Jayapal Statement on Kids Internet and Digital Safety Act NO Vote

WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Representative Pramila Jayapal (WA-07) released the following statement after voting against the Kids Internet and Digital Safety (KIDS) Act, legislation that does not impose strong enough safeguards to protect children online. 

“I am incredibly concerned about the health and safety of children online. Congress absolutely must pass strong legislation urgently to protect our kids from the Big Tech companies that put out dangerous algorithms that prey on their vulnerabilities, but the Kids Act is not that piece of legislation. I voted no because we have a real opportunity to pass bipartisan legislation that holds these companies to not just be transparent about the harms and mitigate them, but actually to prevent them.

“This legislation completely omits the Senate-passed ‘duty of care’ provision, which requires Big Tech to actually fix their algorithms so that kids aren’t exposed to harmful content. The bill also leaves out suicide, depression, addiction, substance abuse disorders, and eating disorders from the list of harms that these corporations must address. Leaving these provisions out is a gift to Big Tech, who will be allowed to write their own rules and police themselves. I am also concerned about a whole host of provisions that were added that do not do enough to actually address the harms of AI. We have seen time and again that these corporations cannot be trusted to put children’s safety over their own profit margins. We cannot keep exposing our kids to platforms that are either completely indifferent to their safety or a direct threat to it.

“The Senate passed a bipartisan Kids Online Safety Act with 91 bipartisan votes last session that addressed duty of care and held tech companies responsible for not causing harm to our kids in the first place. We must urgently move forward with stronger legislation to protect kids and I will continue doing everything I can to ensure that Congress does just that and addresses the flaws in this piece of legislation.”