Rep. Brett Guthrie wins Energy and Commerce gavel
Rep. Brett Guthrie on Feb. 8, 2022. Photo: Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images
The GOP steering committee on Monday selected Rep. Brett Guthrie to be next House Energy and Commerce chair.
Why it matters: The new chair will help shape tech policy next year, but even a Republican-controlled Congress will inherit the same tech regulation impasses that have long plagued leaders on this key committee.
State of play: Guthrie defeated Rep. Bob Latta, chair of the communications and technology subcommittee, to succeed retiring Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers.
- Guthrie is the current chair of the health subcommittee.
- His office told Axios in an email earlier this year his priorities would be to protect critical infrastructure from foreign adversaries and beat China to 6G, streamline permitting to connect more Americans to broadband, renew the FCC's spectrum authority and counter foreign adversaries stealing American technologies.
Expect the new E&C chair to quickly step into the fray on a number of important tech policy issues.
- Speaker Mike Johnson said on Monday that House Republicans are looking forward to working with the Trump administration "to get the right bill into law" when it comes to kids online safety, and the new E&C chair will play an important role in shepherding possible legislation through Congress.
- The effort to pass a comprehensive and bipartisan federal privacy bill once again sputtered and stopped this Congress, leaving it up to a new chair to try and revive the fraught effort.
- AI and areas under E&C jurisdiction, like privacy and energy, are increasingly intertwined and will demand the chair's attention next Congress.
What's next: The full House Republican conference has to finalize the pick, but that's largely a formality.
