Feds Sue California Over Net Neutrality Law

Gov. Jerry Brown on Sunday restored net neutrality rules in California that were repealed under the Trump administration, setting up a legal battle with the federal government over whether states can prevent companies from blocking access to the internet.

The L-A Times reports news that the governor signed the ambitious new law was swiftly met with an aggressive response from Justice Department officials, who announced soon afterward that they were suing California to block the regulations. The state law prohibits broadband and wireless companies from blocking, throttling or otherwise hindering access to internet content, and from favoring some websites over others by charging for faster speeds.

“Under the Constitution, states do not regulate interstate commerce — the federal government does,” Atty. Gen. Jeff Sessions said in a statement Sunday. “Once again the California legislature has enacted an extreme and illegal state law attempting to frustrate federal policy.”

Ajit Pai, the Trump-appointed chairman of the Federal Communications Commission who over nine months worked to shelve the federal net neutrality regulations, said in a statement that he was pleased with the lawsuit, pointing to a federal appellate court ruling that he said found “state regulation of information services is preempted by federal law.”

The bill’s August passage in the CA Legislature capped months of feuding between tech advocates and telecom industry lobbyists. Telecom giants such as AT&T and Verizon Communications poured millions into killing the legislation, while grass-roots activists fought back with crowd-sourced funding and social media campaigns.

California leaders cheered the governor’s approval of the bill Sunday, saying the new rules were vital to protect fair access to the internet and part of the state’s resistance to the Trump administration on tech, immigration and climate change policies.

Experts have said the new law would impose the toughest net neutrality regulations in the country by reinstating the rolled-back federal regulations at the state level. It tasks the state attorney general with evaluating potential evasion of the net neutrality rules.