- 5/8/2025
During remarks on the Senate floor Wednesday, Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) spoke about the FCC's E-Rate connectivity program.
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00:00The Senator from Massachusetts.
00:02Yeah, Mr. President, I rise this evening in strong opposition to SJRES 7, the Congressional
00:11Review Act resolution that would repeal the Federal Communication Commission's common
00:17sense rule allowing schools and libraries to use E-rate funds.
00:23E-rate stands for education rate funds to ensure that there is access to the educational
00:36tools of a school or a library to every child in America.
00:41And that would occur by extending out the way in which we view this program so that Wi-Fi
00:49hotspots can be provided to students and to educators so that they can use them even
00:56when they're not in the school, even when they're not in the library.
01:00And if we pass this resolution, the resolution which the Republicans are malevolently bringing
01:08out onto the floor, we're not simply undoing regulation.
01:14We're pulling the plug on progress in our country.
01:18We are abandoning millions of students who lack the internet access needed to complete
01:23their homework, to attend class, to reach their full potential.
01:28This repeal will widen educational disparities in our country.
01:33It will deepen the digital divide.
01:37And it will slam shut the doors of opportunity for millions of children in our country.
01:43We should be doing everything in our power to close the homework gap that exists between
01:50rich and poor in our nation.
01:54Not reopen it.
01:55Not make that homework gap even larger, making it more difficult for poor kids to get access
02:02to these educational tools that they need.
02:05And in this modern era, that absolutely meets the definition of a Wi-Fi hotspot.
02:16That's society of 2025.
02:20You have to move to that era.
02:22That homework gap is the cruel chasm that separates students who have reliable internet access at
02:30home from those who don't.
02:32It's a gap that existed long before the COVID-19 pandemic, but it was laid bare when schools
02:40closed and kids were forced to learn from kitchen tables and living rooms.
02:44For some, the transition was difficult.
02:47For others, it was impossible.
02:49For too many children, especially in low-income, rural, and black and brown communities, they
02:55were locked out of virtual learning because, simply, they lacked a basic internet connection.
03:03You didn't have to worry about the families that had a good income.
03:08Those kids had internet at home when their schools were shut down during COVID.
03:12But you had to create some kind of a solution for kids who didn't have that at home.
03:19So we saw the stories of the students sitting in parking lots outside fast food restaurants
03:26just to pick up a Wi-Fi signal strong enough to complete their assignments.
03:31We saw families choosing between paying rent and paying for broadband.
03:35And we saw the urgent, indisputable need for action.
03:40In that moment of need, Congress stepped up.
03:44We passed, at my request, $7 billion to help provide hotspots and other connectivity tools
03:53to students and educators.
03:55Demand was overwhelming in our nation.
03:58We had a COVID shutdown.
04:01Schools were closed.
04:03And there was going to be a huge digital divide, which would open up because kids in the suburbs,
04:10for the most part, they had access.
04:13But kids who were poorer, and disproportionately they were black and brown in our nation, they
04:19did not.
04:21And we're still reeling from the effect that that period of time had upon young people in
04:29our nation.
04:30The program, as it was implemented, however, helped nearly 18 million students at 10,000
04:38schools and libraries connect to the internet.
04:41I'm very proud of that.
04:44It was a big difference in the lives of those kids.
04:49But that funding ran out, leaving millions of students across the country at risk of falling
04:55back into the digital divide.
04:58And that's why last year, the Federal Communications Commission took steps to extend the reach of
05:03the E-Rate program, a program that I was proud to author in 1996, in the Telecommunications
05:11Act of 1996.
05:14I can take you back to that period of time.
05:17Not one home in America had broadband.
05:22We still lived in an analog world, not a digital world.
05:26We lived in a world of dial-up internet technology.
05:36Broadband had not been deployed.
05:38So the legislation, which I'm proud to have been the House author of, along with senators,
05:46what we did was we broke down every monopoly that existed.
05:51The telephone monopolies, the cable monopolies, they all were eliminated.
05:57Telephone companies could do what cable companies do.
05:59Cable companies can do what telephone companies do.
06:02And all of a sudden, Comcast can offer phone service.
06:08And Verizon and AT&T, they can offer cable service.
06:11So they need to deploy broadband in order to accommodate all this information.
06:17And we're going to move very rapidly into a digital era, into a broadband era.
06:21And it happened pretty much in the blink of an eye for about 80% of our country.
06:25We're still working on the final 10% of our nation.
06:29But for the most part, it happened by the year 2000, 2001.
06:36It was done.
06:37People had it.
06:38It was deployed.
06:40But what we did was we said to ourselves, we've got to take care of the poorest kids
06:47in our country as we move rapidly on a technological revolution.
06:52Yeah, the economy is going to be absolutely exploding.
06:57In fact, about a trillion and a half dollars worth of private sector investment was put into
07:05that broadband expansion in just a five-year period.
07:08It was incredible.
07:10It transformed our nation.
07:13A 14-year-old girl today thinks that she has an entitlement to a 65-inch screen in her
07:19living room and a little digital device on her lap at the same time.
07:24That didn't exist in the year 2000.
07:28It all happened in the blink of an eye.
07:31Now, what would happen, though, to the kids that didn't come from suburban or wealthier families?
07:39So what I suggested was that we have a program, an education program, so that every time someone
07:47made a little phone call that there would be a little tax on it.
07:52And that tax would then create a fund.
07:56And I called it the education fund, the education rate.
08:04And it ultimately just had a nickname called the E-Rate.
08:09And that's what helps to provide for Internet service on schools, in schools in Harlem, Roxbury, Massachusetts, inner city, Washington, D.C.
08:21That's what helps to supplement that, make it possible for every kid to have access to the Internet.
08:26And that program works, and so far it's spent about $70 billion.
08:32It's still the largest educational technology program in the history of the United States, $70 billion.
08:42Very proud of it.
08:44But times change.
08:47And we learn about what has to happen as we are changing the way in which our country operates.
08:56And new technologies get developed.
08:59So yes, we had that revolution from the 1996 Act.
09:03I'm very proud of it.
09:05We called the companies that got created Google, eBay, Amazon, Hulu, YouTube.
09:11I'm very proud of that.
09:13We wanted a Darwinian paranoia-inducing revolution out in the marketplace.
09:21We would no longer be tied to this old telecommunications system that Alexander Graham Bell would have recognized.
09:29No.
09:30We were moving on to the future.
09:32But with it, we had to bring along the young people in our nation.
09:36And I mean every young person had to have access to it in their schools, at their desk.
09:41So it was ensured to make sure that the schools and libraries had the connectivity which they needed.
09:48That's essentially what the E-Rate program is all about.
09:53But as the technology evolved, so too did the nature of education in our nation.
10:02And today, learning doesn't end when the school bell rings.
10:07Learning follows students home.
10:09And so should Internet access for everybody.
10:13Everybody.
10:15And the Federal Communication Commission's decision to allow schools and libraries to lend Wi-Fi hotspots was not a radical idea.
10:24It was a responsible idea.
10:26It recognized that in the 21st century, a student's ability to succeed should not depend on whether their parents can afford a broadband subscription.
10:37It helped ensure that millions of students that relied upon emergency connectivity funds during the pandemic
10:45wouldn't suddenly lose access to crucial connectivity at home.
10:50In other words, the Federal Communications Commission learned from what happened during the pandemic,
10:58learned from what happened when I was able to move over the $7 billion for these Wi-Fi hotspots to help kids at home get it.
11:07And they said, well, you know what we should do?
11:09We should just make sure that no student is left offline.
11:13We'll make it a permanent program.
11:15And they passed that regulation.
11:16So you don't have to take my word for this.
11:21In study after study, it has shown that students without access to broadband Internet at home perform worse
11:28than their better educated, better connected classmates.
11:35It's not that these kids are smarter in the suburbs than the kids in the inner city.
11:42Those kids are just as smart.
11:43But you can't allow an education gap.
11:48Because the kids who have access are going to get a better education because they have access to the technology
11:53by which young people in our nation get their education in the 21st century.
12:00So you have to make sure everyone gets access to it.
12:03Otherwise, without access to broadband Internet at home, those kids are going to perform worse than their better connected classmates.
12:12It's not their intelligence is less than the kids in the suburbs.
12:17It's not that they wouldn't study as hard.
12:19They would.
12:20It's just that they don't have access.
12:24So the Department of Education's National Assessment of Educational Programs, for example,
12:30has repeatedly shown that high-performing students had a much better access to the Internet at home.
12:36I don't think you have to be Horace Mann, the founder of the public school system in the United States,
12:45to think that that makes sense.
12:47Of course it does.
12:47Because in 2023, a study of Michigan students found that a student without access to home Internet
12:58earned significantly lower grades.
13:02Actually, 0.6 lower on the 4.0 scale than their connected classmates.
13:09Not because they weren't as intelligent.
13:11Not because they wouldn't have learned equally well on their device.
13:16But you need the device.
13:18You need access.
13:20You need a Wi-Fi hotspot.
13:22You need Internet at home.
13:23You need something that's going to help you to compete.
13:27And by the way, we have another word for those kids.
13:30We call them the future of the 21st century in the United States of America.
13:34Kids are 20% of our population.
13:36They're 100% of our future.
13:38And we live in a digital world, and it's a portable skill set that every child should be able to take
13:43to anywhere they want to go in the world for the rest of their lives.
13:47It'll be a skill set that employs them, educates them, makes them better citizens.
13:54But you can't reach that stage if you're denying it to them when they're 6 years old,
13:598 years old, 10 years old, 12 years old, and expect them to be able to compete with the
14:04kids that come from wealthier families.
14:06That's what this vote's all about, by the way.
14:08It's all about that one issue.
14:10When I was a boy, I had my books.
14:14I could take them home.
14:15My father drove a truck for the Hood Milk Company.
14:17I take my books home.
14:19The school superintendent's kids bring their books home.
14:23I can compete against them.
14:25Books are equal.
14:26No, that's not the world we live in anymore.
14:30If you don't have the internet at home, the other kids essentially have their books in
14:36their knapsack.
14:37It's called their iPad.
14:41They've got their home computer.
14:43They've got access.
14:45I'm only here because it was books, and I could compete against any kid in Malden, Massachusetts,
14:51in a blue-collar community.
14:53That's why I'm a senator.
14:55I had never even been to Washington before I got elected to the United States House of
15:01Representatives.
15:02That was my first visit to Washington.
15:04I'm 29, 30 years old, but I've been competing because you give me the books, you give the
15:10kid whose father is the school superintendent, I'll compete against him.
15:14As a matter of fact, I actually sit here at the desk which Jimmy Stewart, Mr. Smith Goes
15:20to Washington, had in the movie, Mrs. Smith Goes to Washington.
15:23He had never been to Washington.
15:25I had never been to Washington.
15:27But it didn't mean you couldn't do a good job if you had access to the same tools that
15:32young people had in the best school systems in America.
15:36That's what this debate is all about.
15:40It's about ensuring that every child has access to the internet through a Wi-Fi hotspot if they
15:47need it.
15:48If the school, the library says we've got to help them at home, they don't have it because
15:55that kid will fall behind the kids who have it.
15:58And it won't have anything to do with their ability, won't have anything to do with their
16:03desire to be a full participant in this great American experiment.
16:08A study using Census Bureau data estimated that individuals with greater access to the
16:13computer and internet at home spent 28% more hours learning than those kids without that access.
16:22I mean, do we really need a study of this?
16:27Of course not.
16:28We know that's the truth.
16:30So as this evidence on home connectivity piles up, there's no debate.
16:33Students without access to internet at home are seriously disadvantaged compared to their
16:39classmates.
16:40Plain and simple.
16:41I identified with this because my father was a truck driver.
16:46There weren't, we didn't have trips to the Himalayas.
16:50We didn't have, you know, some kind of summer school at universities to help out my brothers
16:56and I when we were 15, 16, or 17.
16:58But we didn't feel deprived because we had the same books as the kids in the suburbs, in
17:03the private schools.
17:04We had the same books.
17:07And I'm going to study as hard as I can.
17:10Today, that's not possible.
17:11If you don't have a Wi-Fi hotspot, you can't do it.
17:14If you don't have internet at home, you can't do it.
17:16You might want to do it, but you can't do it.
17:20And by the way, they know they don't have it.
17:22They can see the kids on the other side of town who have it.
17:26They know it.
17:27They're 9, they're 10, they're 11, they're 12.
17:29They know it.
17:31That's what this program's all about.
17:33It's just to say, you've got it.
17:35You've got it at home.
17:36Go to it.
17:37Be whoever you can be.
17:39And these Republicans, they're going to vote this program out of existence.
17:44This is the great equalizer.
17:46This is the access to opportunity.
17:48This is democratization of access to opportunity through education, which is supposed to be
17:53the foundation of our country.
17:57You know, when I grew up, I would look at Abe Lincoln and his story.
18:02I'd look at the movies about Abe Lincoln.
18:04He'd be reading books by candlelight in his house on the prairie.
18:09And that's all you needed was the light because the book was there.
18:14You could do it.
18:16Well, without a Wi-Fi hotspot, there's nothing to read.
18:21Because your device is not working.
18:26You're denying that ambitious, hardworking, imaginative, creative, young person, by the
18:33way, disproportionately black and brown in our nation, from having the same opportunities
18:38as we have provided for 250 years since the dawn of our country.
18:43So, we're putting these young people at a serious disadvantage compared to their classmates.
18:51So now, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, they want to just take that tool
18:56away.
18:57They want to rip the hotspots out of students' hands.
19:01And why?
19:02So, let's just listen to a few of their arguments.
19:05First, the Congressional Review Act supporters say, the hotspots rule is illegal.
19:12That's simply untrue.
19:14It is not illegal.
19:16In Section 254 of the Communications Act, Congress provided the FCC with flexibility to
19:24adapt the E-rate program for changing times and educational conditions.
19:29How do I know?
19:30I'm the author of that provision.
19:32So, when people tell me it's illegal, it's not illegal.
19:36I wrote the provision which says that the Federal Communications Commission can do this
19:42for the children of our nation.
19:45Second, the Congressional Review Act supporters argue that the hotspots rule endangers students
19:51by allowing them to access inappropriate content, including on social media.
19:58False.
19:58That is also not true.
20:00Under the Children's Internet Protection Act, schools and libraries receiving E-rate dollars
20:07must ensure that hotspots block or filter images that are obscene or harmful to minors.
20:14And by the way, with all of the crocodile tears coming down from my colleagues on the other
20:21side about their concern for children, I've had a Children's Online Privacy Protection Act pending
20:29here in the Senate for years that give total privacy protection to children under the age
20:38of 17 in our nation.
20:39And we can't get it passed.
20:40Why can't we get it passed?
20:43Because too many Republicans are concerned about what the big social media companies might
20:49say to them.
20:51Well, where's their concern then for the poor child being exposed?
20:57Not there.
20:59They should be more concerned about what Meta is doing to them, what Google is doing to them,
21:04what those big companies are doing.
21:05Because under the law, it can't happen, under the E-rate dollars.
21:11It can't happen.
21:12It's illegal.
21:13We need another law to pass that makes it illegal to let the big social media companies in our
21:18country do the same thing.
21:20And if my colleagues are really so concerned about children's online privacy and safety,
21:25I urge them to support my legislation, if they care about it, because that would block it.
21:32Third, they say that the program is wasteful.
21:37That's false.
21:38Again, the Hotspots rule limits the amount of money that can be requested by an E-rate
21:43applicant and prohibits the duplication of the funding.
21:46It's all written into the law.
21:49So let me be clear.
21:50This repeal will not save the taxpayer a dime.
21:55What does the resolution really do?
21:57It doesn't make our schools stronger.
22:00It doesn't make our libraries better.
22:02It doesn't improve student outcomes.
22:05It doesn't lower your taxes.
22:07It doesn't save the government money.
22:09All it does is strip away a lifeline for the children in our nation who need it the most.
22:15That they can take it home with them.
22:17That they can study at home.
22:18That's it.
22:19So this E-rate expansion didn't just connect students.
22:24It connected futures.
22:25It helped make good on the promise that every child, regardless of their income, their race,
22:29their geography, deserves a fair shot at learning.
22:32And that promise is worth defending.
22:35It's worth defending.
22:37Education is a great equalizer.
22:40It is the foundation of our democracy, the engine of our economy,
22:43and the heartbeat of our shared American dream that any child, regardless of where they come from,
22:48regardless of who their mother or father is, can dream the great dreams.
22:52But we have to give them access to the tools they need in order to maximize all of their God-given abilities.
23:00In today's world, to be cut off from the digital world is to be cut off from education.
23:04And that means broadband is not a luxury.
23:07It is a necessity.
23:08It is also an essential tool as much as a textbook or a school bus or a lunch program.
23:15This is not a partisan issue.
23:18It's not a liberal issue.
23:19It's not a conservative issue.
23:20It's a children's issue.
23:22It's an American issue.
23:23It's who we should be.
23:25It's a fairness issue.
23:26So I urge my colleagues to not vote to deepen inequality.
23:32Instead, vote to affirm our values.
23:34Vote to defend every child's right to learn, to thrive, to reach for the stars.
23:39Let's reject this resolution and recommit ourselves to closing the homework gap so that all children
23:46have equal access to learning.
23:48I thank you, Mr. President, and I yield.