A federal appeals court struck down the Federal Communications Commission’s landmark net neutrality rules on Thursday, ending a nearly two-decade effort to regulate broadband Internet providers as utilities.

The US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati, said the FCC lacked the authority to reinstate rules that prevented broadband providers from slowing or blocking access to Internet content. In its opinion, a three-judge panel pointed to a Supreme Court decision in June, known as Loper Bright, that overturned a 1984 legal precedent that gave deference to government agencies on regulations.

“Applying Loper Bright means we can end the FCC’s vacillations,” the court ruled.

The court’s decision put an end to the Biden administration’s hallmark tech policy, which had drawn impassioned support from consumer groups and tech giants like Google and fierce protests from telecommunications giants like Comcast and AT&T.

The FCC had voted in April to restore net neutrality regulations, which expand government oversight of broadband providers and aim to protect consumer access to the Internet. The regulations were first put in place nearly a decade ago under the Obama administration and were aimed at preventing internet service providers like Verizon or Comcast from blocking or degrading the delivery of services from competitors like Netflix and YouTube. The rules were repealed under President-elect Donald J. Trump in his first administration, but they continued to be a contentious partisan issue that pit tech giants against broadband providers.

Thursday’s decision effectively concludes the back-and-forth battle. Brendan Carr, whom Trump has named as the incoming FCC chair, has been a strong critic of net neutrality. The court’s reliance on the Loper case in its ruling could also portend more lawsuits to hollow out federal regulations at the FCC and other agencies.

The court’s opinion “puts to bed an issue that unnecessarily sucked up a lot of oxygen in tech and telecom for two decades now”, said Evan Swarztrauber, a former policy adviser to Carr.

In a statement, Carr said that he was “pleased” by the decision and that “the work to unwind the Biden administration’s regulatory overreach will continue”.

The court’s decision doesn’t affect state laws on net neutrality in California, Washington and Colorado. Democrats at the FCC called on Thursday for Congress to create laws promoting net neutrality, signalling that the issue may continue to fester.

New York Times News Service