SASC demands Pentagon transparency in spectrum dispute with Ligado

WASHINGTON —Tucked away in their version of the fiscal 2025 Pentagon policy bill, the Senate Armed Services Committee has signaled renewed interest in the years-long battle between the Defense Department and mobile communications provider Ligado over access to L-band spectrum.

The language, buried on page 161 of the SASC’s National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) report, does not mention Ligado by name. However, it demands that DoD detail what military systems have previously or currently operate in, or in those adjacent to, “the 1525-1559 megahertz and the 1626.5-1660.5 megahertz” radio frequency bands at the center of the dispute, as well as provide a list of potential alternate bands for operations of those systems.

The language further requires that the DoD report, to both the SASC and its House counterpart by Feb. 15, 2025, “the status of any claims concerning these bands of electromagnetic spectrum and any technical objections DOD has in response to such claims.” Put in simpler terms: the SASC is demanding that the Pentagon disclose, in writing, which  if any of its systems are operating on the spectrum that Ligado plans to use for its commercial business.

The language is just the latest move in a years-long fight, with the company and its supporters clashing with federal departments and agencies who say Ligado’s plans for creating a 5G mobile network using those frequency bands would interfere with Global Position System (GPS) satellites.

Ligado last October sued the federal government for $39 billion, alleging that officials at the Departments of Defense and Commerce took “unlawful actions” to, in effect, improperly seize without compensation the spectrum granted to the company by the Federal Communications Commission in 2020. In particular, the lawsuit charged that the Pentagon has “taken Ligado’s spectrum for the agency’s own purposes, operating previously undisclosed systems that use or depend on Ligado’s spectrum without compensating Ligado.”

Those undisclosed systems, sources supporting Ligado have alleged, include not just GPS satellites but also classified radars. In the civil and commercial world, many maritime radars use L-band frequencies that fall into the range of the DoD-Ligado dispute. The US Navy did not respond to a query from Breaking Defense about whether it uses the same frequency bands for any of its myriad radar systems.

“The report language is an important recognition by the Senate Armed Services Committee that the DOD must disclose its continued use of spectrum licensed for Ligado’s exclusive use. This effort confirms the company’s position that DOD has been withholding information about its spectrum use and that DOD must compensate Ligado for that use,” a spokesperson for Ligado told Breaking Defense in a July 30 email.

It is unclear what, if any, such Pentagon disclosures would have on the ongoing legal proceedings.

The Justice Department, in its January motion to dismiss Ligado’s lawsuit, stated that the company had failed “to plead any plausible facts to support its purely speculative claim that the Government has occupied its licensed spectrum.” The motion also charges that FCC licenses do not give companies exclusive “property rights” over spectrum allocations.

The SASC language, on its face, seems to be a bit of an about-face for the committee. Both senior Republican and Democratic committee members have decried the FCC ruling over the last four years, with the late Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., and current SASC Chair Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., leading the charge. However, Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., the current SASC ranking member who formerly ran the Commerce Committee that oversees the FCC, has over the years essentially taken the commission’s side.

Spokespeople for the SASC, as as well as for Reed and Wicker, did not respond by press time to requests for comment.