Report: Ted Cruz Held-Up Tom Wheeler Vote As FCC Chair

FCC Nominee Tom Wheeler

Politico is reportings that Mike O’Rielly’s nomination to the FCC was discharged from the Senate Commerce Committee by a late-Wednesday evening unanimous consent request from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

A request had been made earlier in the day that the Senate unanimously confirm Tom Wheeler, the president’s nominee to lead the agency, and O'Rielly — but Reid never asked for UC on the floor.

Politico cites an industry source as indicating that Sen. Ted Cruz — who previously expressed concern over Wheeler’s stance on the Disclose Act — was the hold-up on the nominee for chairman.

The earliest the nominees could move forward is Oct. 28, when the Senate is due back in session. The Senate Committee had been set to vote earlier this month, but the vote was postponed due to the government shutdown.

As furloughed workers start making their way back to work, it’s going to take more than just a flip of the light switch to get back underway. According to the Politico story,  the FCC is postponing its October meeting that was originally set for next Tuesday. It’s unclear right now when it will be held, but the delay is no surprise, given that staff have not had the last 16 days to get things prepared.

Beyond that, expect a flurry of documents to hit the agency’s busy electronic comment filing system as the commission comes back online. It will take some time to sort through them before everything gets back on-track, especially since filings that were due during the shutdown are due the first business day after the commission resumes normal operations.

And even outside of filings, there’s likely to be plenty to catch up on: The Telecommunications Industry Association, for example, wrote to Hill leaders Wednesday asking them to help swiftly restore the FCC’s website so tech manufacturers can get new products approved — the site, by the way, returned just before midnight Wednesday.

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