Net Neutrality Is Dead, Now Trump’s DOJ Wants To Kill It Again (AVN)

Read the full article by Michael French at AVN.com

Even after the Republican-controlled Federal Communications Commission put an end to rules guaranteeing net neutrality that were put into effect under President Barack Obama in 2015, repealing the open internet regulations once and for all on June 6, the Trump administration is going back to court to make sure that net neutrality stays dead.

Last Friday, according to a report by the tech news site CNet, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a brief with the Supreme Court, asking the court to toss out 2016 rulings by two lower federal courts that upheld net neutrality rules.

The FCC joined the DOJ in filing the brief, which acknowledges that the issue is “moot,” because the net neutrality rules no longer exist.

But according to CNet, net neutrality advocates see the move by the two Trump administration agencies differently. Rather than a simple case of legal “housecleaning,” the administration, they say, wants the court to create a precedent that can be used against an ongoing lawsuit by 23 states—a lawsuit that seeks to overturn the FCC’s repeal of the open internet rules.

The Trump administration contends that the lower courts upheld net neutrality rules only because they believed that courts were required to defer to the FCC’s “legal and factual judgements.” But now that the FCC has “repudiated” its earlier judgments, the lower court decisions should be invalidated, the administration’s brief says.