After Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders dropped out of the Democratic primary race last week and gave his endorsement to former Vice President Joe Biden on Monday, Biden now becomes the all-but-certain nominee of his party, though with the pandemic throwing most political campaigning and voting into disarray, even that's not certain. But Biden got to his position of prominence while largely maintaining a fuzzy position on issues of internet freedom, having failed to endorse net neutrality rules or openly criticize the Republican-controlled FCC’s repeal of those rules in 2018.
But that has apparently changed now that Biden has become the last man standing in the Democratic race, according to a report by the technology news site CNet.
"As Barack Obama's vice president, Joe Biden was proud to push for net neutrality and see the [Federal Communications Commission] take direct action to keep the internet open and free for all Americans," a Biden campaign spokesperson said in a statement to CNet, adding that Biden “is a supporter of strong net neutrality protections.”
Net neutrality rules are designed to prevent internet service providers from favoring some internet traffic with a data “fast lane,” while slowing or blocking traffic from other sites.
But Biden did not always take a position in favor of “strong” net neutrality. During the primary campaign, he remained ambiguous in his stance toward the principles which were enacted as federal rules under the Obama administration, only to be ditched after Donald Trump’s election put Republicans in control of the FCC.
As a Senator in 2007, according to CNet, Biden “never co-sponsored or supported net neutrality legislation,” not even the 2007 Internet Freedom Preservation Act which was co-sponsored by both Obama and Sanders.
During the primary campaign, Sanders took a clear stance in favor of net neutrality rules. A study by a Washington D.C. think tank ranked Sanders, along with Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, as the Democratic candidates with the strongest internet freedom platforms.
But Gigi Sohn, a former top FCC staffer in the Obama administration, told CNet that Biden’s past stances, or lack of them, on net neutrality do not worry her, because not only were the rules a “signature” achievement of the Obama administration, net neutrality has since become a key plank in the Democratic platform.
"I fully expect that a President Biden would appoint an FCC chair that would reinstate net neutrality and the FCC's authority to oversee the broadband market under Title II," Sohn told CNet. "This was one of President Obama's signature initiatives, and I can't imagine that Biden would undermine it."
As the Democratic nominee, Biden would be running against Trump, whose views appear to be in clear contrast to those now expressed by Biden. Trump appointed Ajit Pai, the FCC chair who led the effort to scrap net neutrality rules. Also, last October when a federal court upheld the repeal, Trump called the decision a “great win for the future and speed of the internet.”
Photo By White House / Wikimedia Common Public Domain
