Core Communications’ brief in opposition to AT&T’s motion for summary judgment (see 2307170030) doesn’t dispute “any material facts,” said AT&T’s reply Friday (docket 2:21-cv-02771) in U.S. District Court for Eastern Pennsylvania in Philadelphia in support of its motion. “As to the legal issues, Core’s brief does more to obfuscate the law than to articulate any valid defenses,” it said. Core seeks to recover $11.4 million in unpaid access service charges from AT&T, which refuses to pay, claiming nearly 100% of the calls that CoreTel affiliates in Delaware, New Jersey, Virginia and West Virginia connected were fraudulent (see 2212280001). Core hopes to defeat summary judgment by persuading the court that a “morass” of FCC “technical precedents” supports its purported right to collect from AT&T and that AT&T is trying to “invalidate its tariff,” said AT&T’s reply. That’s “not the case,” it said. The “straightforward” task before the court is to “construe the plain language of Core’s tariff and an FCC rule against the undisputed facts,” it said: “The clear result is that Core simply is not permitted by its own tariff and the rule to recover any additional charges from AT&T.”

The FTC will join with 101 federal and state law enforcement agencies, including DOJ and the FCC, for the Tuesday announcement of a nationwide robocall and telemarketing “enforcement sweep,” said the FTC Monday. Also participating in the 10:30 a.m. CDT news conference from the FTC’s Chicago office will be Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost (R) and Illinois AG Kwame Raoul (D), said the agency.

The FCC and SpaceX, in defending the agency's order approving SpaceX's second-generation satellite constellation, make explanations that were unmentioned in the FTC authorization, Dish Network told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in docket 12-1337 reply brief Wednesday. Dish and the International Dark-Sky Association are challenging the second-gen authorization (see 2301060004). Dish said those unmentioned explanations include citing doubt about the findings of a study performed by a Dish-hired expert. "The doubt invented by the FCC would be sophistry pure and simple even if it were not a post hoc invention of counsel," Dish said. Dish said the FCC also elevates SpaceX's certification that its system complies with power limits to the status of evidence. Dish said the two rely on alleged ITU findings of compliance that don't cover the “joint effect” of the system, as required by the FCC's authorization. It said findings eventually made by the ITU about second-gen compliance with power limits, rather than mooting the challenge to waivers SpaceX received, "illustrate the vast unregulated no-man’s land that the Order has created" because the ITU findings differ from the joint effect finding the FCC had sought.

The FCC must respond to the NAB’s mandamus petition on the 2018 quadrennial review within 30 days, said the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in an order released Friday. A reply from NAB is due 10 days later. NAB filed the petition in April (see 2304250029 seeking to compel the agency to complete the 2018 review of broadcast ownership rules before commencing the 2022 iteration.

Oral argument on the three consolidated petitions to set aside the FCC’s June 2020 declaratory wireless infrastructure ruling (see 2305010050) is increased to 30 minutes per side, said a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals order Monday (dockets 20-71765, 20-72734 and 20-72749). Oral argument is scheduled for 9 a.m. PDT July 11 in San Francisco. The main petitioners are the League of California Cities, the League of Oregon Cities and the individual California cities of Glendora, Rancho Palos Verdes and Torrance. They allege the June 2020 ruling unlawfully preempts local and state government authority over wireless telecommunications facilities and was promulgated without response to the arguments they raised in the record, in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit should deny the March 22 mandamus petition of Gerald Parks, the former licensee of a Kentucky AM radio station, because the court lacks jurisdiction under the All Writs Act to grant him the relief he seeks, said the FCC’s opposition Monday (docket 23-1078). The FCC canceled Parks’ broadcast license in 2020 after he failed to file a timely renewal application, it said. He now seeks a writ of mandamus ordering the agency to reinstate his canceled license on grounds the commission didn’t formally notify him “when it dismissed a defective license renewal application Parks filed more than a decade ago,” it said. The court has “neither current nor prospective jurisdiction” over the cancellation of Parks' license, it said. The statutory deadline to challenge that action “has long since passed,” it said. The relief Parks seeks both in court and before the FCC “seeks to undo now-unreviewable agency action,” it said. “Mandamus is thus improper,” it said. Parks’ “statutory argument is mistaken” because he has “no clear legal right to the relief he seeks,” said the FCC. Contrary to his petition, no timely license renewal application is pending, nor does Parks presently have a license for the agency to continue while it reviews his case, it said. “Principles of equity weigh against judicial intervention,” said the FCC. Parks’ now-expired 2012 renewal application faced delays because he “repeatedly violated” FCC broadcasting rules and didn’t pay the required fees, it said. “Parks then failed to file a new renewal application, ignored repeated warnings that his license would expire, and slept on his rights for 18 months after his license was cancelled,” it said.

Consumers' Research petitioned the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to review and vacate the FCC's approval of the Q3 2023 USF contribution factor, per a filing Friday in case 23-60359. The group has a pending en banc rehearing of its challenge of the FCC's Q1 2022 contribution factor (see 2306300086).

Consumers' Research and the FCC continued to disagree before the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on whether the agency does "active oversight" over the Universal Service Administrative Co. and the contribution factor process, in filings posted Thursday in case 22-13315 (see 2306220062). The FCC cited an Office of Managing Director order modifying the Q3 2023 contribution factor after receiving data from USAC as an example of "FCC-imposed adjustments" that are "consistent with USAC’s subordination to the agency." Consumers' Research disagreed, saying the order "merely makes a ministerial adjustment to USAC's calculations" and wasn't "issued or directly approved by the FCC commissioners themselves."

The person who told the FCC that direct broadcast satellite wholesale services provider Spectrum Five was dropping its complaint against Intelsat had no right or authority to do so, Spectrum Five lender BIU told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in a petition for review last week (docket 23-1163). BIU said it's FCC precedent to take back actions that were initiated by a party lacking proper authority, and the unauthorized withdrawal of the petition "amounts to a fraud on the Commission itself." Spectrum Five's 2020 petition, which it withdrew in April (see 2304130048), sought revocation of the Intelsat 30 and Intelsat 31 satellite licenses for willful violations of license terms. BIU said it received no response to a June 9 letter to the Enforcement Bureau asking that 2020 petition be reinstated. In that letter, BIU said the withdrawal of the 2020 petition and the subsequent bureau order dismissing the petition "were procured by fraud." It said the person representing himself as a senior officer of Spectrum Five had given BIU sole authority to withdraw the petition. In withdrawing the petition himself, BIU said, "we ... must assume that he was compensated by a party-in-interest in the proceeding to do so -- that is, he was bribed." Our calls to an Austin number for Spectrum Five weren't answered. The FCC didn't comment.

A panel of judges on the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals pressed Consumers' Research Wednesday on its argument that the FCC violated the nondelegation doctrine by approving calculations provided by the Universal Service Administration Co. to determine quarterly USF contribution factors. Judge Charles Wilson during oral argument in case 22-13315 asked about whether any issues with the intelligible principles are articulated in Communications Act Section 254. Consumers’ Research attorney Trent McCotter argued “the FCC itself has stated that they are aspirational only,” to which Wilson noted the U.S. Supreme Court called it a "pretty lenient" standard. The FCC, not USAC, acts ministerially in setting quarterly contribution factors, McCotter said, saying the USF statute “contains no such express limitations or rates or formulas.” Judge Kevin Newsom asked what sort of agency participation should be permissible, noting the leniency of the statute at issue. McCotter cited a dissent from Justice Neil Gorsuch that argued an agency “could undertake a particular fact finding to fill in the gaps” so Congress could direct the FCC to calculate the difference between particular prices. “So that's the best authority that you can cite in support of your position as a dissent?” Newsom asked, noting he wasn't aware of any authority after the 1930s being struck down for violating the nondelegation doctrine. Judge Wilson asked "so that the record does reflect that in the past" whether the FCC rejected or modified USAC calculations. FCC attorney Adam Crews noted several instances of the agency doing so and said the commission is "not often intervening" or changing calculations it receives "because what USAC is doing is so routine."