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For Immediate Release
December, 14 2017, 03:30pm EDT
Contact:
Scott McLarty, Media Director, 202-904-7614, scott@gp.org
Green Party Blasts FCC's Repeal of Net Neutrality Rules, Demands Public Ownership of Internet Access
The Green Party strongly condemned the Federal Communications Commission's decision on Thursday and called for a national movement demanding restoration of Net Neutrality rules and public ownership of access to the Internet.
The FCC's decision will leave consumers vulnerable to discriminatory control by Internet service providers (ISPs) over what web sites they may visit, with a choice between restricted access and higher fees.
WASHINGTON
The Green Party strongly condemned the Federal Communications Commission's decision on Thursday and called for a national movement demanding restoration of Net Neutrality rules and public ownership of access to the Internet.
The FCC's decision will leave consumers vulnerable to discriminatory control by Internet service providers (ISPs) over what web sites they may visit, with a choice between restricted access and higher fees.
"It's not enough just to fight for reversal of the FCC's decision. We demand public ownership of services that provide Internet access. The Internet was created with taxpayers' money. We should all be enjoying the benefits of a free and open Internet," said Andrea Merida-Cuellar, co-chair of the Green Party of the United States.
"Here in Colorado, voters in 19 cities and counties approved measures in the November election to enable city-owned Internet services, joining nearly 100 others that have already done so," said Ms. Merida-Cuellar, who also serves as co-chair of the Green Party of Colorado.
Greens noted that the city of Chattanooga, Tennessee, established a publicly owned Internet service in 2010 that offers 10 gigabit-per-second download speeds at $70 a month, with discounts for low-income residents and free WiFi in downtown neighborhoods. The city installed fiber-optic cables and quickly made back its investment.
Green Party leaders called on states and municipalities to provide unrestricted Internet access for all residents.
"Even if it's restored, Net Neutrality will always be in danger as long as the private ISP cartel can purchase influence in Congress and the White House. The FCC's decision is one of the results of concentrated corporate ownership and the growth of gigantic media monopolies ever since President Clinton signed the 1996 Telecommunications Act. It's time for us to take back the Internet," said Green Party co-chair Chris Blankenhorn.
See also:
The Internet Should Be a Public Good
By Ben Tarnoff, Jacobin, October 31, 2016
19 more Colorado cities and counties vote in favor of city-owned internet, while Fort Collins approves $150 million to move forward
The Denver Post, November 8, 2017
Chattanooga Was a Typical Postindustrial City. Then It Began Offering Municipal Broadband.
By Peter Moskowitz, The Nation, June 3, 2016
Updated Green results from Election Day
Green Party victories and highlights on Nov. 7
Press release: Nov. 10
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Green Party of the United States https://www.gp.org
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The Green Party of the United States is a grassroots national party. We're the party for "We The People," the health of our planet, and future generations instead of the One Percent.
(202) 319-7191LATEST NEWS
'Unconscionable and Impeachable': Experts Appalled at Report of Marco Rubio Acting as Venezuela 'Viceroy'
"Trump has turned Venezuela into an effective US colony," said one critic.
Jul 11, 2026
Some critics of the Trump administration are reacting with horror to revelations that US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been serving as the de facto ruler of Venezuela.
According to a Saturday report in The New York Times, Rubio for the last several months has been acting informally as the "viceroy" of Venezuela ever since its recognized president, Nicolás Maduro, was abducted by the American military in January and brought to the US to face charges related to "narco-terrorism."
The Times' sources revealed that Rubio "effectively controls Venezuela’s finances, the distribution of its natural resources, and its government" and "is deeply involved in the country’s day-to-day operations," while maintaining regular contact with acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodríguez.
Under current arrangements, the US Treasury Department takes in revenue from Venezuela's exports, including its petroleum, and then disperses the money back to the country through its private banks with strict conditions set by Rubio over what it can be spent on.
In explaining the system, the Times likened it to "parents handing out allowances to children," adding that it gives Rubio "immense leverage over... Rodríguez, who depends on the money to pay workers and prop up the national currency."
Elizabeth Saunders, professor of political science at Columbia University, described Rubio's power over Venezuela as "insane," as well as "derelict, unconscionable, and impeachable."
"The secretary of state's time is scarce, valuable, and not outsourcable," Saunders emphasized.
Orlando J. Pérez, professor of Political Science at the University of North Texas at Dallas, said the Times report made a mockery of Rubio's professed claims to want to bring democracy back to Venezuela.
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Kenneth Roth, former executive director at Human Rights Watch, wrote that US control over Venezuela appeared similar to the kind of imperial power wielded by European nations in the 19th Century.
"Trump has turned Venezuela into an effective US colony," said Roth, "with Marco Rubio as the viceroy and Washington controlling the country’s oil revenue and dictating major foreign and domestic policies. Democracy has been relegated to the distant future."
Bradley Simpson, historian at the University of Connecticut, also saw the current US arrangement with Venezuela as a return to overt imperialism.
"We are literally back in the Dollar Diplomacy days of the 1910s," Simpson wrote, "when the United States invaded countries and took over their financial systems and ran them as effective colonies. Flagrantly illegal, enormously corrupt. Where is the organization of American states or UN in denouncing this?"
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Rep. Ro Khanna this week was detained by a group of Israeli settlers whom he described as "hoodlums... with machine guns" while making a visit to a Palestinian village in the occupied West Bank.
In an interview with Reuters published on Saturday, Khanna (D-Calif.) said he and his tour group were surrounded by armed settlers as they were traveling through the West Bank on Wednesday.
"We were at a village that Israeli settlers had destroyed, they had destroyed the school, they had destroyed that village, and we were just looking at it," said Khanna. "And these hoodlums come in with machine guns—M4, an American-made machine gun—and they detain us. They block off the road."
The California Democrat said that the settlers called in members of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to help them deal with him and his group.
"The IDF is on their side," Khanna remarked, "not on the side of the Americans."
Cameron Kasky, an aide to Khanna, told Reuters that the group was held for over an hour before officials whom he believed to be police intervened and secured their release.
The IDF told Reuters that both military troops and police officers dispersed the settlers who had set up a roadblock near the small Palestinian village of Khirbet Zanuta.
Khanna wasn't the only American to have a run-in with Israeli settlers this week, as CNN reported that four settlers attacked groups of journalists, including CNN reporters and crew, who were traveling through an area north of the Palestinian city of Ramallah on Saturday.
As the journalists were driving, four settlers blocked off the road with their cars and began attacking the reporters' vehicles with wooden clubs and metal rods.
"The settlers then began to jump on the vehicle behind CNN's—carrying another group of journalists—and smashed the windshield of that vehicle," the network reported. "Another group of settlers tried to block a separate exit route before chasing the journalists towards the town of Sinjil."
Israeli police arrived on the scene and arrested four settlers who were allegedly responsible for the attacks, CNN reported.
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Israeli settlers for years have carried out violent attacks on Palestinians living in the West Bank, and witnesses have regularly described IDF soldiers at the scene either standing by as the attacks occur or even actively helping the attackers.
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"This brazen act should be seen as nothing more than an attempt to prevent the public from knowing what is happening in their country by intimidating journalists from doing their jobs."
Jul 11, 2026
The Trump administration on Friday escalated its war with the press by subpoenaing several reporters at The New York Times days after the paper published a story on Wednesday that detailed security concerns about the luxury jet the Qatari government gave to President Donald Trump.
According to the Times, the subpoenas are attempting to force reporters to testify before a federal grand jury in Manhattan on Wednesday next week, a move that the paper describes as an "extraordinary escalation in President Trump’s efforts to threaten and intimidate independent news organizations."
The issued subpoenas do not specifically name the Times' reporting on the Qatari jet as the reason for the grand jury probe, although they were given to all four journalists—Tyler Pager, Julian Barnes, Eric Schmitt, and Eric Lipton—who reported the story.
Additionally, the Times noted, a senior official at the FBI had asked the paper to hold off publishing its story on the jet before it came out on Wednesday, citing unspecified national security concerns about its content.
David McCraw, the top attorney representing the Times' newsroom, denounced the subpoenas as an attack on the freedom of the press.
"The appearance of federal law enforcement agents on the doorstep of news reporters should shock the conscience of any American who believes in the Constitution and the press freedom it protects," said McGraw. “This brazen act should be seen as nothing more than an attempt to prevent the public from knowing what is happening in their country by intimidating journalists from doing their jobs."
It is highly uncommon for government investigators to subpoena journalists when they are probing national security leaks, as such actions are generally seen as having a chilling effect on reporters’ ability to gather information.
Rick Stengel, former under secretary of state for President Barack Obama, said that the Times' reporting on the Qatari jet, whose security upgrades are being financed with US tax dollars, is completely within the scope of constitutional protections for press freedom.
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Fox News chief national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin also denounced the Trump administration for trying to drag reporters into a grand jury investigation.
"This action by the US government to subpoena reporters for reporting legitimate news on security concerns about Air Force One should alarm every American," Griffin wrote.
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This is the second time in recent weeks that the Trump administration has tried to subpoena reporters to compel their testimony in grand jury investigations.
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