of telehealth during a time of great need, where people -- we could limit the spread of the disease but still have access to medical care. ington, d.c. my physician is five or six miles away in bethesda. prior to the waiver of some of the regulations, i would not have been able to do it telehealth call five miles away from my health -- house. have been able to do a telehealth call t five miles aw from my house.be and so much of the regulations thate, pertain to telehealth is divided between states, medicare, medicaid. we a need to have a serious stu to understand what we learned

from this pandemic with respect to telehealth. and wee need to eliminate the barriers that keep us from using telehealth moree pervasively. we need to look at licensures for doctors across borders, across states. we need to look at same pay. physicians should be paid r the same if they're doing a telehealth call versus if you actually come into their office. there are as myriad of regulations that simply, first of all, need to be re-examined certain that they are not barriers. because this isas critical. it is critical that for our rural areas, it is critical in urban areas to have this type ofth -- and we don't know, just like we didn't know what kind kind of innovation was going to come from the internet. would you ever imagine that you would be owned by your phone basically? or that your kidst would just using their thumbs for exercise

as opposed to running around outside? i'm just joking. could have not envisioned the things that exist. so i think we are at the beginning of a new frontier when it comes to telehealth. andgo i think that we have to d everything withinom our power. that requires state and government and medical people to come together tom come up with proper framework for telehealthl and i'm just about running out of time. so, i think that in order to do that, what we've learned from the internet, is you have to have regulatory flexibility. you have to think of new ways of doing new things when you're presenting, when you're presented with the type of issues and the possibilities that we have from this. so, i thank you all so much. and, randy, again, congratulations. you're just wonderful. [ applause ]

>> thank you so much, deborah. it was great having you again. now,i deborah mentioned bill kenard. i'm glad he was able to pull off that switcheroo. i didn't know about that story. and, deborah i don't know whether you were here earlier, but i had a video from chairman kenard from bill earlier, which i was reallyt grateful to have. but one of the lines -- i've quoted it often, and maybe you even wrote it for him, but if you did, don't say so. one of the things that bill kenard said i think it was in 1999 or 2000, and he was speaking toal a group of state

utilityto consumer advocates i believe. and he was talking about the pleas too impose open access, which you referred to, impose a common carrier-like regime on thend emerging broadband. and at that time, remember i'm talking about 1999, broadband of course really was truly emerging, particularly cable broadband. and bill said in his speech one thing i don't want to do is dump the whole morass of telephone regulation on the cable pipe. not only desay that but he didn't do it. i thought that was a really important development in the development of telecom policy. with that, the final speaker that we'rerl going to have toda

is my colleague seth cooper. for those of you that were here earlier,r, i talked a lot about seth's contribution. so i'm not going to repeat that now. i'm just -- you know, i'll just say that i'm really grateful that set' has been such an important part of the free state foundation. immediately after seth speaks, i'm going to ask that the video be restarted. they're really some fantastic videos. i hope you'll stay at least for 15 or 20 minutes watch those videos. i think you would enjoy seeing them. so, with that, seth. [ applause ] good afternoon, nice to see everyone here. w thank you for coming.ar

i hope you enjoy your free state foundation luggage tag. i would urge you to please when you use it write your name on the card.ge otherwise we could get a lot of lost luggage being sent to the free state foundation office. so please do that if your luggage is past the free state foundationgo office, we will do our best to get it to you. about 12 years ago, i began my work withh the free state foundation. and i had a few good reasons for wanting to work there. and i'll sharety a few of them with you very briefly. first, itsc was the opportunity- wonderful opportunity to work within organization. i was focused on some just fascinating issues of internet technology,l broadband services and the policy. 2009, the convergence of a traditional cable, telecommunications and wireless services was well underway. you have streaming video is

often running. people havewo smartphones. it's just a very interesting time. then to see this interact with the policy framework that had just about none of those things in mind when it was developed, a law that is oldld and getting . older. passed when i was a high schooler. and i'm at ath point now where oldest child will be high school age in about four or five years. so, it was really fascinating that way. the second reason is institutionally the free state foundation had a lot of gravitas just early on because it brought a lot of high-caliber scholars and former officials that had beenen enlisted and providing t research and writing, people likeke dennis weissmann, people likela glenn robinson, people le michelle connly, later on we'd have daniel lyons and others. to be affiliated with people

like that was also a terrific opportunity. and thatntde of course leads meo the third reason, which is more personal, and that isdi simply work with the man himself, our president t and founder randolp may, the free state foundation's indispensable man. before i got to work with free state foundation, not only had i seen hise work, but i had the chance to see him in other venues. and i could see thehe esteem an respect whichi' he commanded, a really saw that, and i was impressed by that. so then i've continued to see that as i've worked with him for 15 years. he's led the free state foundation with skill, hard work,pe and vision, bringing a sharp lawyer's mind to his work with a depth of experience from being an accomplished attorney, fcc official law professor, and a published scholar and expert in communications law, in

administrative law. and randy has the ability to bringg thoughtful analysis to these complex and intricate issues in a way that's interesting, aso i said, thoughtful and also clever. lots of times with a good sense of humor. and to really be able to get to the nub of things. and then, at the same time, step back and lookte at some of the broader principles, the first principles of l things like the declaration of independence and the united states constitution, the rule of law, separation of powers,, limited government, fre markets, private property, property, freedom of the press and freedom of the speech. and i think we've always known that those kindin of principles they'rem hard-fought, they're nt automatic. you have to continuously explain them, defend them, seek to vindicate them, and try to influence those who have thehe b

and the task of implementing them.er and we'veve seen certainly in t freedom of speech come under attack. and we see that for communicationsrs services is ve important, it's very important to us that freedom of speech remain because it's what it meansit to be a free person, toe free people, that technology is used for freedom, not coercion or social control. it's not just trotting out the constitution on a slogan or a banner for protest. it's important and absolutely important as that is we're flesh and blood people. but tont see that through the policy and implementation stage even in thevi details, even in e modern technology. and when you do that and you host events in which you accord people that freedom of speech, you're extending to them the kind of respect that belongs to all people, and all free people. i think that's very important as we continue our work. and i look forward to continuing thater work. randy, you've been a terrific

boss. i'm not onlyth thankful for you. my family's thankful for you. we pray for the may family. i enjoy working with you. i look forward to it. thank you. [ applause ] ♪♪ download c-span's new mobile app and stay up to date with live video coverage of the day's biggest political events, from livestreams of the house and senate floor and key congressional hearings to white house events and supreme court oral arguments. even our live interactive morning program "washington journal" where we hear your voices every day. c-span now has you covered. download the app for free today. ♪♪ stay up to late on the latest in publishing with current nonfiction book releases, plus, best-seller

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