Wisconsin carve-out lets cable skip fees to local TV stations—under a Packers-themed name.

What it does

This bill allows cable and satellite subscribers in 13 specific Wisconsin counties to choose to receive television broadcasts from an adjacent state's network affiliate instead of their local in-state station. The bill exempts these out-of-state signals from normal retransmission consent and copyright licensing rules, allowing carriers to provide them without negotiating fees with local broadcasters or paying copyright holders.

Why we flagged it

The bill's operative mechanism is a narrow geographic exemption from copyright and retransmission rules benefiting subscribers in 13 Wisconsin counties—a single-state, multi-county carve-out. The 'Go Pack Go' title (referencing the Green Bay Packers) is a vanity frame that obscures the bill's technical broadcast-licensing function.

What the text implies

• Local broadcasters in the 13 covered counties lose retransmission consent leverage and copyright licensing fees, reducing revenue available for local news production and community programming.
• The bill's exemption from 'significantly viewed' determinations (§76.54 FCC rules) may allow carriers to avoid must-carry obligations for local stations, further eroding local broadcast economics.
• Satellite carriers are exempted from distant-signal limits when retransmitting adjacent-market signals to covered counties, creating a regulatory carve-out that applies nowhere else in the country.
• The 'Go Pack Go' title appears designed to invoke regional sports loyalty rather than describe the bill's actual function—a transparency red flag that obscures the legislative intent.

Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.

Who it affects

Subscribers in covered Wisconsin counties gain choice and potentially lower costs if carriers pass through savings from avoiding retransmission fees. However, local broadcasters lose licensing revenue, which may reduce their ability to produce local news and programming—a concrete public cost to information access in those counties.

Who stands to gain

• cable operators (reduced retransmission consent obligations)
• satellite carriers (exemption from distant-signal limits)
• subscribers in 13 Wisconsin counties (potential cost savings if carriers pass through fee reductions

Named in the bill

Communications Act of 1934, Title 17 United States Code, FCC (Federal Communications Commission), cable operators, satellite carriers, network stations, Wisconsin counties (Ashland, Barron, Bayfield, Burnett, Douglas, Dunn, Florence, Iron, Pierce, Polk,, Green Bay Packers (implied by 'Go Pack Go' title)

Where it stands

• Sep 4, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
• Sep 4, 2025 — Referred to House Committee on the Judiciary and House Committee on Energy and Commerce · Congress.gov: “Referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and in addition to the Committee on the Judiciary, for a…”

Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.

Money around this bill

1 lobbying clients named this bill on 1 disclosure filings across 1 quarter, Dec 2025 to Dec 2025. Those filings disclosed $30,000 in lobbying spend. A filing names 5 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.

More lobbying clients named this bill than 0% of bills with at least one filing.

Tony Wied, the sponsor, reported $589,000 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.

• El Paso County, Colorado — $30,000 on 1 filing

Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jan 19, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.