Congress orders a check on phone service rules for crises.
H.R. 10285 — Telecommunications GAP Act · Filed by Luz Rivas (D-CA) · 1 cosponsor · Introduced Sep 3, 2026 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill tells the Government Accountability Office to study a rule. The rule makes phone firms keep service on during crises and bad weather. The study must check if the rule works. It must look at what happened during California's January 2025 wildfires. It must find any gaps in service and suggest fixes. The office must report back to Congress.
Who it affects
Phone firms must follow the crisis service rule. People in areas hit by bad weather rely on phones to call for help. They also need phones to get news.
One thing to notice
The bill uses California's January 2025 wildfires as a real test. It checks whether the phone rule works when people need it most.
From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.
Where it stands
1 cosponsor: 1 Democrats.
- Sep 3, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Sep 3, 2026 — Referred to House Committee on Energy and Commerce · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Words to know
- Government Accountability Office — An agency that checks if government rules and programs work right.
- crises — Times of sudden danger or trouble when people need help fast.
- gaps — Missing parts or weak spots in a service or system.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (1,134 characters) on Sep 5, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 14,707 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
As of — page rendered 2026-09-23.
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