Each state as well as the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico will receive at least $100 million, according to a senior administration official also on the call, and four territories will get at least $25 million. Ten percent of the $42.5 billion will be set aside for a “high-cost allocation,” one official said, referring to remote or topographically challenging areas where the cost of broadband access is above average.
The rest of the funding will be awarded proportionally based on the number of underserved communities in a state, based on a Federal Communications Commission map released in May. That map shows about 8.5 million unserved broadband availability locations across the U.S. That leaves about 7 percent of the U.S. unserved, according to officials who could not be named under the terms of White’s call. House.
Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and Commerce Secretary Gina M. Raimondo will announce the effort on Monday.
Zients responded to Republican criticism of the spending, saying they are trying to cut critical funding “across the board” that will “only make life easier for the middle class.”
“Republicans are calling on Congress to reverse historic legislation, including the Inflation Reduction Act, that reduced costs, fought climate change and created good-paying manufacturing jobs,” he said. “We have a historic opportunity here to make a real difference in people’s lives and making sure we deliver on that potential is what we do every day.”
