Biden Urges Bipartisan Legislation To Reign In Big Tech Companies—As GOP Targets President In Tech Probes

Topline

President Joe Biden called on Congress to enact bipartisan legislation to reign in big tech companies on Wednesday, urging lawmakers to address concerns regarding privacy, antitrust, illegal content and social media’s affect on mental health, but the Republican-led House has other plans in the works for its probes into the tech industry—and Biden is a key target.

President Joe Biden leaves the White House on Wednesday.

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Key Facts

In an op-ed in the Wall Street JournalBiden laid out the steps he believes Congress should take to tamp down on the tech industry’s power, starting with the personal data companies collect on users including children, which he called “the most troubling of all” the “risks Big Tech poses for ordinary Americans.”

The president detailed a three-prong strategy he wants Congress to deploy: installing federal protections for data collection, preventing the largest tech companies from stifling competition, and reforming Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which shields social media companies from being held legally liable for most content posted to their sites.

The op-ed comes as House Republicans have launched a series of investigations into the Biden Administration and 2020 Biden presidential campaign’s contacts with social media companies, including whether his staff pushed Twitter to suppress tweets under its Covid-19 policy or remove tweets related to a 2020 New York Post story about his son’s laptop (claims the Biden Administration has denied).

The House established a Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government on Tuesday, which is largely seen as a response to Twitter owner Elon Musk’s release of internal company documents that detail how the company made content moderation decisions.

The House Oversight Committee on Wednesday also sent letters to former Twitter employees seeking their testimony about the company’s decision to block posts about the Hunter Biden laptop story.

Key Background

There are several areas where Republicans and Democrats have reached a middle ground on tech industry legislation. Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) both appeared on NBC’s Meet the Press earlier this month to voice support for reforms. Gallagher advocated for a legal framework that allows users to transfer their data to different platforms that adhere to their content moderation preferences. Klobuchar, meanwhile, called for changes to Section 230. Members of both parties have widely supported narrowing Section 230 in the past, including by taking away tech companies’ liability shield for child exploitation-related content—although some opponents warn those reforms could backfire by discouraging encryption. Gallagher said he was open to discussing the repeal of Section 230, but expressed concerns that it could lead to more censorship.

Tangent

Republicans are making good on months-long promises to use their new authority in the House, which fell under Republican control in the midterm election, to probe the Biden Administration’s policies on everything from Covid-19 to border control, along with his family’s business dealings . In addition to seeking testimony from Twitter executives on Wednesday, newly appointed House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen requesting what are known as “suspicious activity reports” related to Hunter Biden’s finances, claiming “the Biden Administration and Big Tech worked overtime to hide information,” Comer tweeted. Republicans have argued for years that Twitter—before Musk’s ownership—unfairly censored content, a set of claims that were bolstered by the release of documents that revealed internal debate surrounding content moderation decisions. Many of the documents, unveiled via journalist Matt Taibbi, show that Twitter took “extraordinary steps” to remove an October 2020 New York Post story that suggested Joe Biden had contact with Hunter Biden’s Ukrainian business partners when he was vice president (Biden has denied any connections to his son’s business dealings). Twitter initially prevented the story from being shared out of fears it was the product of a Russian hacking scheme. Republicans have also scrutinized Twitter’s previous policy of removing Covid-19 misinformation, which was reversed by Musk–one of several recent moves that has made the billionaire a hero on the right.