What Changed

On March 25, 2026, the House Energy and Commerce Committee favorably reported H.R. 7386, the First Responder Network Authority Reauthorization Act, according to the National Fraternal Order of Police (FOP). As the FOP describes it, the bill would reauthorize FirstNet, the nationwide public safety broadband network, through 2037.

The FOP did not support the bill as written. On March 24, the day before the markup, it sent members a call to action asking for a "clean" reauthorization. After the committee vote, it said the bill "does not address officer and public safety concerns."

Status as of the markup: reported by committee, not passed by the full House. We have not verified any floor action since then. The vote count wasn't included in the materials we reviewed.

What It Says

We couldn't review the bill text directly. What follows is the FOP's account, and it should be read as one stakeholder's view.

According to the FOP, the bill would:

  • Change FirstNet's governance structure.
  • Shift decision-making away from public safety professionals.
  • Create what the FOP calls bureaucratic barriers to FirstNet's operations and delay operational decisions.
  • Leave frontline law enforcement with less input.

FOP National President Patrick Yoes said: "This is about officer safety—the safety of the men and women who protect the public." In its call to action, the FOP argued that the changes could bring back the kind of coordination failures seen before September 11, 2001, which FirstNet was created to fix.

The committee's reasons for the governance changes weren't in the sources we could review, and we won't guess at them.

Why It Matters Operationally

Radio and data networks rarely come up in casualty care discussions. They should.

Every serious casualty event runs on communications. An "officer down" call, the location update when a wounded officer moves, the request for a helicopter, the warning to the trauma center that multiple patients are coming, the rescue task force coordinating with the officer in charge: all of it depends on a network that works when everyone is trying to use it at once.

The military framework makes the point on its own terms. The Committee on TCCC's 2026 guidelines describe Tactical Evacuation Care as its own phase, now managed by a separate committee on en route care. The Joint Trauma System lists that committee's Joint En Route Care Guidelines next to its clinical practice guidelines. Handing a patient from the point of injury to transport is formal doctrine, and every handoff in it runs on communication.

Civilian agencies work under Tactical Emergency Casualty Care (TECC) and local EMS protocols, not military doctrine. But the dependence is the same. When communications fail, care is delayed.

ODM's Position

Position: Whatever form FirstNet's reauthorization finally takes, the people who use the network during emergencies should keep a real voice in how it runs. Agencies shouldn't assume any single network will always work.

Evidence: The FOP, a national organization representing rank-and-file officers, says the committee bill reduces that voice. The FOP ties FirstNet's origin to the coordination failures of September 11, 2001. Casualty care, from the first "officer down" call to the trauma center, depends on communications at every step.

Strongest counterpoint: Congress has a legitimate interest in overseeing a large national network, and governance changes can improve accountability. Our view of the bill comes from one advocacy organization, and others in public safety may read it differently. Supporting "public safety input" doesn't mean opposing every structural change.

What good looks like: A reauthorization that keeps practitioner input on operational decisions, adds oversight where it is needed, and passes before the statutory deadline the FOP says is approaching. At the agency level, it means a communications plan for casualty events that has been rehearsed and doesn't depend on one system.

What Your Agency Should Do Now

  • Build a primary, alternate, contingency and emergency (PACE) communications plan for officer-down and mass-casualty events, and test it in training.
  • Include EMS, fire and your trauma center in radio drills. A notification that never reaches the hospital didn't happen.
  • Train a short, standard casualty report that officers can give over any channel: location, number hurt, type of injury, and what they need.
  • Track the bill. Decide whether your agency or association will weigh in, and do it on the merits.
  • Ask vendors and your emergency communications center what happens to priority access during a network outage, and plan for that case.

Bottom Line

H.R. 7386 is about network governance, but its effects show up at the point of injury. A tourniquet stops the bleeding; communications get the patient to surgery. Those who make decisions about the network should hear from the people who use it, and every agency should plan and practice for the day it fails.

Sources