Engine and Tusk Ventures have released our second “Grading the Candidates on Tech” report card, this time focusing on the candidates in some of November's tightest Senate races. We evaluated the candidates in eleven different contests based on their positions on key issues including broadband access and infrastructure, intellectual property, data security and privacy, and talent acquisition. The report card showed there were no overall leaders in the pool of 22 candidates and all but four candidates received an “incomplete” on a key issue on their respective report cards. The grades also reveal that many have failed to outline or champion any tech policies throughout their political careers, with data security and privacy receiving the most “incomplete” grades due to the lack of unbridled advocacy in supporting reforms to U.S. government surveillance laws. View the full analysis here. 

Our weekly take on some of the biggest stories in startup and tech policy. This week, we look at efforts around the upcoming election, the FTC's report on patent trolls, a lawsuit against Amazon, and Engine's travels with Rise of the Rest.

Our weekly take on some of the biggest stories in startup and tech policy. In this week's digest: stock options legislation, set-top box delay, new broadband adoption data, free rides to the polls, and the EU's copyright directive.

An Engine-championed bill that would make it easier for startup employees to exercise their stock options cleared important hurdles in Congress this week. Yesterday, the House of Representatives passed the Empowering Employees Through Stock Options Act, and a companion bill cleared the Senate Finance Committee earlier in the week. Even with partisan divisions higher than usual in this contentious election year, Democrats and Republicans came together to support EESO, passing the bill unanimously in the Senate Finance Committee and with substantial bipartisan support in the House. As we’ve written in the past, because employees exercising certain types of stock options must pay an immediate tax upon exercise (even though there is no public market on which to sell some of the newly acquired shares to pay the tax), startup employees are often unable to purchase their shares, making it difficult for startups to attract and compensate top talent. EESO allows employees to defer the tax payment on options for seven years or until the underlying shares are actually sold, providing workers with the flexibility they need to realize the value of their contributions to their companies. We are hopeful that the full Senate will consider the bill as expeditiously as possible so that it can head to the President’s desk before the end of his term.

On Wednesday, the House Ways and Means Committee voted to approve the Empowering Employees through Stock Ownership Act (H.R.5719), legislation that will make it easier for startup employees to exercise their options. Two days prior, Engine led a letter signed by over 50 startups expressing support for the bipartisan bill, which would allow employees to defer the tax liability they owe when they exercise illiquid stock options for up to seven years or until there is a liquidity event (whichever happens first). As the letter notes, the bill “will make it possible for more employees to obtain an ownership stake in the companies they help build and make it easier for startups and private companies to attract the talent necessary to grow the economy.” The bill is scheduled to face a floor vote in the House later next week, and the Senate Finance Committee is also likely to consider it before the Senate recesses next Friday. 

Never a fan of net neutrality, AT&T has upped the ante on controversial zero-rating programs, announcing a new program this week that will allow subscribers to stream video from DirectTV (a company AT&T owns) without consuming data under the company’s data caps. This means that AT&T is giving preferential treatment to its own data and putting all other video providers at a clear competitive disadvantage. While other programs like T-Mobile’s BingeOn service have tried to avoid the most egregious net neutrality violations by allowing any video service to participate in the zero-rating program without payment, AT&T’s program seems to directly implicate the Federal Communications Commission’s Open Internet Order. 

Engine is looking for startups, entrepreneurs, and the organizations that support them to sign our letter telling Congress that startups care about broadband competition. Startups, businesses, and other institutions often need significantly more internet bandwidth than consumers use at home, so they rely on what are known as “business data services” (BDS) to deliver high-speed, high-capacity connectivity. Unfortunately, the BDS market is dominated by a few broadband gatekeepers that distort the market and jack up prices for startups and other customers. But that could change soon: the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is in the process of a rulemaking that will introduce competition and lower prices in the BDS market.

For years, the startup community has been calling for reforms to our immigration system that would allow immigrant entrepreneurs to build their companies in the U.S. It’s a no brainer, especially in light of the fact that more than half of the current group of U.S.-based “unicorns” (startups valued at more than $1 billion) have a foreign-born founder. While reforms in Congress have stalled, the Administration is proposing a new International Entrepreneur Rule that will allow foreign entrepreneurs to live in the U.S. for up to five years to help scale their business. To be eligible, the entrepreneur must have a 15 percent or greater ownership stake in the company and play an active and central role in its operations.