(The Center Square) – A years-long plan to provide reliable, affordable high-speed internet access to people in rural Wisconsin now faces delays in funding and administration.
The Broadband, Equity, Access and Development Program, created by Congress in 2021 to provide high-speed internet to rural and unserved communities, is in trouble in Wisconsin after the state legislature declined to provide state funding in the last biennial budget process and the Trump administration initiated a review of the program.
Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick disagree on how the $42.4 billion program should move forward.
In a letter to Lutnick, Evers said the Trump administration and National Telecommunications and Information Administration should continue to support Wisconsin’s BEAD Program in a timely fashion so thousands of Wisconsin homes and businesses in need of high-speed internet access can get online soon.
“Our state has already spent tremendous time and effort to achieve the shared goals of the BEAD Program,” Evers said. “I urge NTIA not to delay our states’ efforts at this final, critical stage, but to use the program review to create efficiencies that will accelerate broadband deployment to unserved Wisconsin residents.”
The lack of reliable funding and Lutnick’s recent initiative to review the program are an obstacle to the Evers administration, which has allocated more than $345 million in state and federal funds toward high-speed internet access since 2019.
The legislature rejected Evers’ proposed $750 million state investment, citing federal investments into the BEAD Program Wisconsin already expected to receive.
According to Evers, if those investments never come, the legislature’s rejection of his proposal would be futile.
“Wisconsinites are counting on these investments,” Evers said. “Internet Service Providers have planned their projects and are ready to put shovels in the ground. NTIA must not require any program changes that will delay Wisconsin’s plans–Wisconsinites in rural and unserved areas have waited long enough.”
The Public Service Commission of Wisconsin estimates more than 450,000 homes and businesses in rural areas alone are unserved, underserved or have no service at all.
However, Lutnick asserted the BEAD Program needs to change course.
One reason for this is that the program prioritizes DEI favoritism over equal access to high-speed internet for all communities.
“Because of the prior Administration’s woke mandates, favoritism towards certain technologies, and burdensome regulations, the program has not connected a single person to the internet and is in dire need of a readjustment,” Lutnick said in a statement.
The new administration seeks to deliver high-speed internet access at the lowest cost for states by removing delays, waste and diversity preferences before getting homes and businesses connected, according to Lutnick.
Additionally, the Evers administration and PSC imposed DEI policies requiring the BEAD program to give preference to race or other minority statuses, such as mandating subgrantees to dole out preferences to woman-owned and minority-owned businesses, according to Daniel Lennington, an attorney for the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty.
“Wisconsin’s BEAD plan is filled with racial preferences, treating some groups better than others, which is unconstitutional race discrimination,” Lennington wrote on X. “The Admin should mandate race-neutrality from @GovEvers, & withhold money until he certifies compliance w/ federal law.”
Despite pushback from the Trump administration, Evers and Wisconsin Democrats are adamant that the BEAD Program harbors no discrimination and seeks to equally serve all Wisconsin communities.
“This is about equity, not race,” Sen. Melissa Ratcliff, D-Cottage Grove, said in a statement. “This is about making sure that every resident, regardless of ZIP code, no matter where one lives, has a shot in today’s economy.”
