Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D- Connecticut) joins Mike to talk about how the Kids Online Safety Act aims to protect children from things like pornography, bullying and posts about eating disorders or self-harm. The bill would let parents opt their children out of certain content. He also discusses the ongoing recovery efforts from the August 18th storm.
Mike Hydeck: Smartphones and social media apps are in the crosshairs of Congress, too, especially when it comes to our kids. Studies show more and more young people are addicted. They're suffering from depression and anxiety and inability to focus in school, as we just said. Joining me now is Senator Richard Blumenthal. He's a co-sponsor of a bill, the Kids Online Safety Act. That's what it's called. Senator, welcome back to Face the Facts. We appreciate your time. After lawmakers have said that tech giants and the social media platforms just aren't doing enough, we also, this week, the CEO of Telegram, it's based in Britain, there's almost a billion users. He was charged by French authorities with complicity of transmitting things like child pornography and the illegal drug trade. Will your bill, the co-sponsor bill that you have, make it easier to sue some of these tech giants? How do you take action on something like that?
Richard Blumenthal: What this bill does, essentially, is give young people and their parents tools to disconnect from those black box algorithms that social media uses to maximize their profits. They drive that toxic content, whether it's exploitive sexual pornography or eating disorders, bullying, sometimes even self harm or suicidal thoughts, at young people, repetitively, addictively, and parents and young people have been our champions in advancing this legislation by a 91 to three vote in the United States Senate.
Mike Hydeck: So is it a lawsuit that gives us, as a parent, I'm a parent, and I have kids who use these apps. Is it a lawsuit that gives us power? Is it the ability to arrest? Like, what is it? How do we get the power?
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Richard Blumenthal: The power is the Federal Trade Commission holding companies accountable. A duty of care when they know or have reason to know that this kind of content is actually harming young people. And yes, there would be the possibility in the future, I think, of more private action, but right now, FTC enforcement and tools for parents to, in effect, disconnect. The default setting would be disconnecting from those algorithms. And we've heard again and again and again from those parents who have lost young people, their own children, and that has been the impetus, young people and parents saying, we want to take back our online life.
Mike Hydeck: So let's be a little bit more clear. I'm a parent. My daughter is on one of these apps. When I want to disconnect her from the algorithm, is there going to be a button I can push to say our data is not going to be shared within your platform? Is that how it would work?
Richard Blumenthal: In effect, it will be a button. It will be a choice that they have, but it will be their choice. And this bill is about product design. It's not about censorship. It's not about saying, 'No, you can't watch this kind of content.' It gives parents and young people the choice, and parents greater control over the choices that their kids make.
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Mike Hydeck: That was my next question. So how it would square with the, you know, the free speech, right? So let's switch topics. You were also in, we had devastating flooding here. You were in Oxford. You were in some of the other other portions of the state that had roads washed away, bridges washed away. A library was closed after massive flooding in one of our towns. Where do we go from here when it comes to getting federal help on this?
Richard Blumenthal: What I've seen is just heartbreaking. People out of their homes. Businesses underwater, literally, and displaced. And municipalities having huge costs in rebuilding roads and bridges. We want to rebuild them, not back to normal, the old normal, but we have to prepare for the new normal, which is these kinds of floods every few years, not every 100 years. So where we are is going with FEMA, house by house, business by business, in Southbury, Seymour, Oxford, Newtown, the communities that are affected, literally every day this past week, and pushing for results as quickly as possible. We need a declaration of major disaster from the President of the United States.
Mike Hydeck: And to get that, it's about record keeping, right? We were telling businesses on our air earlier this week, make sure you document things before it gets fixed. Make sure you keep track of your receipts. Is that a suggestion?
Richard Blumenthal: Thank you for spreading that word because that is indeed critical. To make the case, we need to show the total magnitude of this disaster. So if your neighbor has been wiped out and you've suffered damage, but not as much, it's still important for you to report it because everything counts when the federal government makes this decision. And so yes, we need to document, provide evidence, show proof. And reporting it is absolutely critical for homeowners and businesses to do so.
Mike Hydeck: Last question, I have about a minute. For someone who has never been in this situation before, they've been in this location. There's one guy we talked about had a business for 30 years. Now, all of a sudden, poof, it's gone because it was washed away. He's never had this problem. How long is he going to have to wait in line here? Is it going to be a year before he can get his business going? Is it going to be two, three, four?
Richard Blumenthal: We're hoping that the declaration of disaster application will go at the end of this coming week, and after that, we're going to just push and pound the President and the White House to declare a major disaster as quickly as possible. I can't promise you how quickly the money reimbursement for homeowners will be there or low interest loans for businesses, but it will be. I'm going to push a matter of weeks, not months, and we want to do it as quickly as possible.
Mike Hydeck: So when it's all said done, take the pictures and keep the receipts.
Richard Blumenthal: Exactly.
Mike Hydeck: Senator Richard Blumenthal, we appreciate your time. Thanks for joining us this morning.
