New Street Research analyst and former FCC official Blair Levin joined the podcast live at the ACA Connects Summit this week to talk about the state of broadband in the US, and the urgency around re-funding the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP). According to Levin, uncertainty around the ACP is putting the country at risk of making the digital divide worse, just as it embarks on spending $42.5 billion through the Broadband, Equity, Access and Deployment program (BEAD) to build out broadband networks.

"We as a country may face a situation next year where 50 million Americans, instead of getting faster, better, cheaper broadband – which is what we should be doing everywhere all the time – they will be getting worser, slower, more expensive broadband, if they have it at all," said Levin. "In other words, we are at risk for ... taking the largest step any country has ever taken to increase the digital divide."

Here are just a few topics discussed in this episode:

For an unedited transcript of this conversation, click the caption button in the video toolbar.