FCC unveils its plan to repeal net neutrality rules, a move that would give ISPs broad powers to determine which websites and online services customers use
and Every Day—We Fight to Defend the Open Internet Mallory Locklear / Engadget : What to expect from the FCC's net neutrality proposal Denelle Dixon / The Mozilla Blog : Statement on FCC proposal to roll back net neutrality in the U.S. Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica : RIP net neutrality: FCC chair releases plan to deregulate ISPs Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols / ZDNet : Trump's FCC announces plans to kill net neutrality Brandon Carter / The Hill : Report: FCC chair to push for complete repeal of net neutrality Michael Potuck / 9to5Mac : Trump's FCC plans to abandon net neutrality regulations, allowing paid Internet fast lanes John Johnson / Newser : Big Win for Comcast: FCC Dismantling ‘Net Neutrality’ Tweets: Nilay Patel / @reckless : Rolling back net neutrality is a terrible idea built on aggressively ignoring a crucial basic fact. https://www.theverge.com/... pic.twitter.com/tsHWFeS8DJ @kitsunelaine : Hey, USA! In New Zealand we don't have #NetNeutrality . What I'm about to link and post to you is real. This could be what's in your future. https://www.vodafone.co.nz/pass/ pic.twitter.com/l2OOyp8C0S Albert Wenger / @albertwenger : Maintaining #NetNeutrality is essential for #innovation — otherwise we get service bundle plans like in Portugal and Australia http://continuations.com/... http://twitter.com/... Nikhil Pahwa / @nixxin : The US needs to learn from India on #NetNeutrality . Increase competition among ISPs and keep access neutral. We've done that and with reliance jio launching, rates have dropped, bandwidth gone up, data consumption skyrocketed Benedict Evans / @benedictevans : When I lived in London I had a choice of a dozen broadband providers. That made net neutrality a much more theoretical issue. The US's failure to unbundle local loop (almost unique in developed world) makes NN much more significant here. Jess Dweck / @thedweck : If you're tired of calling Congress to beg them not to destroy health care, congrats, now you can call to beg them not to destroy the internet http://twitter.com/... Benedict Evans / @benedictevans : If you look the last 30-40 years of telecoms regulation, almost every single time there was a major question, the USA took the opposite decision to the rest of the world, and generally got worse results. Twitter Public Policy / @policy : We strongly oppose the FCC's proposed weakening of Net Neutrality protections and will continue to fight for an open Internet, which is indispensable to free expression, consumer choice, and innovation. @eff : The FCC's new plan will create a future where only the largest Internet & cable, & telephone companies will survive while every start-up, small business, & new innovators are crowded out, & the voice of nonprofits and ordinary individuals are suppressed. https://www.eff.org/... Netflix US / @netflix : Netflix supports strong #NetNeutrality. We oppose the FCC's proposal to roll back these core protections. Chuck Schumer / @senschumer : It's official. @FCC's wrongheaded decision flies in the face of the millions of public comments you left urging the FCC to leave internet protections in place. We won't stand for this. We will protect #NetNeutrality http://www.fcc.gov/... John Shimkus / @repshimkus : Title II regulations hurt rural broadband deployment. In the two years after the FCC's #NetNeutrality decision, broadband network investment dropped more than 5.6%—the first time a decline has happened outside of a recession. http://www.wsj.com/... Felicia Day / @feliciaday : It is so hard to keep fighting so many things at once, but this is not a partisan issue. The internet is for everyone. We must keep it that way. #SaveNetNeutrality RT http://twitter.com/... Kumail Nanjiani / @kumailn : #NetNeutrality is an issue that will affect every single person here. It is not a partisan issue. We will never go back to a free internet. https://twitter.com/... Karl Bode / @karlbode : Phew. Comcast says you have nothing to worry about. #NetNeutrality https://twitter.com/... See also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
This is the payoff of a year-long arc: Ajit Pai's FCC released the full text of its proposal to roll back Title II in April 2017, opening the comment period that preceded today's formal repeal plan. The rules being dismantled date to 2015, when the commission under Tom Wheeler moved to regulate internet service as a utility after earlier, lighter-touch approaches failed in court.
The stakes are structural rather than cosmetic: reclassifying broadband strips the FCC of its authority to police blocking, throttling, and paid prioritization, returning those judgments to carriers like Comcast. The opposition is already organized — Netflix, Twitter's public policy arm, the EFF, and Senator Chuck Schumer have all publicly opposed the rollback, while Rep. John Shimkus argues Title II itself depressed rural broadband investment.
First-order effects
- ISPs such as Comcast regain discretion to charge services for priority delivery or favor their own content, since the repeal removes the legal basis for the FCC's open-internet conduct rules.
- Netflix, Twitter, and the EFF shift from commenting to opposition mode, with Schumer signaling congressional pushback against a rule change that takes effect without new legislation.
Second-order effects
- Expect litigation and legislative maneuvering to fill the vacuum: the eventual order's path through the Federal Register is what triggers the legal challenges, and Congress becomes the venue where Shimkus's anti-Title II framing collides with Schumer's defense.
- Edge services and startups face repricing risk at the access layer — if paid prioritization emerges, bandwidth-intensive video platforms are the first customers ISPs approach for fast-lane fees.
Third-order effects
- Broadband regulation becomes a partisan pendulum rather than settled law — the same commission framework that repealed the 2015 rules is later used to vote on restoring them, leaving carriers and edge providers planning around regulatory whiplash instead of a stable regime.
- If each administration rewrites the classification of broadband, the durable question moves from the FCC to whether Congress will legislate an open-internet standard that survives changes in commission leadership.
The trend: US broadband governance is cycling between utility-style Title II oversight and deregulation with each change of FCC leadership, pushing the real fight toward courts and Congress.