The clock might be running out on conservatives to address Section 230 liability protections on big tech, which would enable "more speech, not less," according to FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr on Newsmax TV.
"Everyone needs to wake up out of the stupor," Carr told Wednesday's "Spicer & Co." "This isn't the early 2000s conservative party anymore. Really what we should be about is acting against massive concentrations of power.
"And today where that power is concentrated is in the hands of Silicon Valley, so if we stand for anything as conservatives, it should be to stand against that concentration of power where it is engaging in just such abusive censorship conduct."
Section 230 grants liability protections to major social media outlets as a platform and not a publisher, but censorship of conservatives and a bias toward Silicon Valley-funded Democrats has brought those liabilities protections under scrutiny during the Trump administration.
"We're really a watershed moment when it comes to reining in the abusive power of big tech," Carr told host Sean Spicer.
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has noted the judicial branch has a role in defining the Section 230 platform protections, because of lower court's stretching of the statue.
"And Justice Thomas has it exactly right," Carr continued. "Courts have taken a look at Section 230, a statute passed by Congress, and they've read into it immunities and protections found nowhere in the text of the statute.
"At the FCC, we can play a role in bringing the courts back to the original meaning of 230. The courts themselves could do it, as Justice Thomas laid out. And Congress can also step in either clarify or otherwise amend the rule, so there are paths forward.
"I think it's time for all of us to take action and stop just talking about reining in big tech."
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Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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