A bipartisan group of U.S. senators including Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., and Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., have proposed a bill to ban all U.S. children under the age of 13 from using social media.
The four senators who have proposed the legislation – among them Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., and Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii – say "they believe they are representative of millions of American parents who are gravely worried that social media companies are largely unchecked in what they can serve up to their children," the Associated Press reported Thursday.
Their bill, titled "Protecting Kids on Social Media Act," calls for a minimum age of 13 for users on social media sites, and would require parental consent and age verification for users under 18.
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The four lawmakers did a joint interview with the AP on the bill, noting that they too are parents concerned about the dangers of social media for their own kids.
The piece began with Britt. The senator and mother of two young teenagers in Alabama told the outlet "Enough is enough" when it comes to social media’s concerning effects on children’s mental health.
The GOP lawmaker claimed that when she is back home, other parents are "constantly" complaining to her about how "social media was harming their kids." "The time to act is now," she told the outlet after introducing the Senate bill with the three other senators last week.
Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn, a father of two, told the outlet that though he sees many upsides to social media, he knows children who have been to dark places while using such platforms. He now sees no reason for young kids to be on social media.
The Democratic lawmaker told AP, "I just feel like we’ve reached this point where doing nothing is not an option. And increasingly, when members of Congress go home, this is one of the first or second issues that they’re hearing about from their constituents."
Schatz, another Democrat and the lead sponsor of the new bill, rebuked critics who claim that his proposed legislation would curtail free speech online. He declared, "The idea that an algorithm has some sort of First Amendment right to get into your kid’s brain is preposterous. And the idea that a 13-year-old has some First Amendment right to have an algorithm shove upsetting content down their throat is also preposterous."
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Cotton, one of the Republican Party’s most vocal conservatives, acknowledged that there is major bipartisan consensus on reigning in social media, which is evidenced in him and these other three senators coming together. He stated, "This is an issue that unites parents all across the country, no matter what their political views on other matters might be."
Other bills targeting social media have recently been pushed by bipartisan teams of senators. A bill proposed by Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., and Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., Wednesday aims to "expand child privacy protections online, prohibiting companies from collecting personal data from younger teenagers and banning targeted advertising to children and teens," according to the AP.
Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., two disparate lawmakers in terms of political views, proposed a bill to social media "platforms safer and more transparent by design" last year, and have reintroduced it to the Senate this week.
As the outlet wrote, their bill would "force the companies to give minors the option to disable addictive product features and algorithms and enable child safety settings by default."
These bills come amid bipartisan fervor on Capitol Hill to ban or seriously regulate major social media app TikTok for its ties to the Chinese government via its parent company ByteDance.
