The Senate Judiciary Committee approved by voice vote the nomination of Elisebeth Collins Cook to be a member of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, during an executive session Thursday. Cook has been one of the Republican members of the five-member board, which has offered several recommendations to the White House on phone surveillance and is putting together recommendations on Internet surveillance. She was formerly a Senate Judiciary Committee counsel and now counsel for WilmerHale. President Barack Obama re-nominated Cook in December and if approved by the full Senate her term would continue through 2020.

The House Commerce Committee is eyeing May 8 for a markup of its Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act (STELA) reauthorization draft bill, Capitol Hill and industry sources told us. But multiple people on and off the Hill also said no deal has been reached between Democrats and Republicans, who were divided on the House draft bill’s language on the set-top box integration ban provision as well as the provision that would limit FCC actions on broadcaster sharing agreements until the agency completes its media ownership quadrennial review -- key points of tension when the draft bill advanced out of the Communications Subcommittee earlier this year. There’s no agreement on how to proceed, and many key staffers have been out of town for the NCTA Cable Show, one media industry lobbyist told us. One Hill aide pushed back against judging anything too soon, pointing to many floating rumors but nothing concrete nailed down yet. A second industry official also said he has heard May 8 as the markup day and predicts it will go relatively smoothly. The real hurdle is the language on sharing agreements but the integration ban provision is a settled issue, with no further back-and-forth happening now, that official said. Staffers don’t seem inclined to add any provisions into the draft at this point, the official added. A committee spokesman did not confirm or deny the accuracy of any committee agreement or disagreement on the draft or proposed dates for the markup. The House Judiciary Committee will hold two hearings at the subcommittee level that same day on video issues in 2141 Rayburn -- the first at 9:30 a.m. will be the Antitrust Subcommittee’s oversight hearing of Comcast’s proposed purchase of Time Warner Cable, and the second at 2 p.m. will be the IP Subcommittee’s hearing on compulsory video licenses of Copyright Act Title 17. That second hearing, which multiple officials framed as a STELA hearing, will include Marci Burdick testifying on behalf of NAB and a representative from Dish, one media lobbyist said.

The Senate Intelligence Committee confirmed it has been circulating a discussion draft of its long-awaited cybersecurity information sharing bill. Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and ranking member Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., said in joint statement Wednesday that they sent the draft “to relevant parties in the executive branch, private industry and the privacy community for comment. Once those comments are returned, which we hope will happen quickly, we will consider the final legislation.” The draft bill, the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act, is seen to closely resemble the House-passed Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (HR-624), but includes numerous additional privacy protections (CD April 30 p19).

The Senate Judiciary Committee appears unlikely to have final language ready on a compromise manager’s amendment to the Patent Transparency and Improvements Act (S-1720) in time to mark up the bill Thursday, several industry observers told us Wednesday. Negotiations on the compromise language continued Wednesday, a Senate Judiciary aide told us. A markup of S-1720 remained on the agenda for the committee’s executive business meeting Thursday, which is to begin at 10 a.m. in 226 Dirksen. Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., had hoped to release the text of the manager’s amendment as soon as the Senate returned from recess Monday (CD April 29 p6). Work on the manager’s amendment has been complicated in part by the Supreme Court’s rulings Tuesday in two patent cases on the application of fee-shifting rules, two industry lobbyists told us. The two cases -- Highmark v. Allcare Health Management System and Octane Fitness v. ICON Fitness & Health -- collectively loosened fee-shifting rules, which patent revamp advocates said the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit was applying too stringently. The rulings drew praise from several patent revamp advocates, including the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) and the Internet Association. The rulings are a “bump in the road” because “they're in the same sandbox as the legislation,” said Cathy Sloan, CCIA vice president-government relations, in an interview. “As drafters of the legislation, you have to adjust for that. They're not big changes, but you can’t just pretend the new precedent isn’t there. You have to draft around it a little bit.”

Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., wants the Computer and Communications Industry Association to weigh in on Comcast’s proposed buy of Time Warner Cable. “Do you believe that Comcast’s proposed acquisition of Time Warner Cable would harm the public interest?” Franken asked CCIA President Ed Black in a letter Wednesday (http://1.usa.gov/1kurRSY). “What impact will the deal have on competition in relevant markets, and, ultimately, on consumers? Finally, please provide any other relevant views, including any thoughts you have about arguments made in the Public Interest Statement that Comcast recently filed with the FCC or in the testimony that Comcast and Time Warner Cable recently provided to the Senate Judiciary Committee.” Franken opposes the deal, which Comcast has strongly defended as good for consumers. CCIA’s members “depend on broadband networks to operate,” Franken added.

A House appropriations bill would slate $36.7 million for NTIA in FY2015, well below the $51 million the executive branch requested. The bill would allocate $8.35 billion for the Commerce Department, $95 million less than the White House requested but $71 million more than was enacted for FY2014. The House Appropriations Commerce, Justice and Science Subcommittee released the draft appropriations bill this week (http://1.usa.gov/R0JwHJ) and cleared the proposed budget unanimously Wednesday by voice vote. “For the administration of prior-year grants, recoveries and unobligated balances of funds previously appropriated are available for the administration of all open grants until their expiration,” the draft bill said in a section titled “Public Telecommunications Facilities, Planning and Construction.” Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker testified before Senate and House lawmakers early in April on these budget items. “To continue expanding broadband capacity and promoting policies to ensure a free and open Internet, the budget requests a total of $51 million” for NTIA to “support increasing wireless broadband access and critical telecommunications policy coordination,” Pritzker had said (CD April 11 p5). House lawmakers emphasized the bill preserves core priority spending, and “bolstering cybersecurity” is one such priority, subcommittee Chairman Frank Wolf, R-Va., said in a statement. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office would receive $46 billion, equivalent to what’s estimated to come in from fees and $434 million above FY2014. The National Institute of Standards and Technology would receive $856 million, $5.8 million above FY2014 and $44.2 million less than what the White House proposed.

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., is worried about the FCC’s net neutrality proposal. “I write today to express my concerns that you may be stepping back from an earlier commitment to policies that ensure an open and free Internet for all Americans,” Nelson, a senior member of the Commerce Committee, told FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler in a letter Wednesday. “I am very concerned about reports that the NPRM will presumptively allow ‘paid prioritization arrangements’ as long as they are ‘commercially reasonable.'” Allowing these deals “could upset the basic concept of an open Internet and would be very difficult to remedy at a later time,” Nelson said. The agency needs to “draw a brighter line” in this regard, Nelson insisted, despite acknowledging that Wheeler is trying to operate in parameters of a court ruling that struck down previous net neutrality rules. “As part of that analysis, I also urge the Commission to carefully consider whether section 706 provides the best pathway for these rules or whether Title II, with appropriate forbearance, provides a more sound approach.” Several public interest advocates have recommended the FCC reclassify broadband as a Communications Act Title II service, subject to more regulation. Several other Senate Democrats have voiced fears that these proposed rules are too weak, despite the FCC’s ardent defense of what they're doing and an insistence that this is a first step (CD April 30 p11). Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., bashed the FCC proposal Wednesday. “Reports that the FCC may gut net neutrality are disturbing, and would be just one more way the playing field is tilted for the rich and powerful who have already made it,” Warren said in a Facebook post (http://on.fb.me/1kiMEGc). “Our regulators already have all the tools they need to protect a free and open Internet -- where a handful of companies cannot block or filter or charge access fees for what we do online. They should stand up and use them.”

The American TV Alliance pushed back against TVFreedom’s claims that public safety is a key part of why cable operators must carry broadcast stations, as has been lobbied for before Congress. TVFreedom, a coalition of broadcaster interests, had written a blog post for The Hill Tuesday (CD April 19 p19), and an ATVA spokesman, speaking for pay-TV industry interests, wrote one for the same outlet Wednesday. “Enough with the hyperbole,” the ATVA spokesman said (http://bit.ly/1kpHRnE). “Everyone supports public safety first and foremost. ... Cable and satellite TV providers are working with broadcasters to update the Emergency Alert System, which notifies the public of safety threats 24/7.” He attacked broadcasters on retransmission consent rules, which broadcasters have long defended. The fights have become wrapped up in the Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act reauthorization process.

TVFreedom framed Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act reauthorization in terms of public safety Tuesday. The spokesman for the coalition of broadcaster interests, which includes NAB among many others, penned a blog post for The Hill (http://bit.ly/1rB3ynp)attacking pay-TV industry recommendations that STELA be amended to allow cable operators to remove broadcast stations from the basic tier. “Eliminating this rule would break from federal decision-makers’ long-standing commitment to first always ensure the safety of the American people in their deliberations on legislative and policy matters,” the TVFreedom spokesman said. The spokesman emphasized how emergency responders count on TV and radio broadcasters “to serve as necessary, real-time sources of information” in times of crisis. The coalition has advocated and advertised for a clean STELA reauthorization process. “If Congress decides to eliminate this consumer safeguard as part of STELA, it will be a disservice to the American public and begin to erode the fundamental premise that Washington’s lawmakers and policymakers have long stood by -- preserving public safety as a core ‘first principle’ in U.S. communications policy,” said the spokesman. The American Television Alliance, which includes several pay-TV industry members, has pushed back against broadcasters. “The government requires that broadcast TV stations be placed on a basic tier, forcing cable subscribers to purchase ‘free’ over-the-air broadcast signals, even if they don’t want them,” it said in a recent blog post (http://bit.ly/1fp5f7m). “A free market cannot exist for video when there are such rules explicitly labeled ‘must buy.'” STELA will expire at the end of 2014 unless Congress reauthorizes it.

The House passed by unanimous voice vote a bill Monday that would kill a broadband report put together by the Agriculture Department. House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., introduced the Government Reports Elimination Act (HR-4194) on March 11. It would kill 79 executive agency reports to Congress that the bill authors deem unnecessary or duplicative. At the Agriculture Department, it would eliminate the Rural Broadband Access Program Report. Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., also introduced a version of the bill on March 11, which was referred to the Homeland Security Committee. “By eliminating the 79 reports deemed unnecessary by both the Office of Management and Budget and House Committees, we can save taxpayers an estimated $1 million a year for the next five years,” Issa said in a statement Monday (http://1.usa.gov/1ivr5k9).