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Evan Feinman has not held back in the media after departing as the director of the BEAD Program at the NTIA last week
By: Brad Randall, Broadband Communities
Evan Feinman has been sounding the alarm in media interviews after he departed from his duties as director of the nation’s massive $42 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program.
Feinman, who served his last day as director of the BEAD Program last Friday, has since spoken out following his departure from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA).
Yesterday, in an interview with Feinman published on the Financial Times website, Feinman suggested that he was pressured by Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick to increase the role of low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite coverage in the BEAD Program above other considerations.
According to the Financial Times, Feinman said he was asked by Lutnick if he had spoken with Elon Musk.
Musk’s company, SpaceX, famously owns Starlink, which provides LEO coverage, as a subsidiary.
However, according to Feinman’s comments in the Financial Times, Musk does not practice what he preaches.
“Musk, when Tesla opens up a facility, doesn’t put it on Starlink, he gets fiber,” Feinman told the Financial Times. “You need fiber in your town to have an economic future.”
Additionally, a departure email from Feinman published by WirelessEstimator.com further highlighted more of Feinman’s parting concerns about the direction of the BEAD Program.”The new administration seems to want to make changes that ignore the clear direction laid out by Congress, reduce the number of American homes and businesses that get fiber connections, and increase the number that get satellite connections,” Feinman wrote in the email.
“The degree of that shift remains unknown, but regardless of size, it will be a disservice to rural and small-town America.”
His comments in the email continued.
“Stranding all or part of rural America with worse internet so that we can make the world’s richest man even richer is yet another in a long line of betrayals by Washington,” he stated.
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