Trump administration threatens veto of net neutrality bill

The White House on Monday threatened to veto House Democrats’ bill to reinstate net neutrality rules as the legislation heads toward a vote.

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) said in a release Monday that the Trump administration “strongly opposes” the Save the Internet Act that Democrats have championed in recent weeks.

The legislation would put the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) 2015 rules back into effect. The Trump administration FCC voted to repeal the Obama-era rules at the end of 2017.

Those rules prohibited internet service providers from blocking, throttling or prioritizing web traffic. Republicans have long opposed the 2015 order because it opened up the broadband industry to greater oversight from the FCC.

The OMB said that the Democrats’ bill would “return to the heavy-handed regulatory approach of the previous administration and undo the FCC’s action that restored the Federal Trade Commission’s authority to investigate and take enforcement action against unfair, deceptive, or anti-competitive acts or practices committed by broadband providers.”

Democratic leaders have championed the new bill, hoping that net neutrality’s broad public support will push it through a divided Congress. But the legislation faces an uphill battle in the GOP-controlled Senate.

The House could vote on the bill as early as Tuesday.