{"id":3836,"date":"2015-07-03T20:13:19","date_gmt":"2015-07-03T20:13:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=3836"},"modified":"2015-07-03T20:13:25","modified_gmt":"2015-07-03T20:13:25","slug":"internet-advocates-urge-congress-to-call-off-sneak-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=3836","title":{"rendered":"Internet Advocates Urge Congress to Call Off \u201cSneak Attack\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_3837\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3837\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3837\" src=\"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/gr-46828-1-1.jpg\" alt=\"More than 60 organizations sent a letter calling on Congress to remove a rider in its budget bill they claim would block the FCC from implementing net neutrality rules. Photo: Sean MacEntee\/Flickr Commons.\" width=\"600\" height=\"369\" srcset=\"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/gr-46828-1-1.jpg 600w, https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/gr-46828-1-1-300x185.jpg 300w, https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/gr-46828-1-1-405x249.jpg 405w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-3837\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">More than 60 organizations sent a letter calling on Congress to remove a rider in its budget bill they claim would block the FCC from implementing net neutrality rules. Photo: Sean MacEntee\/Flickr Commons.<\/p><\/div>\n<p><strong><em>by Eric Galatas\/TNS<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>AUSTIN, Texas &#8211; More than 60 civil rights and public-interest groups sent a letter urging Congress to protect the Federal Communications Commission\u2019s (FCC) decision to keep the Internet open.<\/p>\n<p>The coalition is protesting a rider, attached to a must-pass government funding package, that would take away money the FCC needs to enforce net neutrality rules. Timothy Karr, senior director of strategy with the nonprofit Free Press, says the provisions are buried inside a spending bill 150 pages long.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is one of the more sneaky ways to do it,\u201d he says. \u201cSlip a couple lines of language into a budget appropriations bill.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Advocates claim that by eliminating the FCC\u2019s ability to protect net neutrality, the appropriations bill would have a chilling effect on First Amendment rights and the economy. The American Library Association, National Hispanic Media Coalition, American Civil Liberties Union and Electronic Frontier Foundation are among the groups that signed on to the letter.<\/p>\n<p>In February, the FCC responded to nearly four million public comments with a decision to protect the fundamental openness of the Internet &#8211; no \u201cfast lanes\u201d for corporations, and no \u201cslow lanes\u201d for average citizens. Karr says since the ruling, an entrenched phone and cable lobby has worked to punish the FCC for protecting the public\u2019s interest in the courts and now in Congress.<br \/>\n\u201cThe public, on the issue of net neutrality, has been overwhelmingly in favor of open Internet protections,\u201d he says. \u201cSo we\u2019re seeing the backlash of that decision.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Karr adds that the funding package is inching closer to a vote before the full House, but there\u2019s still time for members to remove the provisions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Eric Galatas\/TNS AUSTIN, Texas &#8211; More than 60 civil rights and public-interest groups sent a letter urging Congress to protect the Federal Communications Commission\u2019s (FCC) decision to keep the Internet open. The coalition is protesting a rider, attached to a must-pass government funding package, that would take away money the FCC needs to enforce [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":3837,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3836"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3836\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3838,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3836\/revisions\/3838"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}