Sen. Ron Wyden says President Donald Trump’s recent handling of Federal Communications Commission nominations is a “disaster.” Earlier this week, the Trump administration withdrew the nomination of Republican FCC commissioner Michael O’Rielly, shortly after O’Rielly criticized an executive order demanding that the agency unilaterally revise Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.
There is the EARN IT Act. And then there is just what I would describe as chaos at the FCC. The NTIA filed a petition to the FCC based on the president’s executive order, saying “Figure out a way to regulate social networks and potentially take away the protections of 230.” And then yesterday, President Trump blocked the renomination of Chairman O’Rielly, who is a Republican, because he seems very uncomfortable with the notion of the FCC regulating social networks.