Senate Commerce Republicans Want Sohn Hearing Delayed Until March: Thune

Senate Commerce Committee Republicans want to delay a third FCC confirmation hearing for Gigi Sohn until March, Communications Subcommittee ranking member John Thune, R-S.D., told us Thursday. Thune and other Republicans seek a complete re-vetting of Sohn. President Joe Biden renominated her earlier this month (see 2301030060). Commerce Chair Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., confirmed she’s continuing to pursue a February date for the hearing in hopes of swiftly advancing Sohn to the floor after more than a year of delay (see 2212300044).

Cantwell and other Democratic leaders are trying to “jam in” Sohn’s hearing “before the February break” the week after Presidents Day, but Senate Commerce ranking member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, “has concluded that if we want to do this well and do a proper vetting,” it needs to happen after that recess, Thune said in an interview. Republicans would favor a hearing “during the March time frame. That’s likely where [Cruz is] going to come down” and he would “have a lot of support from Republicans on the committee” for that stance, Thune said. He confirmed Cruz objected to Sohn testifying before the committee soon after the panel formally organizes (see 2301250066).

Cantwell disputed reports that Cruz outright objected to a February hearing date for Sohn but insisted “we’re going to hold it sometime very soon” even with GOP misgivings. “We have a lot to do” during this Congress, including FAA reauthorization, so the objective now is to “clean up stuff that’s left over” from 2022, including nominees like Sohn that the panel tied on 14-14 during the last Congress (see 2203030070), Cantwell said: “We’ll probably bring up other nominees” to testify at the same hearing with Sohn, including some of Biden’s nominees for the Amtrak board of directors.

“We’ve got a new Congress” and potentially some new Commerce members, but many of the concerns Republicans are likely to raise about Sohn this year “will probably be the same ones” they brought up during the nominee’s 2021 and 2022 appearances before the committee, Cantwell said. Sohn’s February 2022 appearance before Commerce focused on her role as a board member for Locast operator Sports Fans Coalition and her commitment to temporarily recuse herself from some FCC proceedings involving retransmission consent and broadcast copyright matters (see 2202090070).

FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel told reporters after the commission’s Thursday meeting (see 2301260041) she hopes Sohn “is able to move through the process” this year, giving the commission an outright Democratic majority after more than two years with a 2-2 partisan split. Sohn “is a nominee who knows this agency well, and we wish her the best as she navigates this process on Capitol Hill,” Rosenworcel said.

Fight for the Future Director Evan Greer urged Senate Democrats and the Biden administration to “loudly & immediately” condemn a Fox News report on the nominee’s role as an Electronic Frontier Foundation board member and focused on that group’s opposition to the 2018 Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act and Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (see 1806290044). The Fox News report is “nothing more than a blatant homophobic attack on” Sohn, who is gay, “complete with Qanon tropes & the conflation of queerness with predation,” Greer tweeted. The conservative Bull Moose Project was among those disseminating the report in opposition to Sohn. Her confirmation “would embolden sexual predators and human traffickers, who she has provided cover for during the last twenty years,” BMP President Aiden Buzzetti said.