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  "description": "In NRC v. Texas, High Court narrowed who can challenge federal agency decisions in court",
  "path": "/fcc-supreme-court-decision-puts-brakes-on-school-bus-wi-fi-suit/",
  "publishedAt": "2025-07-07T18:25:18.000Z",
  "site": "https://broadbandbreakfast.com",
  "tags": [
    "_2023 order_",
    "All Videos from Speeding BEAD Summit",
    "previously reported by _Broadband Breakfast_"
  ],
  "textContent": "WASHINGTON, July 7, 2025 – A recent Supreme Court decision may upend a lawsuit challenging the Federal Communications Commission’s _2023 order_ to fund Wi-Fi on school buses.\n\nIn briefs filed Wednesday, the FCC and the Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband Coalition urged the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit to dismiss _Molak v. FCC_ , arguing the petitioners – led by child safety advocate **Maurine Molak** – lack standing under the Supreme Court’s June 18 ruling in _Nuclear Regulatory Commission v. Texas_.\n\nThe Court’s decision in _NRC v. Texas_ significantly tightened the standard for who qualifies as a “party aggrieved” eligible to seek judicial review under the Hobbs Act. It also sharply limited the _ultra vires_ exception to cases where an agency acts in direct defiance of a specific statutory prohibition.\n\n\n\n_****FROM SPEEDING BEAD SUMMIT****_\n _****Panel 1: How Are States Thinking About Reasonable Costs Now?****_\n_****Panel 2: Finding the State Versus Federal Balance in BEAD****_\n _****Panel 3: Reacting to the New BEAD NOFO Guidance****_\n _****Panel 4: Building, Maintaining and Adopting Digital Workforce Skills****_\n\n All Videos from Speeding BEAD Summit \n\n“Under the Hobbs Act, only a ‘party aggrieved by [a final agency] order may … file a petition to review the order in the court of appeals,’” the FCC wrote, quoting the statute. The FCC contended the Molak petitioners “did not participate in the underlying FCC proceedings,” and “thus, under _NRC v. Texas_ , this Court lacks jurisdiction over the petition for review.”\n\nThe FCC argued that the petitioners neither filed comments nor participated in the rulemaking before the FCC issued the Declaratory Ruling allowing E-Rate subsidies for school bus Wi-Fi. Their only filing came after the ruling, in a later stage of the same docket. That, the FCC said, does not confer 'party' status retroactively.\n\nEven petitioners’ fallback claim – that the FCC’s action was _ultra vires_ , or beyond its legal authority – fails, the FCC argued, saying petitioners “dress up a typical statutory-authority argument as an _ultra vires_ claim.”\n\nSHLB, in a five-page brief, echoed the FCC’s claim that the _ultra vires_ exception cannot apply, saying the petitioners’ challenge “falls well shy of the endzone.”\n\n“Neither petitioner even attempts to claim that they meet” the Hobbs Act’s requirement of being a ‘party aggrieved’ by the agency’s order, SHLB wrote. “Instead, they argue that they are entitled to seek judicial review [under] an exception … for _ultra vires_ claims. They are wrong.”\n\nThe Molaks, for their part, argued that _NRC v. Texas_ was “a narrow decision grounded in the adjudicatory nature of the agency proceeding” and does not apply to the FCC’s informal rulemaking process in this case.\n\n“The Declaratory Ruling at issue here involved a very different proceeding and statute,” the Molaks argued. “The FCC issued the Declaratory Ruling as part of a general rulemaking docket. And while the agency published a draft on its website shortly before issuing the final version, it did not follow notice-and-comment procedures – let alone afford anyone a hearing.”\n\n“If the _ultra vires_ exception is not applicable in this case,” they wrote, “it is not applicable in any case – a result flatly at odds with _NRC_ preserving the exception.”\n\nOral arguments in the case were held on November 4, 2024. At the time, the FCC defended its interpretation of the E-Rate statute and its authority to support Wi-Fi on school buses, as previously reported by _Broadband Breakfast_.",
  "title": "FCC: Supreme Court Decision Puts Brakes on School Bus Wi-Fi Suit",
  "updatedAt": "2026-03-11T03:26:41.364Z"
}