Jeffords switch seen as no shock to tech policy

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By Keith Perine

(IDG) -- Vermont Sen. James Jeffords announced Thursday morning that he is leaving the Republican Party to become an independent legislator. His decision throws the U.S. Senate into Democratic Party control and instantly creates a significant obstacle to President George W. Bush's legislative agenda.

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But though Jeffords' decision changes the political landscape in Washington, existing bipartisan agreement on many technology policy issues means that there are likely to be few immediate, substantive shifts on questions such as an Internet sales tax, online privacy, intellectual property or telecommunications regulation.

Jeffords made the announcement at a press conference in his home state, where onlookers responded with cheers and a chant of, "Thank you, Jim."

Jeffords will vote with the Senate's 50 Democrats on organizational matters. This means that Sen. Thomas Daschle, D-S.D., will become the new majority leader, and Democrats will assume all of the Senate committee chairmanships. The Bush administration now faces greater hurdles in selling controversial initiatives, such as its new energy plan, which in part calls for increased oil drilling and greater use of nuclear power, and the president's dream of a national missile defense shield. But Jeffords said he promised Bush that he wouldn't leave the Republican ranks until after major tax-cut legislation, which cleared the Senate on Wednesday, is finally passed by Congress.

"The impact on our industry will be minimal," says Harris Miller, president of the Information Technology Association of America, whose members include such companies as AOL Time Warner and Microsoft. "We have studiously worked to maintain a relationship with both sides of the aisle."

The chairmanship of the Senate Commerce Committee is likely to pass from Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., to Sen. Ernest Hollings, D-S.C. That could lead to fireworks between the committee and the Republican-controlled Federal Communications Commission, but few regulatory policy shifts, given the Republicans' continued control of the U.S. House of Representatives and the White House.

Hollings is less enamored of the four remaining Baby Bell telephone companies (BellSouth, Qwest, SBC and Verizon) than are McCain or House Commerce Committee Chairman Billy Tauzin, R-La. Jeffords' move could doom a major piece of House legislation, the Internet Freedom and Broadband Deployment Act of 2001, which would allow the Bells to offer high-speed Internet access without first opening their markets to local competition. However, that bill had little chance of passing the Senate even before Thursday's news.

A three-year moratorium on the collection of sales taxes on e-commerce is set to expire in October, but lawmakers from both parties favor a temporary extension.

The prospects for new Internet privacy legislation, an issue that has been left on the back burner so far this year, would improve only slightly with Hollings wielding the Commerce Committee gavel. McCain has tentatively scheduled a June 7 committee hearing on the subject. But Hollings, a fierce critic of industry self-regulation, is outside the bipartisan mainstream, which leans toward enacting mild online privacy legislation, if any.

On issues of intellectual property, observers expect little change in the Senate Judiciary Committee, where Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the likely new chairman, has a collegial relationship with current Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah.

"Internet policy is bipartisan," says Ari Schwartz, a spokesman for the Center for Democracy and Technology. "We like it that way."