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                                       February 15, 2000
  
  
  
  SEPARATE STATEMENT OF COMMISSIONER HAROLD FURCHTGOTT-ROTH
  
  Re: Voicestream Wireless Corporation or Omnipoint Corporation, and Voicestream
  Wireless Holding Company, Cook Inlet/VS GSM II PCS, LLC or Cook Inlet/VS GSM II
  PCS, LLC, and various subsidiaries and affiliates of Omnipoint Corporation, and Cook
  Inlet/VS GSM II PCS, LLC or Cook Inlet/VS GSM III PCS, LLC Application for Consent
  to Transfer of Control and Assignment of Licenses and Authorizations, 
  
       I fully support today's decision to grant transfer of these licenses.  I write
  separately to express my continued disappointment with the agency's approach to these
  transactions.  
  
       On the positive side, much of today's Order focuses on legitimate agency concerns
  regarding the merged licensee's compliance with our existing rules and implementing our
  WTO obligations vis-…-vis foreign ownership.  These analyses are properly related to the
  license transfers at issue.  Similarly conditions based on our spectrum aggregation rules
  are appropriate if a license transfer would result in a violation of those standards. 
  Nonetheless, to the extent the order purports to engage in a "market analysis," such
  concerns are outside the scope of our public interest authority and duplicative of the work
  of other agencies.  As I have stressed repeatedly, our goal should be a license transfer
  process that is efficient, transparent, predictable, and consistent.         
  
       I am also concerned about one other aspect of today's decision:  the hijacking of
  our license transfer authority by other government agencies.   More specifically, the FBI
  and Justice Department continue to use our licensing process to extract concessions from
  licensees in exchange for this agency's approval of the transfer.   The DOJ and FBI once
  again filed their FCC pleadings after the comment period had ended and then engaged in
  lengthy closed-door negotiations that further delayed the Commission's approval process. 
  The subsequent agreement once again creates a questionable FCC role in enforcement of
  these side agreements. If disputes arise between the private parties and federal law
  enforcement officials, the FCC will be cast in the unfortunate role of enforcer.    Our
  resources are most effectively deployed doing our own job, without adding Justice
  Department and FBI responsibilities.  In the final analysis, I believe our processes should
  not be modified or delayed to facilitate these other governmental parties.  I look forward
  to developing a resolution to this issue that gives other government agencies an
  opportunity to comment on our licensing decisions, without ceding our responsibility to
  provide fair and efficient consideration of these applications.  
  
       For the foregoing reasons, I would have granted today's transfer applications, but
  in a far more streamlined proceeding.