As the U.S. struggles to close the digital divide and prepare for the future of technology, recent moves from the Trump administration threaten to roll back hard-won progress. From gutting critical broadband programs to forcing states to choose between internet access and AI safety, these policies prioritize corporate interests over communities, innovation, and national security. Here’s how:
1. Corrupt BEAD Revisions Are Undermining Affordable Broadband Access
The Trump administration’s overhaul of the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program gutted critical provisions designed to ensure affordable, high-quality internet reaches unserved and underserved communities. By prioritizing cheaper technologies over resilient investments, removing mandates for low-cost service plans, requiring fewer community partnerships, and eliminating labor and environmental standards, the new rules put profits over people. This shift sidelines public and municipal broadband providers, which historically serve hard-to-reach areas that private companies often ignore.
Moreover, the administration’s so-called “technology-neutral” policy abandons fiber—a fast, reliable, and future-proof technology—in favor of cheaper, less effective alternatives like unlicensed fixed wireless and satellite internet. This risks long-term reliability and performance, especially in rural and tribal areas, and potentially funnels billions to satellite providers like Elon Musk’s Starlink. The overhaul also forces states that had already submitted and received approval for their broadband plans to revise their plans, wasting taxpayer dollars and delaying critical connectivity.
2. Forcing States to Choose Between Broadband Funding and AI Regulation
A new and troubling provision in the Senate budget reconciliation bill, backed by Trump-aligned lawmakers, forces states into an impossible position: either give up regulating artificial intelligence or lose access to critical BEAD funds. This essentially imposes a 10-year federal moratorium on state AI laws as a condition for receiving infrastructure funding.
This political gambit risks derailing both broadband expansion and responsible AI governance. Reliable, high-speed broadband infrastructure is foundational to deploying AI in key sectors such as precision agriculture, smart manufacturing, telehealth, and education. Without a strong internet, AI applications cannot scale or serve rural and underserved populations. Cutting off broadband funds to states that enact AI protections punishes innovation and safety efforts, leaving communities vulnerable to unchecked AI risks and widening existing digital divides.
3. Auctioning Spectrum at the Expense of Wi-Fi
The budget bill would also compel the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to auction off 800 megahertz of wireless spectrum, a move that threatens to weaken national security, disrupt cooperative spectrum sharing, and undermine affordable connectivity. While generating $85 billion in short-term revenue, this approach ignores the long-term consequences for technological innovation and defense. Using spectrum as a piggy bank during reconciliation negotiations creates a perverse incentive structure—instead of prioritizing long term public benefit, we end up rewarding rent-seeking behavior from telecom incumbents.
The forced auction puts critical spectrum bands at risk, including those used for shared networks like CBRS that provide affordable wireless broadband options in rural areas and on Tribal lands. It also threatens to degrade Wi-Fi quality by crowding more and more devices into a much smaller space and thus increasing interference, which would impact homes, schools, and businesses nationwide. By promoting exclusive licenses over shared use, the bill favors major wireless carriers and reduces competition, potentially driving up costs and limiting access for consumers and smaller providers alike.
4. Defunding the Digital Equity Act
President Trump also illegally terminated the bipartisan Digital Equity Act, a program designed to help bridge the digital divide for vulnerable populations, including rural residents, veterans, seniors, people with disabilities, and low-income Americans. Despite bipartisan support and proven success in expanding access to Wi-Fi hotspots, digital literacy training, and workforce development, the administration inaccurately labeled the program “racist” and “unconstitutional,” cutting off millions in grants that make broadband infrastructure investments more efficient.
This decision disproportionately harms states with large underserved populations—places like West Virginia, Mississippi, and Maine—many of which supported Trump politically. The sudden defunding leaves these communities scrambling for alternatives and threatens to stall progress on essential internet access, education, healthcare, and economic development. It signals a broader disregard for the needs of the most marginalized Americans, further widening the digital divide.
Taken together, these policies represent a coordinated rollback of America’s broadband and digital future—prioritizing corporate profits and political control over equitable access, technological innovation, and public safety. As broadband becomes increasingly critical for economic growth and AI development, undermining infrastructure funding and imposing harmful conditions will only widen the digital divide and weaken the nation’s global competitiveness. It’s clear that these decisions will leave communities behind and compromise the very goals America desperately needs to achieve.