Gov. Jeff Landry wants that leftover money to stay in Louisiana.
In a letter to Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick this week, Landry heaped praise on the Trump administration and requested that leftover Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment grant funds be spent on "state-led initiatives" in Louisiana that advance national goals around artificial intelligence, education and workforce training.
"This approach would vividly demonstrate the business and financial savvy that is a hallmark of your department and the Administration overall," Landry wrote before conjuring a potential headline: "'President Trump and Secretary Lutnick to reinvest billions of dollars of program efficiencies in AI and America First Policies,' focused on rural/urban economies while generating an even higher return for the taxpayer."
Louisiana had been set to get $1.35 billion in funding from the bipartisan BEAD program, created under the Biden administration in 2021 to build high-speed internet connections across the country. This year, the Trump administration overhauled the grant program's rules.
The state's new plan, submitted in August, would spend $499 million to connect households across the state, about $250 million less than its previous proposal. (The first plan also included $500 million for "nondeployment" funds, including for rural healthcare and virtual education.)
"The current administration has done the right thing in ripping out a lot of the regulations and red tape," said Veneeth Iyengar, executive director of the state broadband office, in an interview Friday. "We were efficient before. We're even more efficient now."
The state wants to spend the remaining grant funds via its state agencies toward federal goals outlined in Landry's letter. "Congress granted NTIA clear authority to pursue this path," Landry wrote, citing language in the law that allows the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, an executive branch agency overseeing the BEAD program, to "make available to the eligible entity the remainder of the grant funds allocated..."
"We achieved another $250 million in savings," Iyenger said Friday. "And we think it's an awesome opportunity to leverage those dollars to create a one-plus-one-equals-five opportunity."
The funds could go to state agencies to push "cutting-edge efforts" to improve outcomes in areas of healthcare where Louisiana struggles, he said, including maternal healthcare and chronic disease.
Louisiana was the first state to submit its revamped plan to the NTIA, which has not yet approved it, Iyenger said.
States' plans were due to the NTIA in early September. Last week, the NTIA announced that 36 of the 56 states and territories had submitted their final proposals. Others requested extensions.
"In the plans submitted today, states are already projecting savings of at least $13 billion for American taxpayers," the NTIA said in a press release, "driven by a rise in participation by the private sector, increased matching commitments by subgrantees, and a surge of innovative technology solutions to deliver high-speed connectivity."
Some analysts have pointed to signs that the Trump administration could favor returning excess funding to the U.S. Treasury.
"Since the beginning of the Trump Administration, the Commerce Department has sent numerous signals that the states will have to return all funds not spent on connecting unserved and underserved locations," Blair Levin, an analyst for New Street Research, wrote this week, according to an Ars Technica report.
But it's likely states would push back on such a stance. Iyengar said Friday that he expects other governors to follow Landry's lead, making their own formal or informal requests.
In his letter, Landry asks Lutnick to issue guidance on the use of the remaining funds by Oct. 1.
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