Like a zombie in a horror movie, “net neutrality” is back from the grave . This time, hopefully, it will meet its final defeat.

While much hand-wringing occurred when net neutrality was repealed (not to mention some concerning threats to politicians), the doomsday scenarios never materialized . The internet did not load one word at a time. Minority voices, LGBT communities, and feminists were not silenced by internet service providers. Greedy internet companies did not start to charge piecemeal prices that raised the average user’s cost of staying connected.

Nonetheless, Federal Communications Commission Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel has announced a desire to reestablish such rules, bringing us back to the same debate we just had a few years ago.

Contrary to the dire predictions, it was a net-neutrality-free internet that withstood the stress test of a sudden uptick in usage during the COVID-19 lockdowns. Unlike in Europe , where restrictions similar to net neutrality remain in place, the United States internet service providers not only kept up with higher-than-ever demand, but they also did not have to throttle services such as Netflix in the process. Investment in internet infrastructure remains high, and we continue to see innovative ways of delivering services.

But alas, some bad ideas seem never to go away. Unfortunately, it may be that net neutrality is what ultimately creates a doomsday scenario for the internet rather than preventing it. As Adam Thierer and Berin Szoka wrote in 2009 when net neutrality first became policy, “The reality is that regulation always spreads. The march of regulation can sometimes be glacial, but it is, sadly, almost inevitable: Regulatory regimes grow but almost never contract.”

The return of net neutrality brings with it a wide array of concerning government interventions that are less than favorable to both the consumer and innovation, including a de facto form of rate regulation. But it should also be of concern that this dramatic shift in the FCC’s power over the internet could give rise to the agency changing positions and seeking to classify other areas of the internet, such as search engines and social media as common carriers.

While there is no silver bullet to slay bad policy ideas such as net neutrality, the administrative law that has emerged since the last net neutrality debate provides a staunch defense should the agency try to reenact its prior regime. Not only does the FCC lack a delegation from Congress to engage in net neutrality rulemaking, but the renewed major questions doctrine also calls such an action questionable.

When he examined the issue in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, then-Judge Brett Kavanaugh called the regulations a “major rule” in his dissent. In post-West Virginia v. EPA jurisprudence, this certainly sets up the courts to strike down a reinstatement of net neutrality on administrative law grounds.

Rather than focusing on positive, forward-looking policy that could remove barriers to innovation and expand internet access, the FCC is once again poised to have a policy fight over net neutrality, a bad policy it previously vanquished. The last few years have brought positive and bipartisan action from the agency that benefited both consumers and innovation, but this shift brings with it many concerns about the potential for regulatory positioning and intervention into the internet.

Hopefully, this will prove to be a short-lived nightmare and not the start of a horror movie for the internet as we know it.