Today, the free-market organizations Americans for Tax Reform, Americans for Prosperity, Council for Citizens Against Government Waste, Taxpayers Protection Alliance, and Hispanic Leadership Fund wrote the U.S. Senate urging them to overturn the FCC's Net Neutrality Internet regulations and announced that they may rate a vote on Senate Joint Resolution 6 in their respective annual congressional ratings.
United States Senate
RE: Rating Senate Joint Resolution 6, Net Neutrality
Dear Senator,
We write to inform you that each of our organizations, together representing millions of Americans, will consider rating a vote in favor of Senate Joint Resolution 6 to overturn the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) Net Neutrality Internet regulations in our respective congressional ratings.
The FCC enacted these Net Neutrality rules despite a complete lack of Congressional authorization and after being told by a court that they lack jurisdiction. The FCC nevertheless insists on government regulation of how data travels across the Internet without any showing of consumer harm or other justification.
The FCC’s order also runs contrary to the broad and bipartisan conversation in Washington about how best to grow the economy and spur job creation. President Obama and Members in Congress on both sides of the aisle have called to rein in overbearing regulations that harm economic growth.
The FCC’s Net Neutrality rule is a prime case of unnecessary rules emanating from unelected bureaucrats that will cause economic harm and cost hundreds of thousands of American jobs, as numerous studies have pointed out. But regardless of whether you support Net Neutrality rules, the process by which they were created cannot be allowed to stand.
Under the U.S. Constitution, it is your role in the U.S. Senate to craft laws – not the role of federal agencies that are bypassing Congress. Senate Joint Resolution 6, sponsored by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, is a simple, common sense measure that uses the Congressional Review Act to reject these rules, placing legislating authority back in the hands of Congress where it belongs.
We urge you to vote for Senate Joint Resolution 6 and may be rating your vote in our annual Congressional scorecards. A vote against this measure is a vote to abdicate your responsibility and to instead rubber-stamp the job-killing and unwarranted regulatory actions of an unelected and unaccountable federal agency.
Sincerely,
Grover Norquist
President
Americans for Tax Reform (WILL RATE)
Phil Kerpen
Vice President for Policy
Americans for Prosperity (WILL RATE)
David Williams
President
Taxpayers Protection Alliance (WILL RATE)
Thomas Schatz
President
Council for Citizens Against Government Waste
Mario H. Lopez
President
Hispanic Leadership Fund