how do we go about building a 21st century military. make o we need to do to sure we're equipped to defeat isis and the threat posed by radical islamic terror? how do we make sure that we're secure here at home? economic growth. our economy is far from its potential. families are still suffering. how do we fix our tax code. our regulatoryin state and maximize our potential? healthcare. obama care has driven up premiums and taken away choices and limited access. these are not the signs of success. they're the signs of failure. if we repeal obamacare, what will lower solutions truly cost patient-centered healthcare system? fourth, poverty and opportunity.

there are 46 million americans living in poverty today and the is we t of the reason have this safety net that catches people falling into poverty. up, bring lift people them back into the workforce and mobility? ard the last piece of this agenda, and it's so critical to all the restoring the constitution. the president's executive overreach has undermined the constitution and damaged the people's trust. what needs to be done to restore the separation of powers and rotect our constitutional liberties? we believe in the ideas that we would be advancing. we've gt got a big job ahead of s but this is nothing short of a generational defining moment. everything is at stake, and hunger in real america for solutions, for a and reaches nifies its potential, and we see it as ur duty, here in the people's

house, to offer real ideas, to head-on.he tough issues we want to conquer it, america. get to work. to >> c-span, created by america's 35 years ago and brought to you as a public service by your local cable or provider. >> the senior republican on the federal communications commission, and he is our guest "the eek on communicators." commissioner, welcome back. thanks for being here. can we expect an activist active docket in an election year? to es, you would have are leadership, but i will do what i can to deliver what i public to be the

interest, including things like broad band deployment and making sure every person has access to opportunities, and hopefully the electoral ignore the chatter and focus on what is ultimately in the consumer's interest. >> is broad band deployment your number 1 issue? mr. pai: it is. privilege i had the to travel everywhere from the bayous of louisiana to the dakotas. fcc is an area where the has a role to play and putting a lot of plans on the table that do that.p us mr. slen: where is it not deployed? hat percentage of the american population doesn't have access? mr. pai: it depends on what metrics you use. i think it's clear when i travel there are people out there that broadband the opportunities we take for granted on the belt way. outskirts of reno,

nevada, been north of the arctic ircle, rural mississippi, places that don't really stand out in the american consciousness but nonetheless ave many americans who are yearning for that digital connection. those are the ones we want to make sure have the ability to live, work and take care of other ids the same way americans do. mr. slen: joining us is brian fun fung. fung: i want to circle back on that. we're hearing national people have talked about the fcc as being incredibly divided agency at this point in time. is there anything you and your colleagues on the republican majority with on the of the cycle? mr. pai: it's been unfortunate,

the partisan divide and as we look at the numbers over the partisan is s, the unprecedented. 60% of our votes at monthly party-line ve been votes. that number was north of 90% in chairs of the o person i served under. we've seen more party line votes in the previous 43 years and that's unfortunate because these issues are typically not politicized. onetheless, i'm going to keep advocating for what i think does have support across party lines, deployment.band a streaming wireless nfrastructure policy, allowing changes to a.m. radio. there's some things we can do that doesn't have any political those are things i think the agency can speak with a unified voice on. mr. fung: it sounds like you have a pretty loaded agenda here in the next few months. yourerm is also expiring at the end of june. what's your plan for after. mr. pai: i don't really have a comes next.t

i'm just going to keep focusing on trying to do as good as i can now,the office i hold right and it's certainly been the privilege of a lifetime to serve commission a little over 3.5 years and whatever comes next, 'm hopeful it will resolve itself. mr. slen: would you like to be eappointed and who's your patron? mr. pai: i haven't really thought about the next steps. i'm occupied enough with the term i'm currently trying to finish up so haven't taken any .f these steps mr. slen: who's in charge of that, would that be the president? mr. pai: the commissioner and the minority commissioners are elected by the leadership of the other party in the senate. for example, when i was considered in 2011, it was senator mcconnell who advanced and ie to the white house was obviously very grateful to him and all the senators who ultimately unanimously voted on

. and one of my colleagues mr. fung: one of the things that's been in the news lately t-mobile and re is the binge-on program that allows onsumers to exempt certain programs. there's been a lot of back and forth about whether or not this violation of neutrality and what, if fcc should do to oversee these tactics. on you offer some thoughts what t-mobile's plan is and how relates to the fcc rules? mr. pai: this is part of the about i expressed concern the fcc's content in general. i called it then, and i call it now, a solution that won't work solution of a problem that doesn't exist. problem that a morphed to connectivity to the fcc managing all kinds of

business plans, home companies, to whatever innovative service offerings they might choose to put out in the marketplace. certainly, in this area, has in part by the fact that the agency has been two voices. in november, for example, the fcc leadership said t-mobile's innovative.s highly flash forward one month later, at the friendly direction of the fcc bureaus are hauling in that company to expressing offering, concerns raised about this, violates any neutrality regulations. fcc's nth to month, the answer about an offering tends to vary based on what the are ical leanings suggesting. mr. fung: so whether or not the books, and we e have to live under them. how should the fcc apply those t-mobile now? mr. pai: i think the rules from the get-go are necessary and retty clearly, the wireless

marketplace in particular is an exceptionally competitive. access to icans have four more facilities based providers. cut.es are always being the service offerings, and if people don't like a particular ervice, they can switch with relative ease. this is not a dysfunctional marketplace in short. so i think in that situation, fcc should be highly hesitant to imply yesteryear's regulations, a sort of mother may i approach to regulation to ome of these innovative companies and offerings. mr. fung: so you think if the these ides not to act on proposals or business offerings, what kind of precedent would that set for others who may be thinking about engaging in similar activity? mr. pai: i think the first harm is they're being called into the fcc at all. should have mpany to include their pitch for the business plan a slide, trying to leaves ut from the tea whether the fcc in the future might decide to second-guess it

and prohibit it. that itself projects uncertainty and will ultimately harm consumers. i think regardless of what the fcc does in this case, the a band t has been sent of special interest groups in the belt way, decided to protest a particular offering, that the agency is going to jump to the tune, and i don't think that's a helpful thing, ultimately, for the agency or for the american public. mr. fung: if you weren't chairman today, would you take a more hands-off approach in implementing or enforcing the net neutrality rules? mr. pai: i certainly wouldn't have supported the adoption of the regulations to begin with. i think the record suggested a need for it. and secondly, i don't think legally we had the authority to do it, which i know is a question that the courts are wrestling with. so application of the regulation in the future, would have to be presented with a concrete case to base a particular opinion. mr. slen: commissioner pai, if been about it, it's a year now that net neutrality in lations have been put

place and you know there's speculation about the future. put in the cellular networks and cellular telephones. doesn't that say hey, this is working or it's going to be okay? mr. pai: to the contrary, if you look at the aggravate over months of 2016 and the first nine months, capital expenditure by major broad band providers went down. that's only the first time it happened. the first was the tech bubble and in the midst of the recession. companies like at&t are investing billions of dollars in their broad band network in mexico. for smaller providers, in some sense, the literally mom and pop operations are holding back on investments, and the owner of ireless isp called aristotle testified before congress that she was withholding some of the fund she was going to expand

expanding her network in arkansas specifically because of fcc nerous regulations the passed and it's not conducive to any kind of investment. it on the look at micro or macro level, there are worrying trend lines and i think simply ire thing has been a distraction. the way to solve the problem it was designed to solve is to have that meansition, and the fcc should be focusing on he bread and butter work of incentivesing all sectors of the private sector that build etter, faster networks that benefit all americans. mr. slen: incentivesing the better service and better competition? mr. pai: that depends on the particular transaction you might have in mind. certainly for me, that is the bottom line. is the consummation of this transaction going to benefit the american public in if it in particular the american broad band marketplace would be harmed, that's something i would have concern about. mr. slen: new york regulators recently approved the mr cable.on with

there may be limits to what he jection.about the tra *. is this a positive sign for the party? mr. pai: as you suggest in your question because it's a pending roceeding which i and my colleagues are going to have to render judgment, but i can't really say one way or the other how the new york decision would, like, inform or what it might fcc's decision. mr. fung: let's talk a little bit about the incentive auction and the recession this week. ave you -- what's your impression of the broadcasters that have applied to participate auction? is it a policy level engagement? mr. pai: it's interesting, e're going to see as of the close of today, tuesday, whether or not there's a sufficient evel of broadcaster participation, that's going to be an initial indication of interest. i think i've heard anecdotally at least that there are a number of broadcasters interested in participating, and that's well

for the reverse side of the auction. i certainlily hope if it's a march and 'll see in thereafter. r. fung: your colleague, suggested that the commission should make available some information about which broadcasters are maybe in the aggregate and which broadcasters have elected to participate. do you share that -- is that something that you would also support? mr. pai: i think if the chairman decided to release that information in anonymous form, that's not something that would raise competitive concerns. and if it helps the aspect of auction that the public would be interested in, that's an important conversation. mr. slen: are you hearing from local consumers about losing their television stations, otentially losing your television station? mr. pai: i've heard from a few people, not so much in those words but what will happen with incentive, will that particular station be there after the incentive auction, and

i think that's part of the process, to make sure people know it's not a case of your tv station turning off and the wireless is occupying that spectrum. there's repack, channel sharing. there's other options to help ensure that that local tv ervice people rely on will still be there after 2016. you hearing at are as far as non-wireless carriers reduction.ing in the there's been discussion about what chemical companies might be nterested, what tech companies might be interested. what are you hearing? mr. pai: i think the same thing everyone is seeing in the press. there are companies that traditionally have not been involved in the wireless space looking to enter. i think that's a great thing. i think both the commissioner and frankly the consumer, we all ant to see the best and brightest companies entering the space competing to provide service, cutting-edge services to wireless consumers. the proof is going to be in the pudding, obviously, but now the speculation is running pretty wild as to who's going to show

up at the table. mr. fung: we're talking hundreds of non-carrier participants? thousands? just give me an idea of what the scale is we're anticipating here. mr. pai: first of all, i will not be participating in the auction. game, i ng else is fair think. mr. slen: commissioner pai, s, were they in your view? mr. pai: i tend to think the fcc doesn't do the american ublic or the industry a favor when it excludes certain companies from participating in the auction of spectrum. ultimately, pennies on the treasury, ithe u.s. ends up distorting the i ketplace in a way that don't think serves consumers because the spectrum doesn't go to the highest value use and ultimately, it's not the fcc's job. under the law, we're a good policy, i think, instead of what the outcome should be. we're waiting for a framework nd gives everybody a full and fair opportunity to participate. unfortunately, that's not what we did here.

mr. fung: one thing interesting to me coming out of c.s. is auto at an technology and event earlier today, commissioner riley was saying gigahertz band of spectrum isn't being utilized nough and some of the technologi technologies, won't be sure for some time. what's your opinion on how that should be used and how to apply future? he mr. pai: i commend commissioner riley on his leadership on this highlights think it one of the most promising area.ghts in this it's tailor-made for the next generation of wi-fi. it's a super wide continuous channel, the typical standard is already in place to use it. there's all sorts of applications yearning to use it. that particular part of the the uni4 band it's called has hit a snag, however, which is is that we need to coordinate with our counterparts in the auto motive industry to ensure

license ever a proliferates and doesn't interfere with that, there are table e solutions on the but at this point we need to make a commitment as the fcc to in the issue resolved near future and i think there are many people of good faith on oth sides of the issue, and there was lots of engineers out there who can square that circle 2016. mr. fung: a similar issue is the ltc license issue which has perkulating on a back burner. post wasvember, a blog published suggesting the fcc could use its authority under essentially say hat unlicensed and licensed spectrum should always be under the same non-interference expectations. what's your take on that? mr. pai: ultimately, i think this issue is an engineering issue. politics n issue for or anything else. i think ultimately, we need to figure out a way to make the engineering work so that

innovation can thrive and i think that's so important in this area. as you know, there's congestion in the wireless bands, in the unlicensed bands is growing so we need to find a way to make innovative very service can coexist. mr. slen: commissioner pai, you just referred from c.e.s., the vegas show sponsored by cta. there were some reports that technology has kind of hit a lull, in a spence. that there's improvements going on, but there's no break-out product, another smart phone. e've seen the cars, we've seen the drones. what was your impression of what you saw? mr. pai: i was really impressed actually, your question highlights something i've thought about a lot. we live so much in the forget how that we much progress we've made how quickly. two decades ago, if somebody told you there could be such a smart refrigerator, if you could print something in all these e was things that would proliferate,

smart cars. it would be like a jetson's episode on "star wars." that's the spirit i always bring to me when i go to ces. demonstrations,e they did a virtual reality demo, for example, it's really we've gone from one span of a generation from mower man" to virtual to nol that would enable it happen and i certainly hope i'm around in a couple of decades to it in all ition of its fullness. mr. slen: at one wha point does have jurisdiction over virtual reality and self-driving cars. mr. pai: i just used virtual reality as an example. if you're looking at igh-resolution virtual reality pictures that people could see, that requires extremely high means a lotand that of spectrum. so for example, i spoke with an engineer who said it would be fcc could take initially a 50-60 gigahertz

pectrum very high in the electromagnetic spectrum where ou have super-wide channels where you have a high throughput of data because that's essentially what virtual reality requires. and i'm inn one room another communicating wirelessly in this virtual world, that's an enormous drain or requirement of spectrum. so that's an area where the fcc ould operate and i certainly hope that any future innovation of virtual reality will be tested in my own household. i'm making myself available for any of it because it's really excited to see what the possibilities are. r. fung: and looking at connecting cars and the rise of entertainment systems received services, what's your expectation for -- or those mplications there, you know, who's going to be controlling the data that's gathered from and what and how long are some of the implications surrounding that? mr. pai: i definitely think policy issues that would have to be ironed out and it's certainly not going to be the fcc or any given agency

looking at it. i think it has to be a wholistic conversation, the manufacturers, everybody. and i think the possibilities are exciting, but we also need to be concerned about the potential falls as well. mr. slen: i wanted to ask one more question about the broad deployment issue and the fcc's * recent report finding not being deployed, broad band was not being deployed in a timely enough manner. there's some criticism of the fcc when it revised its broad megabits ition to 25 per second, you know, some said that this was merely a way for the fcc to justify further intervention in the broad band space. is that the way that you feel, is the fcc, you know -- essentially, are we seeing those predictions play out now with this report? mr. pai: absolutely. has been is exercise the ultimate in kabuki theater from the beginning. 706, if weder section make a negative finding or find broad band isn't being deployed, fcc more authority

over the broad band marketplace and this is the latest in the shifting of the goal post. in november 2014, for example, rather, we were told we would be spending 10-millions illion on 10 megabits per second. we were told it's broad band. n january, we were told 25 megabits per second. is sho short of that shorting the american customer. shifting on what the particular policy goal the agency is looking to achieve might be. that's not the appropriate thing to do for a couple of different reasons. number 1, it's not lawful. nd beyond that, more importantly, it isn't just that an agency is behaving in arbitrary and precocious way. at the agency, and moving it up or down depending on the preordained goal we want to achieve and that's ultimately bringing discredit on the

agency. mr. fung: under what conditions should the fcc revise its benchmark? mr. pai: we need to look at how consumers use the internet, try to measure as effectively as we can what the standards should be and obviously adjust it in the future as needs arise. additionally, we need to take stock of what the facts actually are. on the macro level, i've studied a lot of data suggesting that broad band deployment is really exploding across all different parts of the world. here in the united states, there are a lot of people who are innovating and taking the risk to deploy capital. at a macro level, i've traveled to places like the bayou of louisiana to stream fiber for myself through a trench to see how difficult it is. i've heard from people in lawrence, kansas, how difficult it is to get those permits to allow those fiber networks to be built. those are the kinds of facts we should take stock of, not iguring out what we want the result to be and then working backwards, adjust the standard accordingly. mr. slen: commissioner pai, if a republican president came to areinformally and said what

some of the issues i can talk about that deal with telecommunications, what would or her? im mr. pai: it wouldn't have to be a republican candidate. it could be anybody. i think that broadband deployment really is one of the key drivers in education and economic growth. one of the things i found striking is that in the 21st entury there has really been a democratization of entrepreneurship. sioux falls to montana, i've seen people using broad band connections to build businesses. in a previous area, would have had to migrate to a coast or withered on the vine but because of that connection they're able to innovate. and i think that's something very powerful, especially in rural america. i've come from rural america and traveled throughout rural a rica and i can tell you in lot of places without sufficient broad band, i hate to say a lack of hope about the future but there's a pessimism about where things go from here because there is that stark digital people feel they don't have control over their future but i've also heard from havee in rural america who

broad band who are able to build, create, to generate value and that's something that binds communities together. so regardless of political affiliation, that's something i hope every political candidate on.ld focus i mean, it's not necessarily the biggest issue of the day, but nonetheless, it's one of those in the hat really digital era can help build a stronger america. mr. slen: ajit pai grew up in kansas, attended harvard and the university of chicago law school. he worked on capitol hill for the senate judiciary committee as well as worked at the fcc prior to becoming a commissioner in 2012. all right. s the commission set up, in your view, for the 21st century? is it structured correctly? mr. pai: that's a really good question. certainly, in terms of process, no.hink the answer is i think that we have a lot of cumbersome rules and regulations that operate -- that govern our operation that need to be

modernized and i commend ongress in particular for looking at ways of stream lining that. the consolidated reporting act, process reform act, found by partisan support in the house, or example, would help us become a more modern agency. there are also things i think we need to do and we don't require congressional authorization to do, that has been languishing, that almost three years ago now, for example, created an fcc dashboard. a web site where anyone can see how many consumer complaints are pending at any given point in time. how long has the fcc taken to resolve issues. it's any given petition. these are the kind of basic metrics i think people want answers to. also, knowing that spot light was directed at us, that's a to ng incentive, i think, behave in a more expeditious way. 'm often struck when i visit companies, for example, in the bay area, every company i met in the front lobby or somewhere nearby has a huge dash board where you can see all of the numbers of subscribers they

ave, how the network is operating. it's very transparent. but if you came and asked me how many complaints are pending at any given point in time, i would say let me get back to you and urvey all the hundreds of people who might have input in that question. if anything, the very meaning of public servant should be we give you that information ent, tively, we're transpar open and responsive. that's the kind of thing that the digital agency needs to embrace. mr. slen: one of the things that you've raised before in congressional testimony is * some of the spottiness of fcc enforcement. re you seeing any changes now to indicate that things are improving? mr. pai: unfortunately not. we've seen the apportion process has pretty much gone off the rails at this point. there have been a lot of party line votes. more party line votes in the years s 14 months and 43 before that. in addition, it sounds like in a ot of these cases, there's a disregard for what the law is or is not, and almost neglect of

what the facts are in search of press headlines and that's something i think needs to change and needs to change soon. additionally, it's become very difficult for commissions to of the the operations enforcing process. recently in june, i asked for insight into what the pending investigation list was like. that, and2 times after i was rebuffed every single one of those times. f a commissioner can't get information about how the enforcement process is working and if i'm accountable to ongress for how the process is working, we've got a problem and so i think in terms of how the process has proceeded and the nature of any given seriousation, i do have concerns. mr. fung: are you saying that the majority is cherrypicking which cases to enforce based on a political agenda? mr. pai: i'm not sure what the motivation is, but what commissioner, there has been a lot spadework done in congress as far as fcc organizational

issues and rewrite communication . how would that benefit or not benefit the fcc if there is a rewrite? -- iti: to make clear would benefit us to make clear in an era of divergence. had do you fit this square peg of where the industry is now into this round hole where the communications act is? have telephone companies, wireless companies, cable companies, and others that were not conceived when the act was written, they are now competing in the same space. a significant part of the brainpower of the fec see -- of the fcc is how should we think about applying yesteryears regulations to today's technology. ultimately, that deserves the american public. it distorts the private sector and limits the range of choices