WASHINGTON D.C. — Following months of increasingly angry complaints from Republicans about social media companies’ alleged bias against conservatives, the Trump Administration is drafting an Executive Order on the subject. CNN has just published a leaked summary of the draft order, which would take the extraordinary step of directing two independent agencies, the Federal Communications Commission and Federal Trade Commission, to force social media sites to operate “neutrally.”
“Trump’s proposed executive order would transform the FCC and FTC from consumer protection agencies into regulators of online speech,” said Berin Szóka, President of TechFreedom. “Ironically, the same people screaming about ‘censorship’ by private companies would empower regulators to decide what kinds of online speech should and shouldn’t be taken down. That Republicans, after decades of fighting government meddling in broadcasting, now want their own Fairness Doctrine for the Internet is staggeringly hypocritical.”
“After denouncing President Obama for urging the FCC to adopt the strongest possible net neutrality rules, will Republicans now cheer as President Trump dictates how two independent agencies should enforce a bizarro version of net neutrality?” asked Szoka. “This order raises a host of thorny administrative law questions, and is certain to wind up in litigation. But as with the Muslim travel ban, fighting about this in court, win or lose, would at least keep the fight going, which seems to be the White House’s primary objective anyway. If they lose in court, they’ll just insist that Congress must pass Sen. Josh Hawley’s bill to effectively mandate neutrality for social media companies. With any luck, as with the idea of nationalizing 5G networks, the Administration will realize this is a door that shouldn’t be opened — and simply abandon the idea.”
Brian Fung’s CNN story quotes Szóka: “It makes no sense to involve the FCC here. They have rule-making authority, but no jurisdiction — they can’t possibly want to be involved. It would be an impossible position.”
In testimony before the House Judiciary Committee last year at a hearing on anti-conservative bias, Szóka explained in detail the parallels between the Fairness Doctrine and proposals to amend Section 230 to require political neutrality.
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We can be reached for comment at media@techfreedom.org. See more of our work on free speech and Section 230 on our website.
In practice, this executive order would mean that whichever political party is in power could dictate what speech is allowed on the Internet. If the government doesn’t like the way a private company is moderating content, they can shut their entire website down. The administration claims it’s trying to stop private companies from silencing speech—but this plan would create terrifying new censorship powers for the government to do just that. And the White House isn’t alone in promoting this misguided idea, some top Democrats have also called for weakening CDA 230.
The draft order has already been resoundingly condemned by First Amendment and free speech experts from across the political spectrum. Regardless of your politics, regardless of how you feel about the president, this is a terrible idea that will have the exact opposite impact of its stated purpose of protecting free speech.
