O'Rielly: FCC Partisanship Leaves Little Room For Compromise

FCC Commissioneer Michael O'Rielly is frustrated.

O'Rielly, one of two Republicans on the five-person FCC, joined the agency in October 2013. And since then he has been in one battle after another with his Democratic colleagues. For the most part, he's lost.

Michael O'Rielly

"It takes time and effort to soldier on and make your arguments," he said in a CNET interview. "I do the work you'd expect me to do. I read every item. I do my homework. And I make substantive suggestions. But I'm often shot down."

His frustration with the FCC underscores the contentious interaction among the commissioners, which make up one of the more politically divisive commissions in recent history. From hotbed issues such as Net neutrality, which touches on the regulation of Internet traffic, to expanding a program to provide broadband services to the poor, O'Rielly has been a vocal minority, railing against the initiatives with little effect.

"They [the FCC majority] know exactly what they want to do," he said. "It's either you can sign up for what we want to do or not, but we're going forward."

It should come as little surprise that the former Republican congressional staffer turned regulator would not agree with the Democratic majority on many issues. After all, the FCC is by design a partisan agency. By law, three out of the five commissioners serving at the agency can come from the same political party. The result is that the party that has control of the White House controls the commission. Today, that means the Democrats are at the wheel.

O'Rielly and his Republican colleague, Ajit Pai, have opposed all the major Democrat-supported issues that have passed, in large part due to philosophical differences they have with their colleagues across the political aisles on these issues. But O'Rielly said what has truly frustrated him is what he sees as an unwillingness by the FCC leadership to find consensus on any issue.

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