Verizon Tries To Jump The Legal Line In Challenging FCC's Weak Net Neutrality Rules

from the speed-up-the-process dept

There was a noticeable split when the FCC announced its vague and totally watered down net neutrality rules last month. The rules were prepared in close conjunction with AT&T. And while they're pretty similar to what Verizon and Google had proposed, the fact that Verizon didn't get to work on it so closely with the FCC left it with hurt feelings. The scuttlebutt was that the FCC was pretty pissed off about the Google/Verizon announcement which derailed some other negotiations the FCC was already involved in.

In response, even though these rules are completely watered down and really have plenty of loopholes and clauses favorable to the telcos, Verizon, more or less on principle, has decided to fight them, just to make sure that the FCC can't implement stricter rules later (which seems pretty unlikely anyway). However, it also tried to jump the legal line. Rather than filing a lawsuit in a district court, it went straight to the Appeals Court of the DC circuit, leapfrogging the standard district court and appeals process. Apparently, it's using a rather unique legal interpretation to claim that it can do this, though others are pointing out if this is accurate, then basically all cases involving FCC regulations would be forced into that single court, killing off the idea of having different circuits examine issues.

Filed Under: lawsuits, net neutrality
Companies: fcc, verizon