The Daily Signal - INTERVIEW | Blackburn Bill Offers Parents ‘Toolbox’ Needed ‘to Help Monitor’ What Kids See Online

Episode Date: May 16, 2023

A bipartisan bill “would give parents that toolbox that they need to help monitor what their children are seeing in the virtual space,” Sen. Marsha Blackburn says. “Kids are being exposed to things in the virtual space that we would never expose them to in the physical space, so it’s important for parents to have that toolbox, and it’s important to put the responsibility on these social mediaplatforms,” says Blackburn, R-Tenn., who on May 2 reintroduced the Kids Online Safety Act with Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.  “That is what this legislation does,” Blackburn says. “It requires these platforms to open up those algorithms and make them available not only to parents, but also to researchers, so that there can be a monitoring of the harms that children are exposed to.” The legislation was initially introduced in February 2022 and unanimously passed the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee in July, according to the Tennessee senator’s office. However, “the clock ran out before we got it off the floor,” Blackburn says. Blackburn joins today’s episode of “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss the legislation and how its requirements would be implemented. She also discusses the end of the public health measure known as Title 42, and how that will affect illegal immigration. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kids are being exposed to things in the virtual space that we would never expose them to in the physical space. And it's important to put the responsibility on these social media platforms. This is the Daily Signal podcast for Tuesday, May 16th. I'm Samantha Sherris. And that was Republican Senator Marcia Blackburn of Tennessee. Earlier this month, Senator Blackburn and Democrat Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut reintroduced the bipartisan Kids Online Safety Act. According to the senator's office, the legislation which is supported by over 30 senators, both Republicans and Democrats, requires

social media platforms to put the well-being of children first, ensuring an environment that is safe by default. Senator Blackburn joins today's episode of the Daily Signal podcast to discuss her legislation, plus the chaos at the border with the public health measure Title 42 being lifted. We'll get to my conversation with Senator Blackburn right after this. As conservatives, sometimes it feels like we're constantly on defense against bad ideas. Bad philosophy, revisionist history, junk science, and divisive politics. But here's something I've come to understand. When faced with bad ideas, it's not enough to just defend.

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Joining today's show is Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee. Senator Blackburn is a member of the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, the Finance Committee, the Judiciary Committee, and the Veterans Affairs Committee. Senator, thank you so much for joining us. I'm delighted to join you. Thank you. Of course. Now, earlier this month, you and Democrat Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut introduced the Kids Online Safety Act. Now, the Act has bipartisan support. I wanted to first have you tell us a little bit about this legislation. Yes, we reintroduced this bill, and we have 33 bipartisan co-sponsors on this legislation.

Last year, we got it out of the Commerce Committee, but the clock ran out before we got it off the floor. But this bill would give parents that toolbox they need to help monitor what their children are seeing in the virtual space. You know, kids are being exposed to things in the virtual space that we would never expose them to in the physical space. So it's important for parents to have that toolbox, and it's important to put the responsibility on these social media platforms. That is what this legislation does. It requires these platforms to open up those algorithms and make them available not only to parents, but also to researchers, so that there can be a monitoring of the harms that children are exposed to. It also would require an annual audit of what is happening with these social media platforms. Likewise, it would give parents a portal that they could report some of this harmful activity,

such as cyberbullying, attracting children to pedophiles, to drug dealers, videos and postings that encourage self-harm like suicide and bulimia. And this is what parents have said we want to see happen with social media. That is why you've got hundreds of organizations and thousands of parents and kids that are supportive of this legislation. Absolutely. You just mentioned some of the requirements of this legislation. Could you speak more to how they would be implemented and what you would expect from these social media companies? Yes. You would look at the social media companies having to implement. and once the legislation is signed and puts into law, if they do not follow these requirements,

which will be statutory requirements, then the authority to put in place the accountability, the punishment, the penalties will be with the FTC and the various states' attorneys general. And I also wanted to just briefly talk about one social media platform in particular, TikTok, that's gotten so much bipartisan pushback. There's efforts throughout the country to ban it. You know, even at the state level, Democrats and Republicans have taken action to ban the app over both privacy and national security concerns. How would this legislation be applied to TikTok and social media platforms more broadly moving forward? Well, the TikTok would be under the same guidelines. And so they would have to open those algorithms. They would have to expose the type thing that they're posting. They would be required to take this down. They would have to do an annual audit. And it is important to do that, to put that burden on the social media platforms. Now, when you have to have people saying, well, it's the pair, or some of the social media platforms say, well, it's free speech.

It's the parents' responsibility. But the parents can't get the social media platforms to respond to them. We have people that report, that moms, that we know that report cyberbullying, they never get a response. Or if they get a response, it is something closely akin to a statement that. says this does not violate our community standards. We have parents who have reported things like the TikTok choking challenge, things that cause suicide or cause death, and things that encourage bulimia and the social media platforms refuse to remove these. So that's what parents are up again. Senator, I just want to shift topics and get your thoughts on what we've been seeing at our southern border with Title 42 being lifted.

We've seen countless videos of illegal immigrants walking into the U.S. What happens now? What is happening now is that people from across the globe are working with the cartels. We know last year at the end of the year there were people from 176 different countries that came across that southern border. We know so far this year there's been about 130 different countries that have crossed that border. So you are seeing the cartels function as global businesses. They are recruiting people to come here. We know that some countries are releasing criminal offenders, felony offenders, what we would call a felony offense,

rape, murder, aggravated assault, robbery, battery. They're releasing them from their jail, and the cartels are transporting them to our southern border. We know that we have apprehended 332 people with their names on the terrorist watch list. We know that we have apprehended dozens of MS-13 gang members. We have apprehended dozens of criminal aliens. And that is in the the people that we know. Think about the ones that are in the gotaway, that we do not know who it is that is coming in, what they are bringing. We know 19,000 pounds of fentanyl have been apprehended so far this year at the southern border. 19,000 pounds. Think about the pounds of fentanyl that have come across that border that were not apprehended. Talk to any sheriff. They

will tell you that drugs fentanyl, fentanyl coming across the apprehensions that they are getting in their communities from fentanyl. It is at the top of the list. We recently had a fentanyl distribution gang in Chattanooga, Tennessee that was apprehended. Wow. That is absolutely terrifying. You brought up these immigrants that are coming over that are on the terror watch list. We just had over the weekend, Bill Malusian of Fox News reporting that in the San Diego sector, there was actually an Afghan National who was arrested, who was on the FBI's terror watch list. So it's absolutely terrifying to just know who's coming into our country. It's great news and terrifying that this arrest was made, but we are still waiting to see, you know, many of these people we might not

ever know who's actually coming into the country. Just one final question for you. President Biden was asked on Sunday how he thought things were going at the border, and he replied much better than you all expected. What's your response to the president? I don't know what video the president is watching or who is briefing him. But when you have an open border and people are illegally entering the country, and his administration continues to work overtime to find a way to make illegal, legal. That is a problem. Senator Blackburn, thank you so much for joining us. Just before we go, do you have any final thoughts, either on your legislation or Title 42 or both? Yes, you know, I would encourage all of the parents that are listening to your podcast. They can find me on

social media at Marcia Blackburn. Our website is blackburn.com. They'll be able to follow the work that we're doing with the Kids Online Safety Act. They can keep up with what we are working on. I encourage them to do so. And I encourage them to call their legislators and encourage passage of the Kids Online Safety Act. Great. Senator Blackburn, thank you so much. Thank you. Bye-bye now.

And that'll do it for today's episode. Thank you for listening to the Daily Signals interview edition. Make sure you subscribe to the Daily Signal wherever you get your podcast and help us reach even more listeners by leaving a five-star rating and review. We read and appreciate all of your feedback. Thanks again for listening. We hope you have a great Tuesday and we'll be back with you all this afternoon for our top new show. The Daily Signal podcast is brought to you by more than half a million members of the Heritage Foundation. Executive producers are Rob Louis and Kate Trinko. Producers are Virginia Allen and Samantha Asheras.

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