Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., intends to make his focus in the current Congress a legislative package aimed at protecting children online, including setting the age threshold for being on social media at 16. years.
In an interview with NBC News, Hawley detailed some main lines of what his schedule will include, such as:
- Force social media companies to verify the age of their users.
- Give parents the right to demand that tech companies delete their children’s data.
- Commission a comprehensive mental health study from Congress on the impact social media has on children.
«For me, it’s about protecting the children, protecting their mental health, protecting their safety,» Hawley said. «There is ample evidence that big tech companies put profits before protecting children online.»
Since his election to the Senate in 2018, Hawley has made scrutiny of the tech industry’s core his political trademark and has pushed to divide the tech giants and reduce the reach of TikTok.
Those efforts were hampered after Hawley sparked bipartisan outrage over his infamous photo before the Jan. 6 riots and his formal objection to the state election results. But since then, nonetheless, he has advanced legislation with the Democrats on technology and China. His efforts have also often run counter to more traditional conservative economic theory, but have gained ground among segments of the right dismayed by the industry’s broad influence and perceived anti-conservative bias.
Hawley surmised that for the past decade, tech companies have run «a giant social experiment involving our kids, where big tech makes loads of money, collects loads of data, which they then sell and make even more money.» .
«And children get hurt in the process,» he added. «So the overall goal of this agenda is: let’s do something real and tangible, that protects kids online and puts power back in the hands of parents.»
Hawley will publish individual pieces of legislation in the coming months and expressed hope that his effort could attract bipartisan interest in a divided Congress.
“I’ve had a lot of conversations with Democrats across the aisle and over the years about this issue in general and about different parts of it,” Hawley said. “I don’t see this as a partisan issue. I mean, it’s about protecting children from irresponsible and rapacious big tech companies. Every parent in America, whatever their political persuasion, or if they don’t have any, can agree to that. «
Hawley’s announcement came hours before Tuesday night’s State of the Union address, during which President Joe Biden was expected to call for greater online data privacy and a bipartisan effort to ban targeted advertising. Young. among other measures.
“We must hold social media companies accountable for the for-profit experiment they are conducting on our children,” Biden wrote in a Wall Street Journal. opinion piece from last monthadding: «There will be many policy issues we disagree on in the new Congress, but bipartisan proposals to protect our privacy and that of our children; to prevent discrimination, sexual exploitation and cyberbullying; and to addressing anti-competitive conduct should not tear us apart.»
Late last year, Biden signed legislation spearheaded by Hawley that banned the Chinese-owned social media app TikTok from most government devices. That legislative push came as the company’s ties to China are under increased scrutiny in Congress.
hawley seeks to further that effort, announcing plans late last month to introduce legislation banning TikTok across the US.
Democrats have also called for TikTok to be limited, with Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado telling the new york times this month that Apple and Google should remove TikTok from their app stores for national security reasons.
As for his upcoming legislative effort aimed at protecting children online, Hawley, a father of three young children, said: «I don’t want to do things that are just token.»
«We are looking at ways to give parents and children, where appropriate, real legal rights where they can force companies to do XYZ or go to court,» he said. «So I think giving real legal power, shifting power from tech companies to parents and children through enforceable rights, including rights to action in court, I think is a key thing here.»