Jim Cicconi, AT&T’s long-time top policy exec who retired in September 2018, is back, at least temporarily, according to an internal AT&T note confirmed by a sources.
AT&T said that move was made "given the pressing legislative and regulatory agenda we face in Washington D.C. and elsewhere."
Cicconi Monday (Sept. 16) returned to AT&T Washington on an interim basis as senior executive VP or external and legislative affairs, reporting to AT&T chairman and CEO Randall Stephenson.
Cicconi joined AT&T in 2005. Before that, he served in the White House under two presidents – as deputy to the Chief of Staff for President George H. W. Bush and special assistant to President Ronald Reagan.
Cicconi's return comes as Washington is awaiting a decision on the FCC's deregulation of net neutrality rules, which will almost certainly spur a new call for Congress to step in whichever way the decision goes. Cicconi was AT&T's point person for calling on a Hill solution to the thorny issue.
Cicconi had been replaced back in 2018 by Bob Quinn, but Quinn exited the company, and his duties assigned to General Counsel David McAtee, after AT&T made payments to Donald Trump attorney Michael Cohen for political consulting services, payments Stephenson said had been a mistake.
