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Section Five

INDEPENDENT REGULATORY AGENCIES

n addition to the executive departments and agencies discussed previously, a number of independent commissions exist that are loosely affiliated with the executive branch. In general, the President can appoint people to these commissions but cannot remove them, which makes them constitutionally problematic in light of the Constitution’s having vested federal executive power in the President. Nevertheless, they exist, their constitutional legitimacy has generally been upheld by the courts, and there will be an opportunity for the next Administration to use them as forces for good, particularly by making wise appointments. Few appointments to these commissions will be as important as the President’s selection of the next chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). In Chapter 28, FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr writes that the FCC chairman “is empowered with significant authority that is not shared” with other FCC members. Under a new chairman, he writes, “[t]he FCC needs to change course and bring new urgency to achieving four main goals: [reining in Big Tech; [p]romoting national security; [u]Jnleashing economic prosperity; and [e]nsuring FCC accountability and good governance.”

“The FCC,” writes Carr, “has an important role to play in addressing the threats to individual liberty posed by corporations that are abusing dominant positions in the market.” Nowhere is that clearer “than when it comes to Big Tech and its attempts to drive diverse political viewpoints from the digital town square.” Carr writes that the FCC should require more transparency from Big Tech, which today

“offers a black box.” And it should issue “an order that interprets Section 230”— which provides protection from legal liability to online computer services that