The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation issued a Consolidation Order consolidating pending petitions for review of the FCC’s copper retirement rules that were filed in the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Fifth and Sixth Circuit. The Sixth Circuit was randomly selected as the venue to hear the consolidated appeal. The challenged FCC rules eliminate certain section 214 filing requirements for network changes and reduces other regulatory barriers that the FCC has concluded impede the transition of legacy copper networks to Internet protocol-based network.
