Appeals Court Kills FCC's $9B Internet Subsidy Fund (2026)
The Universal Service Fund pays for the wires and towers that keep rural America connected — a court just ruled its administrator was never legal. Image: TechPulse USA RURAL INTERNET Appeals Court Kills FCC's $9B Internet Subsidy Fund (2026) The fund that keeps rural America online just lost in court — on a technicality from 1997. Published October 16, 2026 · By Daniel Rao, TechPulse USA Your phone bill has been quietly funding rural America's internet for nearly three decades. Yesterday, a federal appeals court said the company collecting that money was never legal in the first place. On Thursday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit struck at the heart of the $9 billion Universal Service Fund — the program that pays for rural broadband buildouts, discounts for low-income households, internet for schools and libraries, and connectivity for rural health clinics. The court ruled that the Federal Communications Commission broke the law in ...