The House Subcommittee on Communications and Technology, chaired by Congressman Richard Hudson (NC-09), held an oversight hearing focused on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and its recent actions. The session highlighted the FCC's direction under Chairman Carr during 2025.
Chairman Hudson stated, “The FCC had an active 2025 that can be summed up in one word: deregulation. Under Chairman Carr, the FCC has taken significant steps to reduce barriers to broadband deployment, modernize outdated regulatory regimes, and delete obsolete rules.”
Congressman Bob Latta (OH-05) questioned whether the United States is maintaining global leadership in wireless technology development. In response, Chairman Carr said, “We are. We had fallen behind, in my view, during the Biden years. And now, we’ve hit the accelerator, and we are going to be leading the world once again.”
Congresswoman Kat Cammack (FL-03) raised concerns about robocalls and scam texts originating from overseas. She asked about international coordination efforts and what Congress could do to help strengthen them. Chairman Carr replied, “We are pursuing, at the FCC, the idea that if you get a call on your phone from abroad, it shouldn’t necessarily, in my view, display a U.S.-based area code, because that could mislead someone to think that this is a call originating in the U.S. So, if you’re a company and you want to have a call center overseas, at least be truthful and honest with your customers. So, we’re looking at that. We’re looking at potentially doing standards for call centers to make sure that foreign call centers are compliant with our customer service regulations. So, a lot of effort was taken on that front.”
Congressman Russell Fry (SC-07) referenced previous spectrum policy changes made during former President Trump’s administration and asked Commissioner Trusty about American leadership in Wi-Fi innovation. Commissioner Trusty responded by emphasizing support for flexible spectrum policies: “Absolutely. As I mentioned a little earlier, I’ve been a proponent of an all-of-the-above approach to spectrum policy, where we accommodate a variety of users, use cases, and technologies. When you look at things like CBRS (Citizens Broadband Radio Service), the United States has long been a leader in innovative uses of spectrum, and CBRS is a model for that. It accommodates the military, transportation, logistics, tracking, schools, hospitals, and much more. My job at the FCC is to ensure spectrum is being put to its highest and best use. Given all of these use cases, I think it emphasizes the meaningful benefit of CBRS and unlicensed spectrum.”
