In a significant setback for the outgoing Biden administration, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday that the Federal Communications Commission lacked the legal authority to reinstate net neutrality rules.
The decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit invalidates the FCC’s 2024 “Safeguarding and Securing the Open Internet Order,” which reintroduced regulations originally enacted in 2015 under the Obama administration. Net neutrality, which is the requirement that internet service providers do not charge differently based on the source or destination of data, has been a political flashpoint for over a decade.
The three-judge panel concluded that broadband internet service providers cannot be classified as “telecommunications services” under Title II of the Communications Act, a designation that underpins net neutrality enforcement.
The court’s decision comes amid a shifting legal landscape following the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2024 decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, which overturned the Chevron doctrine, eliminating judicial deference to agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes.
“Today we consider the latest FCC order, issued in 2024, which resurrected the FCC’s heavy-handed regulatory regime,” the judges wrote in their 26-page ruling. Using “the traditional tools of statutory construction,” the court determined that broadband providers offer only an “information service” and are, therefore, not subject to the FCC’s net neutrality policies.
The decision sparked widespread reactions on both sides of the net neutrality debate. FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel released a statement calling on Congress to “heed” the calls of consumers and “take up the charge for net neutrality, and put open internet principles in federal law.”
Meanwhile, Evan Swarztrauber, senior vice president at Ax Advocacy and a longtime opponent of Title II regulations, celebrated the ruling on X, calling it a big win for figures such as former FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and “countless others who fought this battle over many years.”
#NetNeutrality via Title II struck down by the Sixth Circuit. This is a massive victory for @AjitPai, @BrendanCarrFCC, @MPORielly, @TomMJohnsonJr, @SimingtonFCC, and countless others who fought this battle over many years. https://t.co/9phXKdlKDw
— Evan Swarztrauber (@SayreEvan) January 2, 2025
After the Obama-era FCC classified broadband providers as Title II telecommunications services in 2015, a Republican-led FCC under then-President Donald Trump repealed those rules in 2017, arguing that lighter regulation would foster innovation and investment.
The Biden administration sought to reverse that decision, tasking the FCC in 2024 with reimplementing net neutrality through the Safeguarding Order. However, the court’s decision blocks that effort, citing the FCC’s lack of authority under the Communications Act.
Pai, the chairman during Trump’s first term, posted to X on Thursday that it is “time for regulators and activists to give up on this tired non-issue once and for all and focus on what actually matters to American consumers—like improving Internet access and promoting online innovation.”
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President-elect Trump has nominated Brendan Carr to be the agency’s chairman in the new administration. Carr has called Biden’s plans to restore net neutrality rules through Title II an “unlawful power grab” and has specifically called the move an effort to impose more government control over the internet.
Given Republican control in both chambers of Congress, a majority of lawmakers are unlikely to push the Obama- and Biden-era net neutrality agenda over the next four years.
