Maine Becomes Latest State to Put Net Neutrality Law in Place

Less than two weeks after she signed the nation’s toughest internet privacy law, as AVN.com reported, Maine Governor Janet Mills has taken another step to protect Maine internet users. On Tuesday, Mills made Maine the 11th state to take measures protecting net neutrality, since the Republican-controlled Federal Communications Commission repealed the rules last year. The net neutrality rules put into effect in 2015, under President Barack Obama, prohibited online service providers from blocking or slowing data traffic on the internet, or favoring traffic from certain sites over others. But led by Donald Trump appointee Ajit Pai, the FCC dumped those rules as of June 11, 2018.  On Tuesday, Mills signed a new bill essentially reinstating the Obama-era rules, for any broadband and internet provider that enters into a contract with the state government in Maine. Mills said in a statement that the new Maine net neutrality rules will take effect in September, according to TV station WMTW in Portland, Maine. Less than three weeks ago, the New York State assembly passed its own state-level net neutrality bill, as AVN.com reported. The state’s senate must still vote own the bill before it reaches the desk of Governor Andrew Cuomo. The FCC, however, claims that its order repealing the 2015 net neutrality rules also prohibits states from imposing their own open internet regulations. In fact, the FCC has sued California after that state passed its own bill, which was signed into law last year by then-governor Jerry Brown. California then blinked, putting the implementation of its net neutrality law on hold indefinitely.  In signing Maine’s net neutrality bill, Mills also said that she hoped that the federal rules dumped by the FCC would be reinstated. Photo By Julia Ess / Wikimedia Commons