Members of Congress Agree Era of Self-Regulation for Tech Companies is Over
U.S. Senators Amy Klobuchar, Mark Warner, Richard Blumenthal And Chris Coons In A November 2018 Letter To Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg: “Both Elected Officials And The General Public Have Rightfully Questioned Whether Facebook Is Capable Of Regulating Its Own Conduct.” (Senator Amy Klobuchar, “Klobuchar, Warner, Coons, Blumenthal Press Facebook On Reports That They Retaliated Against Critics,” Press Release, 11/16/18)
U.S. Senator Mark Warner: “Congress Has To Step Up And Establish Much Needed Guard Rails On Social Media To Protect Our Democracy And American Consumers. The Era Of The Wild West In Social Media Is Coming To An End.” (David Ingram, “The ‘Wild West’ No Longer: House Dems Eye Silicon Valley Crackdown,” NBC News, 11/8/18)
U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal: “Tech Is Now Like Every Other Industry, In My View.” (Nicholas Confessore & Matthew Rosenberg, “Democrats’ Longtime Alliance With Silicon Valley,” The New York Times, 11/17/18)
U.S. Senator Chris Coons: “If They Don’t, If They Continue To Act As If We Couldn’t Possibly Deign To Regulate Them, They’ll Get Regulated And They’ll Be Unpleasantly Surprised With How Swiftly It May Happen.” (Nick Wadhams & Laura Litvan, “Senators Threaten To Regulate Facebook Unless It Makes Fixes,” Bloomberg, 11/16/18)
U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein: “You’ve Created These Platforms, And Now They Are Being Misused, And You Have To Be The Ones To Do Something About It. Or We Will.” (Byron Tau, Georgia Wells & Deepa Seetharaman, “Lawmakers Warn Tech Executives More Regulation May Be Coming For Social Media,” The Wall Street Journal, 11/1/17)
U.S. Senator Bob Corker: “[Facebook] And Others Need To Come Together Quickly And Figure Out How They’re Going To Deal With This Issue Or Congress Will – And The Likely The Outcome Is Not Going To Be Particularly Good.” (Nick Wadhams & Laura Litvan, “Senators Threaten To Regulate Facebook Unless It Makes Fixes,” Bloomberg, 11/16/18)
U.S. Representative David Cicilline: “It Is Long Past Time For Us To Take Action.” (“U.S. Lawmaker Says Facebook Cannot Be Trusted To Regulate Itself,” Reuters, 11/14/18)
U.S. Representative Ro Khanna: “We’ve Got To Regulate [Tech] Thoughtfully, But We Want Make Sure We’re Remaining The Innovation Leader.” (Greg Bensinger & Douglas MacMillan, “Tech Firms Should Face ‘Thoughtful’ Regulation, Lawmakers Say,” The Wall Street Journal, 11/13/18)