Congress Warns: The U.S. Has No Reliable Backup If GPS Fails

Why It Matters

The House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology convened a hearing on June 4 to examine the state of U.S. positioning, navigation, and timing capabilities, with lawmakers from both parties warning that America has no reliable backup if GPS fails. The central tension was a live, contested FCC rulemaking over whether a single company, NextNav, should gain priority access to the 900 MHz spectrum band to build a terrestrial GPS alternative, a proposal that drew sharp criticism from fellow witnesses and members alike.

The Big Picture

GPS underpins an estimated $1.4 trillion in annual U.S. economic activity, from financial transaction timing to power grid synchronization to 911 dispatch. Yet the U.S. still has no congressionally mandated backup system. President Trump issued a new national space-based PNT policy in February 2026, the first update in more than 16 years, and his first-term Executive Order on PNT resilience remains in effect.

The FCC, under Republican-appointed leadership, forwarded a draft rulemaking on NextNav's 900 MHz proposal to the White House Office of Management and Budget in March 2026, setting a tight window for congressional input. The hearing echoes a pattern dating to a 2009 hearing on GPS service gaps and a 2015 examination of eLoran as a GPS backup, a system that was never deployed despite years of study.

What They're Saying

Subcommittee Chair Rep. Richard Hudson (R-NC) set the tone directly: "We rely on GPS every single day, from navigation to national defense, but lack a backup system in case of failure." Full Committee Chair Rep. Brett Guthrie (R-KY) was sharper: "Our adversaries are constantly looking for ways to jam and undermine America's GPS system."

The sharpest exchange involved NextNav CEO Mariam Sorond, whose company is seeking FCC authorization to repurpose the lower 900 MHz band for a terrestrial PNT network. Harold Feld, Senior Vice President of Public Knowledge, pushed back directly in written testimony, arguing the proposal would exchange roughly 14 MHz of shared, low-power spectrum for 15 MHz of full-power, flexible-use national spectrum rights worth substantially more, raising questions about public value.

J. David Grossman, Vice President for Policy and Regulatory Affairs at the Consumer Technology Association, highlighted the 900 MHz band's existing critical security and life-safety uses, warning that displacing those users creates new vulnerabilities even as it claims to solve old ones.

Lisa Dyer, Executive Director of the GPS Innovation Alliance, urged definitional discipline before any policy action: "Terms like complementary, alternative, resilient, and backup are used interchangeably." She also flagged a concrete modernization gap, noting that eight of the constellation's 32 GPS satellites are operating on single-string redundancy, one failure away from becoming non-operational.

Sam Matheny, Executive Vice President of the National Association of Broadcasters, offered a competing technology. NAB's Broadcast Positioning System, built on the ATSC 3.0 NextGen TV standard, uses existing high-power broadcast towers that operate at signal strengths up to 1,000 times stronger than GPS satellites, making them harder to jam. A January 2025 NIST peer-reviewed paper validated BPS as a viable complementary PNT solution.

Members pursued distinct sector angles. Rep. Rick Allen (R-GA) pressed on first responder applications in natural disasters. Rep. August Pfluger (R-TX), a retired Air Force Colonel, focused on GPS jamming in the Middle East as an active threat to military operations. Rep. John Joyce (R-PA) and Rep. Erin Houchin (R-IN) both pressed on rural and agricultural GPS dependence, with Joyce calling for PNT expansion into rural communities before a crisis strikes. Rep. Gus Bilirakis (R-FL) focused on autonomous vehicles and emerging technologies that require sub-meter positioning accuracy beyond current GPS capabilities.

Political Stakes

For NextNav, this hearing was high-stakes. The company's business model depends on FCC authorization for the 900 MHz restructuring, and congressional endorsement, or skepticism, carries weight while the draft rulemaking sits at OMB. The Security Industry Association reported after the hearing that Sorond faced sharp criticism from both fellow panelists and members of Congress, a notable outcome for a witness seeking regulatory approval.

For the administration, the hearing offered an opportunity to claim leadership on a national security infrastructure issue, but the FCC's direction on NextNav creates internal friction. The 900 MHz band's existing users, utilities, alarm companies, and rural wireless operators are traditional Republican constituencies, and their opposition to the proposal is broad and organized.

Three of the five witnesses, Feld, Grossman, and Matheny, converged on a technology-neutral framework, arguing that no single solution should be mandated and that open, competitive processes should govern any spectrum reallocation. That consensus makes it less likely Congress will legislatively pick a winner. The harder question is whether the FCC, moving independently on a draft rulemaking already in interagency review, will wait for congressional direction or proceed on its own timeline.

What's Next

The FCC's interagency review of the NextNav NPRM was underway as of March 2026. Once OMB clears it, the agency can issue the formal rulemaking and open a public comment period, narrowing Congress's window to shape the outcome. Hudson's stated intent to "finally move the ball forward on complementary PNT" signals the subcommittee is building toward legislation, though no markup date has been announced.

The Bottom Line

A decade of GPS backup hearings produced eLoran studies and executive orders but no deployed system. Whether this hearing breaks that pattern depends on whether Congress acts before the FCC's rulemaking forecloses the choices.

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