Got an email today from BroadbandOhio. Apparently they know their BEAD proposal is approved but aren't sure exactly what changes the Trump people have made to it. "BroadbandOhio is still awaiting details of the approval and will release additional information as it becomes available." What we know:

Trump Commerce Dept has approved Ohio's final proposal for spending BEAD rural broadband funds -- only $260 mil out of the state's original $793 mil grant. 40,000 of Ohio's 83,000 BEAD-assisted connections will be Low Earth Orbit Satellite, i.e. SpaceX. Fate of the remaining $550 mil is still TBD.

Clevelanders, remember when Bernie Moreno was your Civic Leaders' favorite new-money donor, and they all dutifully hyped and attended his Blockland extravaganza, and invited him to join their boards (Cleve Foundation, Tri-C, Cleveland State University)? Yeah, this is the same guy. Go figure.

This is gonna have apocalyptic effects in places like southwestern Ohio, where we’ve got a higher percentage of foreign medical grads doing the work than the 25% that this article cites…

life is what happens between flushes. 🧵

Ohio's original $793 million in BEAD rural broadband funding has been whittled down to just $240 million, partly by relegating 35,000 rural households to Musk satellite vouchers. Trump's people are pushing to claw back the other $550 mil. Maybe Sherrod Brown or Amy Acton should say something?

"The rural health care 'Hunger Games'" -- $50 billion in MAHA patronage that won't cover rural providers' losses from looming Medicaid and ACA cuts, but will keep proposal writers busy at megasystems like Cleveland Clinic. And also make lots of work for consultants and conference promoters.

Cleveland.com (online Plain Dealer) does a daily podcast of Editor Chris Quinn and a few colleagues yakking about various topics. Then they publish one or more AI summaries of each yak session packaged as actual news stories -- with Quinn's takes always quoted at length. Do other papers do this?

NTIA admin Arielle Roth recently said her agency will withhold federal broadband deployment funds fr any state that enacts affordability laws Legal experts say it should be "laughed out of the room" But it may be enough to dissuade some states from moving bills forward. Our story here 💻🌐📶⬇️

Guess there are no quiet parts now, it's all out loud. "By abolishing the FCC’s ownership cap, the Trump administration can allow the opportunity for more right-leaning affiliate owners to become more influential... Yet, puzzlingly, some people who should get this point are actually fighting it."

the benevolence of predators will always blow my mind

Trump bureaucrats keep making up new rules for states' use of rural broadband grants. This one means a NY law mandating $15-$20/mo Internet options for a million+ low income households wouldn't apply to Verizon and Spectrum, NY's two biggest ISPs, because they're taking BEAD $ to connect 7000 homes.

No Kings rally this afternoon in Meadville (pop 12-13K), Crawford County, PA.

Fight, not flight.

National Digital Inclusion Alliance sues Trump Admin to restore national competitive grant program in support of community efforts to close digital divide.

As quoted by @neotrans.bsky.social today, Gov DeWine and Dev't Director Mihalik eloquently point out that Ohio has a serious digital divide in cities as well as rural areas. Great! So please tell us how you plan to replace the $24 mil in cancelled Federal $$ for the OH Digital Opportunity Plan... /1

This is what can happen when regulators and advocates have a legal basis to insist that ISP mergers serve the public interest. But look for FCC Chair Brendan Carr, who thinks the "public interest" means network censorship of jokes he doesn't like, to try to squelch this pro-consumer agreement.

DigitalC, Cleveland's nonprofit wireless broadband network, is now serving 6,000 households @ $18/mo.

New American Community Survey: More than a million Ohio households still lacked home wireline broadband at any speed in 2024, and most lived in urban areas.

New CYC blog post: Ohio's Gov DeWine needs to either fight for Ohio's $24 million in Digital Equity Act funding, or else find state dollars to replace it.

Approps subcommittee chaired by Dave Joyce (my Congressman) blocks FCC spending to stop digital discrimination, nixes restoration of Affordable Connectivity Program. Joyce says he opposes ACP $$ but won't say why. There were 71,000+ ACP households in his district when the program ran out of money.

Spent the morning productively. Happy Labor Day!

Of 30 states that posted their BEAD "Final Proposals" by Friday, Ohio is WAY ahead of the pack in diverting its underconnected rural residents from fiber to SpaceX. FYI @karlbode.com @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social @seangon.bsky.social @daviddewitt.bsky.social @sportshotchris.bsky.social

So 31,000 rural Ohio households that were on track six months ago to see gigabit fiber broadband extended to their homes will have to settle for $120/mo satellite service they could already get, but now government will pay Elon $1650 each to get them free $400 dishes. "Benefit of the bargain" LOL.

BroadbandOhio published its BEAD Final Proposal "for public comment" yesterday. No press release and so far, no press. (Comment period ends next Wednesday.) Proposal only covers 72K of Ohio's 114K eligible locations, and awards 31K of those (43%) to StarLink @ $1652 each. Train wreck in progress.

Governor Huckabee Sanders has joined the BEAD Resistance.

The price of Trump's Bolsonaro Tariff at the Pierpont, OH Dollar General, 8/23/25.

Good nuts-and-bolts "economic development" analysis from Ohio River Valley Institute via @ohiocapitaljournal.com.

The two big winners in West VA's BEAD Final Proposal are CityNet, in-state fiber provider HQ'd in Bridgeport, and Frontier, WV's biggest telco (currently being acquired by Verizon). Interesting problem for Lutnick and Roth. Will probably get even more so when Ohio's proposal comes out next week.

Red State Rebellion? First Virginia, then Louisiana, now West Virginia. Apparently some GOP governors are not that eager to turn their states' BEAD priorities over to Musk and Bezos, then return big unspent balances to Lutnick. I predict Ohio's Final Proposal, due out on the 28th, will look similar.

BroadbandOhio posted its "low bid" list this a.m. and it looks like my prediction was on the nose. Bidders aren't ID'd at this stage, but we have low bids of $600 on 78,000 of the state's 114,000 BEAD-eligible locations (76.5%) and $563 on another 7,500 locations. Starlink and Kuiper is my guess.

Preview of coming events in Ohio. BroadbandOhio is now taking bids, says it will post its final BEAD proposal for public comment August 28. I predict Starlink will bid on at least 75% of Ohio's 114K BEAD-eligible locations, ignoring tree cover.

Not a registered Democrat, of course.

Majority of voters, especially older voters, don't trust crypto. Brown can't prevent the deluge of cryptobucks attacking him next year, but he can turn it into swing-voter poison for Husted. He let Moreno get away with it in '24. Can't do that again.

This is from my Rep Dave Joyce (R OH-14), who seems to think TRMC, struggling to reopen after being bankrupted by Steward Health, is a rural hospital. (It's in Warren, a city of 40,000 in an SMSA of 400,000.) Not mentioned: Joyce's vote to cut Medicaid reduced TRMC's income prospects by $millions.

In May Ohio had $30+ million in Digital Equity Act funding arbitrarily canceled, without a peep of objection from our governor, attorney general or US Senators. This new Signal article explains why that's bad. But it fails to ask Dewine, Yost, Moreno or Husted why they're letting it happen.

New analysis by ‪@johnbhorrigan.bsky.social‬ says OBBBB fallout will likely include lost Internet access for millions of low-income households, inc hundreds of thousands in Ohio. Of course these same folks will need to be on line to deal with new Medicaid/SNAP reporting rules and look for work.

No surprise that Carr is wiping affordability off the list of FCC's broadband success benchmarks. Obvious plan is to declare universal access a solved problem ASAP, so Carr & Co can concentrate on cool shit like spectrum and spaceships. Who cares if you and I can afford working Internet?

"populism" is....making it easier for regional telecom companies to rip off captive customers and hiding all evidence of market failure

Why didn’t she invoke the Economy Act and dragoon the telephone staff at IRS? There literally is a well-tested procedure to do this and temporarily pick up hundreds of telephone people that FEMA doesn’t have to reimburse IRS for thanks to the Economy Act.

Hurray and best wishes to Greenlight. But it's truly stunning that this article fails to mention *why* 90% of Baltimore (unlike its suburbs) lacks fiber Internet in 2025. Why can't anyone there bring themselves to say "Verizon FIOS redlining"?

SO good. (Long thread.)

LOL. Was this rolled into AT&T's Tuesday release about doubling its fiber passings from 30 to 60 mil by 2030? Or is it now 65 million? Either way the numbers are imaginary. But... biz press *could* ask if this finally means 100% AT&T fiber coverage for Cleveland, Chicago, Detroit, Houston, LA, etc.

Passing along some good news. It's been a long hard road, but Cleveland's nonprofit $18/mo wireless broadband provider has completed its citywide deployment, connected its 5000th household, and established itself as a real force in the city's broadband market.

"I’m having trouble grasping why a home in a BEAD area that is using Starlink is not considered to be served with broadband while Starlink can ask for funding to serve the neighbor, who will then be considered as served."

Very long story, full of detail about Ohio's rural broadband plans, waits till paragraph 41 to get to what should have the lead -- the disruption of those plans by Trump Admin's BEAD rule changes and cancellation of digital equity funding.

"Unlicensed fixed wireless providers have a chance to make their coverage areas ineligible for BEAD funding" means "The local WISP that might or might not be able to reach you through the hills and trees now has a chance to keep you from getting the fast, reliable broadband you were promised."