James Erwin, federal affairs manager for telecommunications at Americans for Tax Reform, said Tennessee is leading the nation in awarding funding for broadband internet provided by the federal Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program by ensuring funds do not go exclusively towards government-owned networks (GONs).
The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, signed by President Joe Biden in 2021, provided the National Telecommunications and Information Administration with $42.45 billion to administer to all 50 U.S. states for the BEAD program, which was intended to “provide broadband access to unserved communities, particularly those in rural areas.”
Erwin said Tennessee’s guardrails in place to ensure block grants do not go towards funding GONs are ultimately benefiting those in rural areas in need of high speed internet.
“Tennessee’s done a good job of incorporating free market principles into how to award these block grants. The basic principles you want to keep in mind is don’t give your money to government owned networks because they don’t respond to market forces,” Erwin explained on Wednesday’s edition of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show.
“We can tell Tennessee’s done a really good job because there are several government owned networks in Tennessee and most of them aren’t even applying for Tennessee’s block grant program, which is a good sign. It’s a sign that Tennessee has put in strong guardrails that are going to keep out some of the least sustainable networks that are likely to waste the money,” Erwin added.
Erwin said GONs, while they are marketed as an affordable alternative for fiber internet as opposed to private sector companies, are not reliable in terms of security and network upgrades.
“There’s a bit of a movement nationwide to get more of these GONs off the ground. I think it’s really a plot to build socialized internet,” Erwin explained.
Erwin said GONs’ goal is to wipe out the competition in areas where private sector companies provide internet to customers in order to “monopolize the entire market” and “saddle everybody with one size fits all internet.”
Instead, Erwin said companies that have experience in providing customers with internet are more reliable with block grant funding.
“Long term, the people who have experience providing internet service know how to do it and standing up a new company out of nowhere with taxpayer dollars is really a recipe for waste,” Erwin said.
Watch the full interview:
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
