FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler To Step Down At Start Of Trump Admin, Net Neutrality Likely Dead

Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chairman Tom Wheeler will step down from his post at the start of the Donald Trump administration, he announced before the commission’s open meeting on Thursday.

Wheeler was appointed to his current position in 2013 by President Barack Obama. Though he has two years left in his current term, he plans to step down from the board on Jan. 20, 2017—the day of Trump’s inauguration.

“Serving as FCC Chairman during this period of historic technological change has been the greatest honor of my professional life,” Wheeler said in a statement. “I am deeply grateful to the President for giving me this opportunity. I am especially thankful to the talented Commission staff for their service and sacrifice during my tenure. Their achievements have contributed to a thriving communications sector, where robust investment and world-leading innovation continue to drive our economy and meaningful improvements in the lives of the American people.”

Wheeler’s leadership marked a productive and proactive period for the commission. His most noteworthy accomplishment was the preservation of net neutrality by defining broadband internet as a public utility and prohibiting internet service providers from prioritizing some types of data over others.

The announcement of Wheeler’s departure comes just days after the U.S. Senate failed to reconfirm Jessica Rosenworcel —a net neutrality advocate—for a second term. The absence of both Rosenworcel and Wheeler as reliable Democratic voters on the five-person board leaves the Republican votes with a 2-1 majority.

It is common for the serving chairman to step away from the post at the start of a new administration, especially when the ruling party changes, but Wheeler’s absence at the commission may mean a near-immediate rollback of much of the rulings made under his leadership. Wheeler’s signature issue, Net Neutrality, is likely dead.

Net Neutrality dictates all data must be treated as equal by internet service providers. The rules prevent companies like Comcast or Verizon from throttling certain types of traffic and prohibits those ISPs from giving priority to services in exchange for payment.

Net neutrality guarantees an internet service provider cannot charge a data-heavy service like Netflix an extra fee just to deliver its product to customers. It also prevents the creation of "slow lanes" and "fast lanes" for certain types of data, ensuring consumers experience all parts of the internet equally and without restriction.

President-elect Trump will fill the two vacancies on the commission, including the chairman position. Though he hasn’t named a successor yet, Trump’s transition team has been stacked with opponents to net neutrality, including former Verizon consultant Jeff Eisenach, Sprint lobbyist Mark Jamison, and American Enterprise Institute scholar Rosyln Layton.

Two of the three remaining FCC members, Republicans Ajit Pai and Michael O'Rielly, have already advocated for drastic rollbacks of rules made by the commission under Wheeler. Pai suggested the board should “ fire up the weed whacker ” and cut back on regulations like net neutrality, while O’Rielly advised the board should act quickly to “reverse any damaging policies put into place over the last eight years and in the last few weeks of this administration."