Lifeline Advocates to Rally Outside FCC Headquarters in Protest of Pai’s Plan to Gut Essential Program
WASHINGTON — Representatives from social-justice and digital-rights groups will rally outside Federal Communications Commission headquarters on Wednesday to protest the agency’s plan to gut the Lifeline program that subsidizes internet and telephone services for millions of people living below the poverty line.
The groups, including the Center for Media Justice, Common Cause, Free Press Action Fund, the National Consumer Law Center, the National Hispanic Media Coalition and the Open Technology Institute, will be joined by Lifeline subscribers who will speak to the importance of affordable access — and against FCC Chairman Ajit Pai’s efforts to severely limit their ability to benefit from the subsidy program.
Pai’s attack on Lifeline is one of several agency actions that disproportionately harm low-income communities while concentrating media power in the hands of a few wealthy companies. His FCC has also failed to defend reforms to exorbitant prison phone-call rates, blocked opportunities for communities to build their own broadband networks and repealed Net Neutrality protections that safeguarded free expression and choice online.
What: Speakout to Save Lifeline
When: Wed., Sept. 26, at 10 a.m. EDT
Where: FCC headquarters, 445 12th St. SW, Washington, D.C.
Who: Activists, advocates and others united against attacks on the most vulnerable in our society
Press RSVP: Timothy Karr at tkarr@freepress.net
Confirmed speakers include former FCC Commissioners Michael Copps and Gloria Tristani, George Alvarenga of Shelter House, Cheryl Leanza of the United Church of Christ, OC, Inc., Sarah Morris of the Open Technology Institute, Francella Ochillo of the National Hispanic Media Coalition, Jesse Rabinowitz of Miriam’s Kitchen, Carmen Scurato and Joseph Torres of Free Press Action Fund, Erin Shields of the Center for Media Justice, Aja Taylor of Bread for the City, and Monica Thammarath of the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance.
