Remarks of Assistant Secretary Arielle Roth at the Free State Foundation Luncheon

Remarks of Arielle Roth 
Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information  
National Telecommunications and Information Administration
Free State Foundation Luncheon
December 2, 2025

Good afternoon. 

What an honor it is to be here at the National Press Club among so many thought leaders and colleagues.  I’m grateful to the Free State Foundation and Randy May for his leadership and for inviting me to speak to you today—and for the remarkably subtle, understated, barely noticeable publicity devoted to this event over the last three months.  So truly, Randy, no pressure at all for me up here! 

For decades, Free State has championed the bedrock principles that underpin American flourishing—limited government, free markets, and respect for the rule of law.  From my earliest days in telecom law, Free State’s scholarship and conferences challenged how I thought about these issues.  I’ve learned a tremendous amount from their work, and Free State’s analysis continues to inform how I approach my own responsibilities as NTIA Administrator. 

That certainly applies to my current work overseeing the $42 billion BEAD program and ensuring it fulfills its core mission of ensuring broadband availability throughout the country. 

For almost four years, BEAD was weighed down by bureaucratic red tape, market-distorting restrictions, and heavy-handed, extralegal social mandates.  A major bipartisan initiative was at risk of becoming yet another broadband program that failed to deliver. 

But new leadership makes a difference.  In just a few short months, the Trump Administration transformed BEAD from a boondoggle built on unlawful rules into a genuine success for the American people. 

Under Secretary Lutnick’s leadership, our Benefit of the Bargain reforms restored the program to its statutory objective: universal connectivity delivered through competition, accountability, and respect for the law.  The result has been lower costs for taxpayers, real skin in the game for providers, and faster broadband access for consumers. 

Benefit of the Bargain in Action 

The results speak for themselves. 

Take Louisiana. Under its Benefit of the Bargain-approved plan, Louisiana will connect over 127,000 locations around the state at a cost of just under $500 million—down more than $220 million from the plan conditionally approved during the Biden Administration, and over $850 million below its original allocation. 

Under the prior administration’s strict fiber mandate, the cost to serve a single location in Louisiana was as high as $120,000.  That’s enough to buy a home in many parts of the state and roughly twice Louisiana’s median household income.  Imagine explaining to the family living there that Washington thinks it’s better to give a company $120,000 to build broadband to their home than to give that household two years of income in cash.  It’s simply unreasonable to expect taxpayers to foot that kind of bill, especially when the outcome wasn’t based on the law in the first place. 

Under the Benefit of the Bargain reforms, the highest-cost location in the state is now about $7,000, with an average per-location cost under $4,000.  That’s still a lot of money, but it’s an amount that can be explained to ordinary Americans.  And Louisiana’s private matching contributions jumped from the statutory minimum of 25% to over 42%—a shift that can only be explained by the Benefit of the Bargain reforms.  That increase in skin in the game, driven by increased competition, is an encouraging sign that these projects are at lower risk of default. 

We saw similar gains in West Virginia: a 10% increase in private match and a 43% drop in cost as compared to their pre-Benefit of the Bargain plan.  They were able to reach these results while still achieving universal broadband access in a way that meets the state’s unique terrain and connectivity challenges. 

And this is consistent with nationwide trends in the program, where states are seeing average matches approaching 40%.  In Georgia, providers are matching more than 170% of federal dollars. That’s an astonishing figure, rivaled only by the state coming in $1 billion under its original allocation. 

These successes are thanks to a surge in participation.  Providers who sat out under hostile, burdensome rules came back to the table, strengthening competition and improving value for taxpayers. 

And don’t just take my word for it.  According to the Arizona State Broadband Office director, their state saw 40 percent more applications under the Benefit of the Bargain round.  Virginia revealed that it received double the applications under the Benefit of the Bargain than under the previous rules. 

States, freed from unlawful one-size-fits-all mandates, could evaluate projects on a granular basis and select those that truly fit their needs. Indeed, our results show huge diversity in state technology mixes—both within and across states—reflecting the realities of our country’s geographic, topographic, and population density differences, as well as our guiding principle of market-driven technological innovation.  Today, we’ll be posting state-by-state data on technology selections, costs, and average match amounts on NTIA’s website, so you can see how each state applied our rules to its specific on-the-ground circumstances—with states like Rhode Island leaning more on fiber, others like Nebraska leaning more on fixed wireless, and some like Montana leaning more on satellite. 

Our reforms have even saved time.  Under the prior rules, Texas was the last state to submit its Initial Proposal to NTIA, and its Final Proposal would not have been due until November 21, 2025.  Instead, through NTIA’s acceleration efforts and Texas’ diligent work to deliver a responsive, high-quality application, the state beat this deadline by nearly a month. NTIA was able to approve the plan quickly, shaving an estimated six months off Texans’ wait time for broadband. 

NTIA has been working around the clock to approve as many states as possible by year’s end. 

Last month, we announced 18 approvals, with Texas and West Virginia following soon thereafter.  Today, we are adding 9 more to the list: South Dakota, Nebraska, New Jersey, Arizona, Colorado, Indiana, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Ohio.  I am thrilled by this momentum and eager to complete the remaining reviews. 

Putting Savings into Action 

We’re getting the job done—at a fraction of the cost.  In fact, we estimate the Benefit of the Bargain savings will ultimately reach $21 billion. 

Naturally, the million dollar—or rather, $21 billion—question is: how will we use these savings? 

First and foremost, these dollars belong to the American people, and they should reap the benefit. We didn’t work as hard as we did just to spend the savings wastefully; any spending must produce real, measurable value—not duplicate investment the private sector is already making. 

Second, and just as importantly, we must avoid actions that distort investment or stifle innovation. 

We saw the consequences of distorted investment with the prior administration’s fiber mandate.  Preferencing a single technology doesn’t just waste money; it can stifle innovation and undermine America’s leadership in critical emerging sectors.  And in a world where technological dominance and national security go hand in hand, domestic policies shouldn’t be viewed in a vacuum.  Policies that handicap American companies don’t just limit connectivity but have real international consequences, especially as other countries seek to follow our lead. 

Our approach to the BEAD savings will complement the program and reflect the same principles that made the reforms successful.  We haven’t made any decisions yet but stay tuned.  We’ll have much more to share in early 2026. 

Curbing Kids’ Excessive Screen Time 

Speaking of distortionary incentives and second-order effects, I want to pivot to another topic that is both critical to our nation’s future and personally meaningful to me. 

At my nomination hearing, I outlined three priorities as Administrator: course correcting BEAD, advancing commercial spectrum access, and addressing kids’ excessive screen time. 

As a mom of six, the issue of screen time is deeply personal.  Like many parents, I struggle firsthand to monitor and limit my kids’ internet and screen use. It’s hard enough to manage at home—especially with the ever-present social pressures to be online and the addictive pull of screen time—but it’s even harder when screens have become inescapable at school and so much homework now requires internet or device use, built on the premise that connected technology is the backbone of modern education. 

That mindset accelerated during COVID, when remote learning pushed the school day onto a screen and nonstop device use became a substitute for in-person teaching.  And even though the country has long since moved past lockdowns, many of the habits and influences of that period remain: students tethered to devices, digital platform-based lesson plans, and the expansion of technology in learning as a default. 

A popular, yet rarely challenged, talking point in certain tech and telecom circles is that schools simply need more bandwidth, more devices, more connectivity—for classrooms, homework, or according to some, even school buses (a surprise to anyone who has ever been on a school bus!).  There’s an oft-repeated claim that more devices and more connectivity will “close the homework gap” and “level the playing field” for low-income students. 

These assumptions deserve real scrutiny.  Technology has a role in education, of course.  But many parents worry, rightly, that their children are being inundated with screens in ways that are indiscriminate and harmful to their development.  This concern transcends politics—it cuts across communities, income levels, and political affiliations.  The track record shows that in cases of heavy reliance on ed tech, the students who struggle most are often the very low-income kids these tools were supposed to help. 

While much of the public debate has focused on banning cell phones in schools—an important conversation, to be sure—the problem is far broader than that.  The primary drivers of screen exposure in classrooms today aren’t smartphones; they’re school-issued laptops and tablets, education platforms, and digital curricula that embed hours of screen time into both the school day and homework.  Even if every cell phone disappeared tomorrow, the core issue would remain. 

Surveys show even elementary and middle school students spending three or more hours per day on devices for schoolwork and homework.  It’s routine in certain districts to give kids laptops starting as early as first or second grade.  Some schools introduce tablet-based learning as early as kindergarten. 

When screen time becomes the default for instruction, downtime, and homework, instead of a targeted and intentional tool, it displaces the things children need most: reading, writing, physical and creative play, hands-on learning, and face-to-face interaction.  Moreover, security and filters are rarely foolproof.  Many teachers report that students are playing games, instant messaging, or accessing inappropriate content during school hours, on school-issued devices. 

And as schools have been flooded with technology, academic performance hasn’t improved.  According to National Assessment of Education Progress—the Nation’s 'Report Card'—high schoolers' math and reading scores are at their lowest levels on record. 

Parents feel overwhelmed and outmatched by the social and academic pressure pushing their kids to be constantly online—while lacking the tools and transparency they need to protect them. 

NTIA’s Role 

Addressing this challenge will be a major priority for me as NTIA Administrator.  That’s why today I am announcing an NTIA-led effort to put children first when it comes to screen time at school.  We want to empower parental control, increase transparency, and promote healthy tech use. 

NTIA is uniquely situated to convene federal agencies, subject matter experts, and creative ideas at the intersection of tech policy and children’s wellbeing.  We are coordinating across the Administration and talking with leading experts. 

We will also be looking closely at how federal subsidies and connectivity targets may be pushing schools toward more device use—often without asking whether it helps children learn.  We’ve all heard the shiny promises: that ed tech platforms will automatically capture and analyze student data to improve instruction, that gamified apps will transform engagement, that teachers can use tablets for classroom management and improving behavior, and that connected devices will enable ‘anytime, anywhere’ learning.  Tech companies—chasing taxpayer dollars—say all this and more to close a deal.  But our students are worth more than their sales pitch. 

NTIA has no authority to set education policy.  But NTIA does have a role in reviewing whether federal spending on broadband and connected technology in the name of education has fulfilled its mission. 

Federal dollars should be tied to outcomes that support children, guided by parents and teachers.  Technology should empower families, not undermine them.  It should enhance learning, not encourage addictive habits. 

At its core, this is about protecting childhood.  Children need less time glued to a screen and more time outdoors, for building friendships, and learning to manage anxiety and boredom. 

I admit there is no easy answer here—connectivity is part of modern life, and many students will go on to create extraordinary things using digital skills. But we can do better, and we want to do our part to help. 

That work begins with listening.  On December 10, NTIA will host a virtual listening session to explore the drivers and consequences of excessive screen use in schools. 

We want to hear from parents, from teachers, and from students.  We want to hear from experts on how federal policy intersects with children’s technology use.  If you have insights, now is the time to add your voice. 

We will use this feedback to inform our analysis of screen use in schools, the role of federal rules and incentives in shaping device and platform markets, and the practices of ed tech platforms—particularly regarding children’s data. 

There is no better test of a government—or a society—than how it treats its children. That means being honest about what works, what doesn’t, and what best supports learning. 

The era of throwing money at problems and hoping for the best is over. We are committed to a better approach—one that puts children, their well-being, and their education at the center of every decision.  If you share that commitment, we welcome the opportunity to work with you. 

These are just two of the many issues we are focused on at NTIA. We are also pressing ahead on our spectrum mandate from the One Big Beautiful Bill; promoting U.S. leadership in 6G across standards bodies and international fora; and evaluating the next steps for public safety communications as Congress considers FirstNet reauthorization. 

My first six months at NTIA have been incredibly busy, and the next year promises to be even more so.  In 2026, I look forward to seeing BEAD dollars in action, as we finally shift from approving State Final Proposals to getting shovels in the ground—and outlining how states can put their significant Benefit of the Bargain savings to work.  We will also begin the year with a broad tribal consultation as we bring our Tribal connectivity programs in line with BEAD.  Finally, I foresee a busy year on the international front, as we finalize and build support for U.S. positions ahead of the 2027 World Radiocommunication Conference. 

I look forward to working with many of you as we take on these challenges together.