RON JOHNSON, WISCONSIN, CHAIRMAN JOHN McCAIN, ARIZONA ROB PORTMAN, OHIO RAND PAUL, KENTUCKY JAMES LANKFORD, OKLAHOMA MICHAEL B. ENZI, WYOMING JOHN HOEVEN, NORTH DAKOTA STEVE DAINES, MONTANA CLAIRE McCASKILL, MISSOURI THOMAS R. CARPER, DELAWARE HEIDI HEITKAMP, NORTH DAKOTA GARY C. PETERS, MICHIGAN MARGARET WOOD HASSAN, NEW HAMPSHIRE KAMALA D. HARRIS, CALIFORNIA DOUG JONES, ALABAMA ianitrd ~tatrs ~rnatr COMMITTEE ON CHRISTOPHER R. HIXON, STAFF DIRECTOR MARGARETE. DAUM, MINORITY STAFF DIRECTOR HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL A~AIRS wAsH1NGTON, Dc 20510-6250 ecefved & Inspected The Honorable Ajit Pai Chairman Federal Communications Commission 445 12th Street, SW Washington, D.C. 20554 Dear Chairman Pai: FEB 1Z2018 February 5, 2018 FCC Mal/room Pursuant to its authority under Senate Resolution 62(I15th Cong.), the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations is reviewing agencies' processes to solicit and accept public comments on proposed rulemakings. To assist the Subcommittee, please provide the following information. If your agency includes multiple divisions that receive comments in different ways or have different policies regarding the notice and co:mment process, pleas.e provide information for the three divisions that received the most comments over the past five calendar years (2013 through 2017). 1. Over the past five calendar years: a. How many proposed rules :did your agency publish for notice and comment? b. How many man-hours or full-time equivalents were required to collect and review comments for those proposed rules? c. How much money did your agency provide to support Regulations.gov? d. In each year, which three proposed rules received the highest number of comments? How many comments did each of those proposed rules receive? 2. List and describe the means by which your agency solicits and receives comments during the notice-and-comment rulemaking process. 3. For comments filed through Regulations.gov or any other agency electronic filing mechanism, what fields of information are commenters required to provide? What fields are optional? 4. All policies and procedures regarding: a. The collection or validation of commenters' identities or email addresses b. Detecting and preventing automated activity such as "bots" from submitting comments or spam c. The d~termination of commenters' nationalities, : I ; . ' ~ : . 112 Hon. Ajit Pai February 5, 2018 Page 2 of2 d. Any limitations on file formats commenters may submit during the .comment process and what types of files your agency accepts (e.g., portable document format, Word, executable files, audio files). e. The process by which your agency makes comments available to the public, including written guidance on whether and how to review, screen, redact, or summarize any comments before they are made publicly available. 5. In any comment period from January 1, 2010 to the present, has your agency received any information that a commenter filed a comment under someone else's identity? If so, please provide: a. The proposed rule b. The comment c. All documents regarding whether the comment was filed under someone else's identity. d. All documents regarding how the agency addressed the filing of a comment under someone else's identity. Please submit the material responsive to this request as soon as possible, but in any event, no later than February 26, ~018. In order to expedite the Subcommittee's review, we ask that you submit the material responsive to this request as it becomes available, rather than waiting to provide it all at once. To avoid any unnecessary delays in connection with this production, we ask that you carefully review the attached Procedures for Transmitting Documents to the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. If you have any questions regarding this request, please contact Amanda Neely with Senator Portman at 202-224-9877 or John Kilvington with Senator Carper at 202-224-1548. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Sincerely, Rob Portman Chairman Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations Tom Carper Ranking Member Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations