The FCC approved CenturyLink's planned buy of Level 3, despite Democrats' concerns. Commissioner Mignon Clyburn dissented, we're told. Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel supported the transaction but said the agency's review was seriously flawed. She approved in part and dissented in part. A commission spokesman said Monday the item was approved by commissioners.

A media ownership reconsideration order that does away with cross-ownership rules, joint sales agreement attribution rules and the eight-voices test, and allows case-by-case waivers of the top-four network rule was circulated to the eighth floor for a vote at the Nov. 16 commissioners' meeting, Chairman Ajit Pai told the House Communications Subcommittee Wednesday. The draft of the item will be made public Thursday. Pai framed the recon order as taking steps to keep the government out of newsrooms: “If you believe as I do that the federal government has no business intervening in the news, then we must stop the federal government from intervening in the news business.” The order also would establish an incubator to encourage diversity in media ownership, and would retain disclosure rules for broadcaster shared service agreements, Pai said. Industry officials told us Wednesday they expect the recon order to be approved with a 3-2 party line vote, and that a court challenge from public interest groups is extremely likely.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, lifted his hold on final Senate consideration of David Redl’s nomination as NTIA administrator, Cruz’s office said Monday. Cruz’s longstanding concerns about Redl’s position on the 2016 Internet Assigned Numbers Authority transition prompted several delays of a Senate Commerce Committee vote on Redl. Cruz placed a hold on Senate action after the committee advanced Redl earlier this month on a voice vote.

President Donald Trump is expected to nominate soon candidates to the three vacant FTC commissioner seats. They are former Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Assistant Director Rohit Chopra; Noah Phillips, chief counsel to Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, R-Texas; and Paul Weiss antitrust lawyer Joseph Simons, a White House spokeswoman told us. Trump would designate Simons as FTC chairman if the Senate confirms him, the spokeswoman said.

The FCC Incentive Auction Task Force will allow mostly broadcasters and some MVPDs to draw initially on $1 billion of the $1.75 billion repacking reimbursement fund, the IATF announced. That’s less than was requested by NAB, Ion and public TV groups. But the estimated cost of the repacking dropped from $2.12 billion to $1.86 billion, IATF said, a number likely to keep changing as repacking progresses. A smaller shortfall would make it more likely that Congress will authorize more funds to make up the gap, broadcast industry officials said.

Jessica Rosenworcel in her first policy speech since rejoining the FCC as a member Aug. 11 expressed concerns Thursday on Sinclair's buy of Tribune Media, the transition by TV stations to ATSC 3.0 and her agency's course on net neutrality. "I am concerned the Commission is gearing up to approve a transaction that will hand a single broadcast company the unprecedented ability to reach more than 70 percent of American households," she said of the deal worth about $4 billion. She called current 3.0 plans "not a great boon for consumers, it’s a tax on every household" with a TV.

President Donald Trump asking his 40 million-plus Twitter followers about challenging NBC's "license" drew quick criticism Wednesday morning from Democrats at the FCC and on Capitol Hill. The company owns several FCC-licensed TV stations.

The Senate Commerce Committee cleared NTIA administrator nominee David Redl Wednesday on a voice vote.

The Senate confirmed FCC Chairman Ajit Pai for another term Monday, as expected. Pai's new term lasts until June 30, 2021. Votes were continuing at our deadline, but late Monday afternoon he reached the threshold needed.

AT&T asked the Supreme Court to review an appellate court's affirmation of the FCC's 2015 net neutrality order under Communications Act Title II. It challenged the commission's authority to reclassify fixed and mobile broadband internet access service as Title II telecom services, and to reclassify mobile broadband internet access service as a "commercial mobile service," both subject to common carrier regulation. "In 2015, acquiescing to unprecedented White House pressure, the FCC repudiated its prior interpretation and subjected Internet access service to extensive common carrier regulation," said an AT&T cert petition in AT&T v. FCC, appealing the rulings of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit (USTelecom v. FCC).