Today in a hearing of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution, U.S. Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) exposed how Big Tech uses its market power to squelch competition, suppress conservative voices, and even sway voters and control elections, such as when they buried the infamous Hunter Biden laptop story just days before the 2020 presidential election.
“It was their decision. They own it. And truthfully Facebook and others had a pattern of censoring long before this,” Hawley said, referring to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s claim that the company was pressured into censorship by the Biden Administration. “They have been avid participants in this censorship campaign.”
“Companies like Facebook, Meta have enormous structural power that Mark Zuckerberg has spent [. . .] billions of dollars amassing. He has worked to destroy competitors who might break that power up or challenge that power in any way. He has used that power to stifle competition. He’s using it to stifle views he doesn’t like,” Senator Hawley continued. “This is a textbook example of what happens when a monopoly that has a political agenda [. . .] uses that monopoly in order to try to control other competitors and also to try to control the information that flows to the American people.”
Senator Hawley concluded that until these companies are stripped of their power, nothing will change.
Senator Hawley has been vocal about holding Big Tech accountable. Earlier this month, he held a hearing to highlight Big Tech’s role in facilitating child exploitation on their platforms. He has also advocated for those victimized by Big Tech and harmful AI, including having their voice and images used without their consent.
Watch the full exchange here.