WASHINGTON – Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) on Tuesday led 24 of his colleagues in calling on the Federal Communications Commission to conduct an assessment to address and redress the harm the agency’s policies and programs have caused Black and brown communities.

Reps. Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.) and Brenda Lawrence (D-MI) joined Bowman in leading a letter to FCC Acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel — which was sent with the support of the nonprofit Free Press Action Fund — which requests that the agency identify the affirmative steps it will take to break down barriers to just media and telecommunication practices.

Immediately after his swearing-in, President Joe Biden signed an executive order that directs executive agencies and strongly encourages independent agencies like the FCC to assess whether their “programs and policies perpetuate systemic barriers to opportunities and benefits for people of color and other underserved groups.” Despite this action by the president, the FCC has yet to begin such a review. 

“Although many journalists and artists of color have used their talent to ensure critical stories about their communities are being told, our nation’s big media companies nevertheless continue to stereotypically depict people of color as being a threat or a burden to society,” the members wrote in the letter. “Historic federal policies are a primary reason why structural inequities exist in our nation’s media and telecommunication systems today. 

“FCC policies, license decisions and inaction have had the result of effectively excluding people of color from media ownership opportunities. Our nation’s first radio and TV licenses were awarded by the Federal Radio Commission and then its successor, the FCC, during an era of Jim Crow segregation. The previous administration's efforts to consolidate the media marketplace limited ownership opportunities for people of color and women.”

The review the members call for in the letter is especially urgent given that FCC policies have left millions of households unable to afford home wireline broadband services. Overall, nearly 80 million people are without adequate home internet service — including 13 million Black people, 18 million Latinx people and 1.3 million Indigenous people. The lack of affordable broadband has left too many households of color unable to use the internet to take care of the health and well-being of their families, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Joining Reps. Bowman, Clarke and Lawrence on the letter are Reps. Karen Bass (D-CA), André Carson (D-IN), Joaquin Castro (D-TX), David Cicilline (D-R.I.), Danny K. Davis (D-IL), Val Demings (D-FL), Debbie Dingell (D-MI), Dwight Evans (D-PA), Jesús “Chuy” Garcia (D-IL), Vicente Gonzalez (D-TX), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), Steven Horsford (D-NV), Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), Andy Levin (D-MI), Jim McGovern (D-MA), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Mark Takano (D-CA), Bennie Thompson (D-MS), Marie Newman (D-IL), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ), and Frederica Wilson (D-FL. 

Click here to read the full text of the letter.

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