PHOENIX (Legal Newsline) — Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich has joined the attorneys general from Texas, Oklahoma and Nevada in a lawsuit against the Obama administration in an attempt to stop it from ceding U.S. government trusteeship of the Internet to an unregulated and nongovernmental international body.
Those involved in the lawsuit believe the transfer is unconstitutional, violating the First Amendment. Brnovich and the other attorneys general seek a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction blocking the federal government’s relinquishment of authority over the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).
ICANN, a nonprofit entity, provides technical coordination for the Internet’s domain name system (DNS).
“There are too many questions that remain unresolved before the U.S. government hands over stewardship of the Internet to an unaccountable group of international stakeholders,” Brnovich said. “The continued freedom of the Internet is too important for our government to allow a half-baked transfer to proceed.”
The other attorneys general in the lawsuit are Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt, Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.