WGAW Statement on FCC’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to Rollback Open Internet Rules

LOS ANGELES – “The war on the Open Internet being waged by FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioner Michael O’Rielly is an attack on free speech, competition and the public interest.

"Chairman Pai has described the Open Internet rules as ‘a panoply of heavy-handed economic regulations' that could harm 'one of the most incredible free market innovations in history.’ This doublespeak – the claim that every attempt to protect true free market competition from monopoly control is necessarily a regulatory attack on the free market – is pure Orwellian demagoguery. In reality, the Internet is free now, and can remain free from monopoly control by ISPs, but only if the Open Internet rules remain.

"While it does not come as a surprise that this Administration’s Internet policies favor a handful of powerful corporations at the expense of society, it is nevertheless alarming to witness yet another planned repeal of regulations that benefit consumers.”