An aide says Obama hasn't yet seen the text of the bill. Obama's net neutrality conflict

An FCC net neutrality plan that could empower Internet providers to charge Netflix, Amazon, Facebook and others for faster service clashes with one of President Barack Obama’s oldest campaign promises.

Before he arrived at the White House, Obama in 2007 explicitly rejected the possibility that “gatekeepers” someday could “charge different rates to different websites” — a system, he said, that “destroys one of the best things about the Internet — which is that there is this incredible equality there.”


Obama’s comment now seems at odds with the so-called fast lanes that might result from the open Internet proposal from FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler. But the president still “strongly supports” net neutrality, a White House spokesman stressed Thursday, while declining to comment on the specifics of Wheeler’s plan.

Obama hadn’t yet seen the text, added the aide, who also pointed to the fact that the FCC is an independent agency.

Meanwhile, old divisions in the familiar net neutrality debate quickly resurfaced on the Hill. Some Democrats, including Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) and Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.), urged the FCC to harden its rule proposal, while House Republicans criticized the telecom agency for trying to impose any requirements at all on Internet providers.

“It is well past time for the commission to focus on areas where its work will foster new innovation, competition, and job creation,” said Reps. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and Greg Walden (R-Ore.).

The early divides highlight the difficult politics of net neutrality, a perennial lightning-rod in Internet-policy circles. A constantly warring and partisan Congress renders any legislative fix implausible, even after a January court decision struck down the FCC’s old net neutrality rules. And Wheeler, still a relatively new FCC chairman, risks only more fighting if he imposes on Internet providers the same, strict rules that long have applied to traditional phone companies.

Wheeler’s proposed solution prohibits Internet providers from outright blocking websites or content. However, it also creates an opening for those Internet service providers to charge content companies for better access to their pipes. If an Internet provider does so on “commercially unreasonable” terms, then the FCC could take action.

Already, the proposed system hasn’t won much support — even among net neutrality’s biggest congressional defenders.

“Like many Internet users, I fear that the latest round of proposed net neutrality rules from the FCC will not do enough to curtail discrimination of Internet traffic, but rather leave the door open to discrimination under more ambiguous terms,” said Eshoo, the top Democrat on the House’s leading telecom committee.

Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), another top net neutrality supporter, stressed the “Internet’s rules of the road must not open up fast lanes to those who can pay, leaving others stuck in traffic.” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), meanwhile, called it a “terribly misguided proposal,” and even wagered its implementation would mean “the Internet as we have come to know it would cease to exist and the average American would be the big loser.”

And Franken described the plan as “deeply disappointing and very troubling.” The senator added, “Chairman Wheeler’s proposal would fundamentally change the open nature of the Internet, and I strongly urge him to reconsider this misguided approach.”

By and large, GOP reaction Thursday seemed muted — lawmakers still are away on recess, and Wheeler’s proposal isn’t the most onerous legal avenue he could have taken. Still, a few Republican net neutrality opponents slammed the Obama administration once the FCC detailed some of its plans.

“We have said repeatedly that the Obama administration’s net neutrality rules are a solution in search of a problem,” said Upton and Walden, the leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and its telecom subcommittee, respectively. “The marketplace has thrived and will continue to serve customers and invest billions annually to meet Americans’ broadband needs without these rules.”

Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), another regular net neutrality critic, later charged that Wheeler’s plans amount to “regulatory action that could change the future of the Internet as we know it.”

But the most closely watched reaction came from the White House.

An Obama administration spokesman said Thursday that the president has been “clear from the start that we support” the open Internet. The aide said the president would be “closely following these developments as the FCC launches its proceeding.”

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