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Law360 (April 15, 2020, 7:59 PM EDT) -- The Federal Communications Commission is facing pressure from at least one lawmaker to take steps to prevent internet service providers from raising rates while the coronavirus pandemic leaves millions without work and mostly confined to their homes.
Rep. Anthony Brindisi of New York called on the agency Monday to extend a pledge that the FCC has asked telephone and internet service providers to sign promising that they won't cut off service for 60 days because of the pandemic.
The pledge should be amended to add a moratorium on price hikes, a promise that should last for as long as the pandemic does, the lawmaker said.
"Household budgets are stretched enough as it is; to raise prices now, during this time of national sacrifice, is simply outrageous," the Democratic lawmaker said in a statement. "It has to stop."
The congressman's open letter to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai singled out Spectrum for attention, saying that the lawmaker has been flooded with messages from constituents complaining that the internet giant has hiked their rates while they're bound to their homes.
Brindisi said he already wrote to the head of Spectrum to ask him to forgo any rate hikes for the next 90 days while the country battles the pandemic, but in spite of his request, families in his upstate New York district have continued to report their bills being jacked up.
The FCC rolled out its "Keep Americans Connected" pledge in mid-March and more than 700 companies have signed it, agreeing not to disconnect residential and small business customers for lack of payment for 60 days and to waive any resulting late fees during that time, according to the agency. As part of the pledge, participating providers also agree to open up their Wi-Fi hot spots to "any American who needs them."
But with the original 60-day grace period already half gone and the spread of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, showing no sign of slowing down, the lawmaker said the agency should ask companies to hold out on cutoffs for even longer.
The lawmaker's home state New York now has more cases than any country in the world outside of the United States. More than 630,000 people across the country have been diagnosed with COVID-19, and nearly 30,000 have already died from the disease, according to Johns Hopkins University.
--Editing by Amy Rowe.
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