WASHINGTON — Sen. Amy Klobuchar on Thursday plugged her bill in Congress aimed at helping local media get more compensation from the likes of Facebook and Google by collaborating under an exemption from antitrust regulation — fittingly at the Business of TV News event here.

The Minnesota Democrat, who chairs the Judiciary Subcommittee on Competition Policy, Antitrust, and Consumer Rights, co-sponsored (with Republican Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana) the Journalism, Competition and Preservation Act. That bill, which she said cleared the Judiciary Committee by a 14-7 bipartisan vote, helps address the challenges faced by news organizations that have seen revenue decline while Big Tech thrives.

Read More: Coverage From the Business of TV News Event

“If the world was perfect, we wouldn't be here talking about this at all, because the antitrust laws would've been already enforced against these platforms,” Klobuchar said in a keynote opening the conference. “But because we’re not in a perfect world, as has happened in the past with farm co-ops and the like, you get exemptions from the antitrust law to be able to actually take on what is a monopoly and even the playing field. And so that's what this [bill] does. It allows for the news organizations to band together to negotiate for better rates.”

Klobuchar spoke about her father, Jim Klobuchar, who was for decades a reporter and columnist for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. “He interviewed everyone from Mike Ditka to Ronald Reagan to Ginger Rogers,” she said. 

“He once wrote a book called The Heroes Among Us about ordinary people doing extraordinary things. And he would capture that in everything he did,” Klobuchar said. “And that's what journalists do. They find the thread that brings people together from different walks of life. They open our eyes to the bad and the good. And we need that more than ever. Right now, we know that these outlets are struggling, and I don't think it's because of a lack of talent or passion for the work.”

The senator noted that local newspapers have closed all across the country — “eight more in the last month,” she said. “And that's where you see decaying democracy. That's where you see that no one really is covering what the city council is doing or why a business closed. … And that scares me for the band that binds us as communities. It also scares me for our democracy.” 

TV news has not been immune from economic pressures. From 2000 to 2018, ad revenue for local TV stations declined by over 40% in real terms, Klobuchar said. “Meanwhile, two companies, Facebook and Google, worth over $3 trillion combined, became advertising titans.” Google reported more than $61 billion in quarterly advertising revenue, up 13% from the same period the prior year, she said. 

“And we all know this is how people are getting their news, but how are they doing it while they're sucking up ad dollars, while taking actual news stories from credible reporters and feeding them to their users and refusing to offer fair compensation?“ Klobuchar asked. “And as new digital technologies allow consumers to access even more news content on connected devices like smart TVs and smart speakers, the problem will only get worse. While the rise of digital platforms has sometimes been a larger audience, we know that for certain news outlets that hasn't translated to increased revenue.”

In Australia and Canada, government efforts have helped local media get more compensation from Big Tech, she said. “We’re hopeful we are going to find a way to forward this bill,” she said, in spite of lobbying against it and the overall difficulties of getting laws passed these days.

The Senate Judiciary Committee has favorably reported the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (S. 673) to the Senate for a vote, potentially paving the way for broadcasters, newspapers and other journalism creators to share in the revenue their original news content generates for Big Tech platforms.

That came at a business session Thursday (Sept. 22).

The bill, which creates a limited antitrust exemption to allow publishers to collectively negotiate with the largest platforms such as Google or Meta (Facebook), has been modified to clarify that it is about fair compensation for news creators, not what content should or should not be on those platforms.

The measure also provides for outside arbitration if deals can’t be struck.

There is plenty of bipartisan support for the bill, which was able to bring together Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), who forced the issue on clarifying the bill was not about content, but compensation.

Klobuchar, who worked with Cruz and the bill's lead Republican, Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), said the bill was never intended to be about negotiating for payment, not for content type. Cruz, though, had been concerned that the bill would allow Google or Facebook to include which type of content they would have on their platforms. Cruz and other Republicans have long argued that Big Tech uses its power to favor liberal content while censoring conservative voices.

She said the bill as approved Thursday (Sept. 22) now makes it clear that “discussions about content are outside of the scope of the bill, and of the bill's narrow antitrust safe harbor.”

“This bill bars Big Tech firms from throttling, filtering, suppressing or curating online content while providing local news outlets with a fair playing field to negotiate against these censorship giants,” Kennedy said.

But not all the senators were praising the final result.

Also: DOJ’s Jonathan Kanter Says Big Tech Needs Antitrust Mole Whacking

Sen. Alex Padilla, a Democrat from Silicon Valley's home state of California, had a number of issues. Top among them, or at least the first he raised before the vote, was that the money secured by broadcasters and other original content creators might not go to the workers, but instead to stock buybacks and executive salaries.

The bill was adjusted to toughen the reporting requirements, which he had asked for, but he said those were still only reporting obligations. Then there was the issue of content. He said the bill was still about content, since its prohibition on Big Tech platforms taking content into consideration in negotiations meant they could be subsidizing disinformation and hate speech on outlets with which they fundamentally disagree. He also argued that the bill would compel payments for “foundational” features of the internet, such as aggregating, crawling or indexing.
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) also had plenty of discouraging words. He said the fundamental flaw in the bill was that it was trying to boost competition by sanctioning the creation of cartels, cartels that antitrust laws “go out of their way to prohibit.” In protesting the bill, computer companies repeatedly called it a cartel creator.

Also: Big Tech Says Media Antitrust Exemption Would Create News Cartels

Lee also said that if the goal was to get new content creators out of the big shadow of Big Tech, it instead tied them financially to the “monopoly rents” of those platforms.

Those concerns notwithstanding, the majority of committee members, Democrats and Republicans, backed the bill and it is headed to the Senate for a vote. ▪️

The Senate Antitrust Subcommittee has scheduled a hearing next week titled “Breaking the News — Journalism, Competition and the Effects of Market Power on a Free Press.”

The February 2 hearing is likely to include some focus on a proposed Senate bill, the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA), which would grant publishers immunity from federal and state antitrust laws for a 48-month period while they bargain collectively with digital platforms.

Media outlets argue that Big Tech has been using their content without sufficiently compensating them for their investment in original, independent journalism, and sought the antitrust carveout to be able to present a more united negotiating front.

Also: GOP Backs Big Tech-Targeted News Media Antitrust Exemption

Sens. John Kennedy (R-La.) and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) — Klobuchar is chairwoman of the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee and a lead sponsor of the bill — are political opposites in the chamber  They have said the JCPA would simply give “news content creators“ — print, broadcast or digital — an antitrust a safe harbor to negotiate collectively with digital platforms like Facebook and Google for carriage of their original content.

Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.), the House antitrust subcommittee chairman who has backed a House version of the bill, has argued that if the balance of power remains as it is, Big Tech’s dominance of digital advertising could be an “extinction-level event” for local media.

Similar bills have tried, and failed, to provide a safe harbor, but the new pandemic-driven normal, with edge providers seen increasingly as gatekeepers rather than as tenders of the virtuous internet garden, could improve the bill’s prospects.

News content creators are defined as outlets with a dedicated professional editorial staff that create and distribute original news and related content concerning local, national or international matters of public interest on at least a weekly basis, and are marketed via subscriptions, advertising or sponsorship. They include operations that provide original news and related content, at least 25% of which is current news and related content, or broadcast original news and related content via an FCC license.

As introduced, the bill would apply to content distributors with at least 1 billion active users per month on all their websites worldwide, so the bill is clearly aimed at the biggest platforms. ■ 

The Senate has weighed into what was described as an “overgrown standing army” of Big Tech monopolists, with Senate Antitrust Subcommittee chair Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) saying to the army of lobbyists that would try to take down a tough new antitrust law under consideration: “Bring it on.”

The bill, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act, is aimed at preventing big online platforms like Apple, Google, Amazon and others from self-favoring conduct that leverages their dominance in search and apps and online commerce to suppress competition. A House version of the bill was also introduced in June, but the Senate version has a number of changes that would have to be reconciled.

Those new parts of the bill include clarifying that some types of “privacy-enhancing conduct” would be permitted, making sure that powerful platforms not publicly traded do not escape the bill’s coverage, and that subscription services like Amazon Prime Video and other streamers were not impacted.

The bill also now requires guidelines to be issued to the business community within nine months and a one-year period for covered platforms to come into compliance.

Klobuchar, a lead sponsor of the bill, said that helped the measure strike the right balance, but the hearing featured much striking out at provisions of the law from both sides.

While the bill did eventually pass out of committee Thursday, there is no guarantee it can achieve the necessary votes in the full Senate. 

While attacking Big Tech is one of the few issues that unites Democrats and Republicans, the bill being marked up by the Senate Judiciary Committee was hardly a bipartisan beatdown of the Big Tech pinata. In fact, it appeared to divide not only Democrat from Republican, but Democrat from Democrat.

There was disagreement on the content of the bill, the consequences — or unintended consequences — of the bill, and the process that got it to markup on Thursday (January 20).

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), ranking member of the antitrust panel, made it clear the bill was not, in its current form, the way to go. He said he could not support it, and he was not alone.

Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) said he still had issues that needed to be resolved before he could vote for it on the Senate floor.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) had big problems with the bill's focus on regulating the behavior of the biggest big tech companies — Apple, Google, Facebook and Amazon — while allowing others to engage in the same conduct. She said it could be a “very dangerous” law that could tip the balance of power toward big foreign firms not covered by the bill.

Feinstein said the bill had major security problems because it required companies to take down protections, a complaint lodged by some Republicans. She said she would oppose the bill and said it should have gotten a full committee hearing.

Lee also said one of his issues was there had been no legislative hearing on the bill. He conceded that it had been “mentioned” on occasion in other Big Tech antitrust hearings, but that did not equate with a legislative hearing on the bill itself.

The hearing featured a testy exchange between Feinstein and Klobuchar, with Klobuchar saying one claim Feinstein made about administration concerns with the bill was “not true.”

Lee asked how much pro-competitive behavior could get caught in the bill and end up with the unintended consequence of removal of popular products and services that helped consumers.

The bill potentially fines violators 15% of a company's total revenue, which Lee said would just line government coffers. He said the penalties were not tied to actual harms, and could just push online platforms to stop working with third parties.

Lee also said he was concerned about giving federal agencies sweeping new power to redefine markets. He said that’s something that has never worked and he didn’t see why it would now.

He raised another hot-button issue. He said deep state bureaucrats should not be given control over Big Tech, and said the bill should address Big Tech censorship, rather than giving the keys over to the Federal Trade Commission to control those companies then use it against Republicans.

Klobuchar said she was shocked by some of the things Lee said and that the hearing — in December — where the bill was raised was hardly perfunctory and the Republicans' own witness supported the bill. Klobuchar said there have been four separate hearings related to the issues the bill addresses.

The American Edge Project has taken out ads on Washington media outlets opposing the bill and claiming it could hurt America's tech edge globally. Klobuchar conceded at the hearing that the bill's supporters did not have the money to take out TV ads showing their support, but were behind it nonetheless.

The bill did unite strange political bedfellows Klobuchar and conservative Josh Hawley (R-Mo.). Hawley said the bill goes “right at competitive conduct." Hawley is one of the biggest Big Tech critics. He disagreed with Lee that the bill could, ironically, strengthen Big Tech, though he agreed with the Big Tech/Big Government alliance and about censoring speech.

Klobuchar warned that there would be attempts to delay the bill with a raft of amendments. Lee took issue with that, saying his amendments were an effort to make the bill better, not kill it.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said the bill was an overreach and needed more work, but said he would not call for a vote on the 40-plus amendments he had filed. His issues included who was covered, what it meant by making “preferencing” illegal and what the consequences of illegal “preferencing” would be. Another 40-some amendments were also withdrawn, but Klobuchar said she would stay there day and night to finish the markup.

Small Hopes for Compromise

While the bill made it out of committee, it was tough to see how there could be a meeting of the minds on exactly the way forward, particularly with the concerns addressed by many Democrats. Some of those Democrats said they could not vote for the bill in committee, others said they would vote for it, but could not vote for it in the full Senate without changes.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) backed an amendment to allow for individuals to sue Big Tech over violations of the new law, pointing out that support was a reversal from the norm, where Democrats push for private rights of action and Republicans oppose, including himself. But Cruz said Big Tech's conduct was so egregious he was ready to “unleash the trial lawyers.”

Some Democrats argued that the bill unfairly targeted conduct by larger players, but Cruz said that the bill was targeted to the large companies because “they were the monopolists.”

He ultimately withdrew all his amendments, saying he looked forward to working on the issue and would vote for the bill out of committee, but reserved judgment on a full-Senate vote.

Cruz used some of his time on bill discussion to agree with Lee that censorship of conservative speech by Big Tech is “pervasive, pernicious and brazen.” Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) added that he saw Big Tech as a “killing field” for the truth. 

“This bill endangers U.S. digital leadership, and puts consumers’ security and privacy at risk," said Matt Schruers, president of the Computer and Communications Industry Association after the 15-6 vote to report the bill to the full Senate. "Rather than drafting general rules to protect consumers’ welfare, the bill regulates the business models of a handful of companies.  This bill is European-style industrial policy, not competition policy.”

Consumer Reports, which got a shout-out during the hearing over its support of the bill, was understandably pleased it made it out of committee.

“The bill will stop the largest online platforms from imposing their self-serving rules on markets and society," said Sumit Sharma, senior researcher for tech competition at Consumer Reports. "The bill will benefit consumers by making it easier to install, choose, and use alternative apps and online services. It will remove the roadblocks that the largest online platforms have put up to hinder innovation by competitors. We will see more innovation as a result of the bill, which will create more choices for consumers.”■

The Connected Commerce Council (3C), which represents thousands of small businesses with a digital footprint — from juice bars and breweries to consignment shops and tattoo parlors — is pushing back on a Big Tech bill being marked up in the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday (January 13).

“Millions of small businesses across the country have embraced digital tools and services provided by American technology companies and say they plan to continue using these tools and services that helped them get through the pandemic," said 3C executive director Rob Retzlaff. “Beltway insiders like Senators [Amy] Klobuchar and [Chuck] Grassley aren’t paying enough attention and seem to not understand how these companies provide affordable, scalable, and secure benefits that small businesses like to use to find success.”

The bill, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act, was introduced back in October by Klobuchar (D-Minn.), chair of the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee and a self-described leading antitrust reformer, and Grassley (R-Iowa), the ranking member. It‘s one of many proposed bills to rein in Big Tech, and not the only one backed by Klobuchar.

The bill prevents an online platform from: 1) preventing a business from interoperating with another platform; 2) requiring a business to buy a dominant platform‘s wares to get preferred placement; 3) “misusing” a business‘s data to compete against it; and 4) from biasing search in their favor.

The bill only applies to larger platforms — like Amazon and Google — defined as “at least 50,000,000 U.S.-based monthly active users on the online platform; or has at least 100,000 U.S.-based monthly active business users on the online platform; or is a critical trading partner, defined as a person with the ability to impede access of a business user to its customers and users or to a tool or service it needs to serve those users or customers.” ■

The Senate Judiciary Committee has moved its scheduled markup of a tough new online antitrust bill from Thursday (Jan. 13) to Jan. 27.

The bill, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act, was introduced back in October by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), chair of the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee and a self-described leading antitrust reformer, and Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), the ranking member. It‘s one of many proposed bills to rein in Big Tech, and not the only one backed by Klobuchar.

Also: CCIA Study Asserts Edge Regs Could Be $300 Billion Economic Hit

The American Innovation and Choice Online Act would do the following:

CCIA members include Amazon and Google, both of which are clearly in the bill‘s sights. 

“Gerrymandering regulations around a handful of leading businesses will skew competition and leave consumers worse off,” he said, adding: “By hamstringing successful U.S. tech companies without even imposing corresponding obligations on foreign rivals, this shortsighted legislation will put the data and security of U.S. users at risk.”

Consumer Technology Association president Gary Shapiro has said the bill would do irreparable harm to U.S. companies, including by putting them at a disadvantage to China and other nations. “The bill allocates vast new powers to the FTC, allowing the commission to ignore the consumer-welfare standard, while imposing massive fines with minimal due process,” Shapiro said.

The bill allows civil penalties of up to 15% of U.S. revenue for the duration of the violation and authorizes a court to penalize a CEO or corporate officer an amount equal to their compensation for the 12 months preceding or following a complaint. ■

A new bill, the Reforming Broadband Connectivity Act, is asking the Federal Communications Commission to look beyond the customers of declining landline phone service for the subsidies it will need to power universal broadband.

Currently, the FCC‘s Universal Service Fund support for broadband in rural and lower-income areas is primarily subsidized by fees on traditional landline service, in part because it was unclear whether the regulator had the authority to such fees on broadband providers.

Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), co-chair of the Senate Broadband Caucus, and John Thune (R-S.D.) have teamed up on a bill that charges the FCC with opening a rulemaking to “reform the contributions system, taking into account the fairness and the relative burden any changes in fees will have on consumers and businesses, as well as the impact the proposed changes to the contribution system will have on seniors.”

Also: FCC Tops $2 Billion in Emergency Broadband Funds for Schools, Libraries

USF fees are passed along to customers on their monthly bills.

“In 2021, we should be able to bring high-speed internet to every family in America — regardless of their zip code,” Klobuchar said in a statement. “This bill will help ensure we have the resources to keep the Universal Service Fund strong so we can continue to expand access to broadband."

Added Thune: “It is crucial that rural communities across South Dakota have access to reliable broadband services.” 

The senators pointed out that relying on landline subsidies for USF, which supports rural health care, service to low-income households and school and library broadband access, even as landline use declines in favor of wireless and VoIP, "places a disproportionate impact on seniors, who are significantly more likely to use a landline than younger adults."

The Biden administration is hardly relying on the USF alone to close the divide. In fact, it has been arguing that the $65 billion it has allocated for broadband buildout and adoption in the new infrastructure package that passed in Congress — plus earlier, COVID-19-related, emergency broadband funding — should be enough to get the job done, though it was unclear whether that presumed continued stable USF funding.

Acting Federal Communications Commission chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel has pledged to re-examine the marketplace for video programming and take “appropriate action.”

She made that promise during her nomination hearing in the Senate Commerce Committee Wednesday (Nov. 17).

During her questioning, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) said that from her work at the Judiciary Committee (she chairs the antitrust subcommittee), she had heard concerns from independent programming networks “regarding the negotiating tactics of some of the video distributors.” Independents have long complained that they lack the leverage to get crucial carriage on large distributors.

The senator asked if Rosenworcel would work with Klobuchar and her colleagues “to re-examine these practices and take appropriate action to protect the public interest.”

Rosenworcel said that if confirmed, she would do so.

Rosneworcel has long been concerned about program-access issues. Back in 2015, when the FCC sought input on that issue, she said: “Time and again we hear that independent programmers face a daunting challenge securing ‘real estate’ on cable and satellite systems. These systems still dominate our video experiences — and securing carriage can be a prerequisite to build the viewership that supports investment in more diverse content.”

If she is confirmed, designated chairman and gets the necessary Democratic majority, Rosenworcel will have both the tools and the impetus to follow through on that re-examination. ■

In the eyes of Congressional lawmakers, Roku's dominant position in connected TV and its $43 billion market capitalization don't qualify the Silicon Valley company as a "dominant digital platform" and a "gatekeeper."

But as it engages in an escalating battle with Google, being the little guy is probably just fine right now with Roku, which found Congressional support Thursday in its fight with a far mightier tech adversary (market cap over $1.8 trillion).

Also read: Google Says Its Big YouTube App Could Be Removed From the Roku Channel Store on Dec. 9

"Roku’s claim that Google requires the company to preference YouTube content over that of other providers in Roku’s search results highlights why we need new laws to prevent dominant digital platforms from abusing their power as gatekeepers," wrote Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., in a statement published Thursday. 

Klobuchar used the issue to promote bipartisan legislation she introduced along with Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-IA, aimed at curtailing the "anticompetitive conduct" of Big Tech, American Innovation and Choice Online Act.

Meanwhile, over in the House of Representatives, Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I., took to Twitter to also tie the Roku-v.-Google issue to his support for the same legislation, which he authored. 

"This is the exact type of shakedown that my bill, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act, would stop," Cicilline tweeted. "We cannot allow Big Tech to continue to throw its weight around, bully other businesses, and harm consumers. This must end. #ReinInBigTech."

The skirmish between Roku and Google first emerged in April, when an agreement to support virtual pay TV app YouTube TV expired, and the app was taken out of the Roku Channel Store. The fight escalated Thursday, when Google indicated that its support deal with Roku for the flagship YouTube app was also set to expire on Dec. 9. 

If Roku and Google can't reach an agreement by that date, a connected TV app that garners as much use as Netflix will no longer be able for downloaded on a connected TV platform that serves more than 55 million active users. (Google did say that Roku users who already have the YouTube app downloaded will continue to be able to use it.)

So what's the fight all about?

In a blog posting published Thursday, Roku accused Google of continuing "to interfere with Roku’s independent search results, requiring that we preference YouTube over other content providers."

In its own post, Google responded, "To be clear, we have never, as they have alleged, made any requests to access user data or interfere with search results. This claim is baseless and false.”

However, an 2019 email, said to be from Google executives to their Roku counterparts, and intercepted and published Friday by CNBC, seems to refute that defense: “YouTube Position: A dedicated shelf for YT search results is a must," the email reads. 

A Google spokesperson responded that Roku is able to rank YouTube search results "as they wish."

Google has been more cagey about its position. However, an earlier report by tech publication Protocol suggested the fight was centered more around hardware. 

Google, the pub said, wants to migrate the streaming hardware ecosystem to support the AV1 video codec, which would ease YouTube's transition into a 4K world. Roku, which has built its market share by enticing smart TV OEM partners with low computer horsepower requirements to run its operating system, wants to keep the current hardware paradigm in place. 

As advertised last week, Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), joined by a bipartisan chorus of others, including Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), have introduced a bill that would crack down on Big Tech.

The tech industry immediately fired back against the bill.

The American Innovation and Choice Online Act prevents an online platform 1) from keeping another business form interoperating with a dominant platform of other business; 2) from requiring a business to buy a dominant platform's wares to get preferred placement; 3) from "misusing" a business's data to compete against it; and 4) from biasing search in their favor.

The bill only applies to larger platforms, defined as "at least 50,000,000 U.S.-based monthly active users on the online platform; or has at least 100,000 U.S.-based monthly active business users on the online platform; or is a critical trading partner, defined as a person with the ability to impede access of a business user to its customers and users or to a tool or service it needs to serve those users or customers."

Also Read: Big Tech Says Texas Social Media Law Is a Big Mistake

Bill co-sponsors include Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Mark Warner (D-Va.), Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), and Steve Daines (R-Mont.).

Consumer Technology Association president Gary Shapiro said the bill would do irreparable harm to U.S. companies, including by putting them at a disadvantage to China and other nations. "The bill allocates vast new powers to the FTC, allowing the commission to ignore the consumer welfare standard, while imposing massive fines with minimal due process," he said.

The bill allows civil penalties for violations of up to 15% of U.S. revenue for the duration of the violation and authorizes a court to penalize a CEO or corporate officer an amount equal to their compensation for the 12 months preceding or following a complaint.

But Shapiro was not through. “Further, the bill will take away features and functions that millions of Americans love and use in their everyday lives," he said. "Say goodbye to Amazon Prime free shipping, Google maps in search results, preinstalled iPhone apps and many more."

“The Senate proposal, like its House companion, requires nondiscrimination between products, services, or lines of businesses offered by only a handful of online services that would have the unintended consequences of disrupting Americans’ use of integrated tech services they like, and weakening U.S. competitiveness," said Computer & Communications Industry Association VP Arthur Sidney.

Under a proposed new law, if the algorithm of a Twitter or Facebook promotes vaccine misinformation and disinformation on their sites, edge providers will be considered publishers of that content, and thus liable for it.

With vaccine/COVID-19 misinformation a hot topic in D.C. and at the White House, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) has introduced a bill, the Health Misinformation Act of 2021, that would remove Section 230 civil civil liability protection for third-party content from edge providers whose algorithms promote that misinformation.

“For far too long, online platforms have not done enough to protect the health of Americans,” said Klobuchar in a statement. “These are some of the biggest, richest companies in the world and they must do more to prevent the spread of deadly vaccine misinformation. Earlier this year, I called on Facebook and Twitter to remove accounts that are responsible for producing the majority of misinformation about the coronavirus, but we need a long term solution. This legislation will hold online platforms accountable for the spread of health-related misinformation. The coronavirus pandemic has shown us how lethal misinformation can be and it is our responsibility to take action.”

What will constitute health misinformation subject to the law. The Secretary of Health & Human Services, "in consultation with the heads of other 18 relevant Federal agencies and outside experts determined 19 appropriate by the Secretary, will get to make that call.

Also Read: Facebook to D.C. on Sec. 230: Regulate Us, Please

Although he has since said he was talking about the misinformers, not the messenger, President Biden said vaccine misinformation on Facebook is killing people.

Facebook called the comments unsupported accusations that are a distraction from its effort to save lives.

The White House has been in talks with media outlets and Big Tech players over the vaccine misinformation issue as the Delta variant pushes COVID-19 infection numbers up, while vaccine rates have gone down.

The bipartisan leadership of the Senate Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee have written Apple CEO Tim Cook telling him the company needs to send a witness to its upcoming hearing on mobile app competition and app stores.

In their letter, Chairwoman Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and ranking member Mike Lee (R-Utah) said that the company has known for weeks that the subcommittee was planning an April hearing--it has yet to be scheduled--and was even in discussions about who it would send when "a little more than two weeks [16 days] before the planned hearing, Apple abruptly declared that it would not provide any witness," they said.

Also Read: Apple Privacy Labels Draw Hill Flak

Given that the company has been willing to discuss the issue in other forums, they said its refusal to do so in their hearing was "unacceptable," elaborating on just how many times Apple has been willing to weigh in. 

"Earlier this year, Apple provided witnesses to testify before the North Dakota Senate and the Arizona House of Representatives to oppose state bills that would regulate the very same conduct that the Subcommittee intends to explore," they wrote. "You testified before the House Antitrust Subcommittee regarding these same issues last year. And on the exact day Apple informed the Subcommittee that it would not provide a witness for an April hearing, the New York Times released a podcast interview in which you discuss competition issues relating to Apple’s App Store, including Apple’s pending litigation with Epic Games."

Also Read: D.C. Ticked Off at Big Tech Big Time

They urged Cook to reverse course and send someone.

The political climate might finally be ripe for giving news publishers more clout in negotiations with the Big Tech platforms that draw eyeballs and ad dollars by aggregating the original work of others, including cable and broadcast news operations. Proponents say the alternative could be the death of independent local journalism. That’s hyperbole, perhaps, but maybe now with a louder ring of truth.

Several factors are at work to give the latest shot at collective bargaining a chance. The COVID-19 pandemic has put an even greater emphasis on access to the latest news on everything from vaccine availability to what is opened or closed to what is safe to do. 

Then there is the flood of fake news, particularly online, that has put a premium on trusted news sources, the kinds that take money to invest in reporters and editors and bureaus and fact-checkers. 

Add in the fact that the Big Tech platforms like Google and Facebook — the 800-pound gorillas with whom news outlets must negotiate — aren’t high on Capitol Hill’s holiday card list, over concerns ranging from data breaches and promoting extremism to election ads and antitrust issues, and a bipartisan push for collective news bargaining could have legs after several years of trying.

Seeking a ‘Fair Chance’

David Chavern, president of the News Media Alliance, representing more than 2,000 publishers, said the campaign represented by the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act is really only a “fair chance” for the news media to fight for themselves. “Today, local journalism is under threat because the dominant digital platforms control access to audiences and refuse to fairly value what we provide,” Chavern has said in pushing for the legislation.

He has willing listeners on both sides of the aisle. Sens. John Kennedy (R-La.) and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), political opposites in the chamber, said the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act would give "news content creators" — print, broadcast or digital — an antitrust safe harbor to negotiate collectively with digital platforms like Facebook and Google for carriage of their original content.

Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.), the House antitrust subcommittee chairman who is backing a similar bill, argued that if the balance of power remains as it is, Big Tech’s dominance of digital advertising could be an “extinction-level event” for local media. 

Similar bills have tried, and failed, to provide a safe harbor before, and a recent effort in Australia made headlines when Facebook pulled Australian news sources from domestic news feeds. (Facebook restored the Australian sources after legislators proposed tweaks to the law.) 

But the new pandemic-driven normal, with edge providers seen increasingly as gatekeepers rather than as tenders of the virtuous internet garden, might improve the bill’s prospects.

The bill would grant publishers immunity from federal and state antitrust laws for a 48-month period while they bargain collectively with digital platforms.

News content creators are defined as outlets with a dedicated professional editorial staff that create and distribute original news and related content concerning local, national or international matters of public interest on at least a weekly basis, and are marketed via subscriptions, advertising or sponsorship. 

They include operations that provide original news and related content, at least 25% of which is current news and related content, or broadcast original news and related content via an FCC license.

The online content distributors that publishers would collectively negotiate with must have at least 1 billion active users per month on all their websites worldwide, so the bill is clearly aimed at the biggest platforms.

Seeking a Safe Harbor

Publishers under the News Media Alliance banner have for years been trying to get Congress to give news publishers a limited safe antitrust harbor so they can get tech platforms — Facebook and Google most notably — to pay for use of their content. That’s because the tech platforms “take most of the advertising revenue sold against that content,” the NMA contends, adding that “[a]dvertising revenue that previously went to the news publishers and allowed them to reinvest in quality journalism is now going to the platforms.” 

The bill says the joint negotiation is only allowed so long as negotiations are: not limited to price (no price fixing); are nondiscriminatory as to similarly situated news content creators; are directly related to the quality, accuracy, attribution or branding, and interoperability of news; and involve terms available to all news content creators.

The coordination among bidders has to be directly related to and reasonably necessary for negotiations with an online content distributor and cannot involve any person that is not a news content creator or online content distributor.

“We must enable news organizations to negotiate on a level playing field with the big tech companies if we want to preserve a strong and independent press," Klobuchar said of the bill. "This bipartisan legislation will improve the quality of reporting and ensure that journalists are able to continue their critical work. Our media outlets need a fighting chance when negotiating for fair treatment by the digital platforms where so many Americans consume their news.” 

Some congressional Republicans are warning about helping one powerful constituency against another. They suggested that The New York Times, for example, is plenty powerful on its own without letting it team up with other publishers, digital and otherwise. Broadcasters, though, argue that the power is squarely in the hands of Big Tech.

Local Ad Revenues at Risk

At a recent House antitrust subcommittee hearing on “Saving a Free and Diverse Press,” Graham Media Group president Emily Barr, who chairs the National Association of Broadcasters TV board, told Congress: “The market power of the tech platforms undermines the online advertising model for local broadcast journalism in two significant ways. First, the tech platforms’ role as content gatekeepers stifles our ability to generate user traffic independent of their services. Second, anti-competitive terms of service and a ‘take it or leave it’ approach leave local broadcasters with a below-market sliver of those advertising revenues that are derived through their products.”

Barr, like Chavern, views the current imbalance as an extinction-level event. 

“If we do nothing, local, independent journalism will not thrive,” she said. “Indeed, it may not even survive.”

As advertised, House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.), joined by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), has re-introduced a bill to close the digital divide by connecting everyone to the internet at high speeds--1 Gig is the goal.

"Internet access will have the same dramatic impact on rural communities as the rural electrification efforts in the last century," Clyburn tweeted of the bill, which he previewed at the INCOMPAS virtual conference last month. "This pandemic has further widened the digital divide and exposed the urgent need to enact the Accessible, Affordable Internet for All Act," said Clyburn.

It may be affordable, but the price tag for the government will be $100 billion.

Also Read: Dems Push Billions for Distance Learning

Clyburn, who created the Rural Broadband Task Force, has said he has lined up support in the House and Senate for his bill.

“Internet for All is more than a goal, it’s a moral imperative," said Chip Pickering, CEO of INCOMPAS and himself a former member of the House. "Together our nation can and must, extend the power of faster more affordable internet access to every American family. The “Internet for All” legislation will create jobs today and make a bold investment in a better future filled with more competition, innovation and opportunity for all."

Also Read: LIFT Act Would Invest $100 Billion-Plus in Broadband

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) is introducing a new, Big Tech-targeted, antitrust bill that would block anticompetitive mergers, toughen antitrust enforcement and seek civil fines and forfeitures. 

Also Read: Klobuchar Pushes Competition Policy

Talking about the bill on CNBC Thursday (Feb. 4), Klobuchar, incoming head of the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee, said the GameStop/Reddit stock manipulation story was another example of the enormous power of Big Tech platforms and she was glad it was being looked into.

She said for too long, Big Tech has pushed against any rules of the road, saying "just trust us," but that that hasn't worked for people who have had their personal information "spit out all over the place" or for victims of misinformation. She said there also needed to be some rules of the road for privacy, which if past is prologue is much easier said than done.

She said that was why there needed to be new rules of the road for antitrust as well as privacy and that it was not good for competition if you have big companies like Google "that can control the gateways of things.

Klobuchar argued her bill was aimed at a conservative principle, which was capitalism and competition in the marketplace. She invoked Adam Smith on the "overgrown market of monopolies" and said it was time for some checking and balancing.

It won't be the first time Klobuchar has introduced legislation to get at Edge Giant market power, but a Democratic House and Senate could mean more success this time around. 

Also Read: Klobuchar Bill Provides New Antitrust Tools to Get at Edge Giants

She said antitrust has not kept up with the marketplace. 

Klobuchar concedes getting at misinformation requires a different set of rules, but that competition rules would not just apply to tech mergers. But she said what they have in common is that when you squelch competitors, and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's e-mail about nascent competitors was exhibit A, you squelch innovation.

Asked if she was looking to break up the companies or just prevent them from buying up, she said she was looking for resources so the law was not being enforced with Band-Aids and duct tape

She said she did want to punish success, but she also said bad things were happening and there needed to be remedies and resources to address that. 

Democratic Senators Amy Klobuchar (Minn.) and Patrick Leahy (Vt.) have introduced a bill, named in honor of slain journalist Jamal Khashoggi, to ensure that governments are held accountable for human rights abuses committed against journalists.

The bill is supported by Reporters Without Borders; PEN America; Project on Middle East Democracy (POMED), Freedom House and the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Also Read: WGAE Condemns Trump's Mocking Praise of Attacks on Press

While the bill would help secure justice for electronic and print journalists generally, it has a specific target--the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a resident of the United States who was working for the Washington Post when he was murdered at the direction of the Saudis due to his writings critical of the government. 

The Jamal Khashoggi Press Freedom Accountability Act would "include targeted sanctions, restrict foreign aid, and increase reporting on human rights abuses committed against journalists by foreign governments."

The Trump Administration has drawn criticism from the journalism community for not taking such steps to sanction the Saudi government and for defending the crown prince, Prince Mohammed bin Salman, even after his own CIA concluded that the prince had ordered the killing.

Also Read: President Signs Daniel Pearl Freedom of Press Act

“This legislation, named in honor of the late Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, would build upon the Daniel Pearl Freedom of the Press Act to strengthen the United States’ commitment to hold to account those who would target journalists for violence and persecution,” said bill supporter Rep. Adam Schiff. 

Pearl was the Wall Street Journal reporter who was kidnapped and murdered in 2002 while covering Islamic extremists in Pakistan. He had once covered the media beat in Washington so was well known in communications journalism circles.

The Senate Judiciary Antitrust Committee weighed into the online advertising market Tuesday (Sept. 15) with an emphasis on the 600 pound gorilla in that space and whether it has exerted its power over anticompetitively, as critics have alleged. The tenor of the hearing was telegraphed in its clever title, which posed its indictment in the form of a question: "Stacking the tech: Has Google harmed competition in online advertising?"

The answer, Committee Chairman Mike Lee (R-Utah) said, "matters."

Don Harrison, president of global partnerships and corporate development, for Google was on the hot seat, but showed up to take the punishment as one of the key witnesses.

Related: Big Tech Faces Hearing Buzz Saw

Lee worked with ranking member Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) on setting up the bipartisan hearing.

Lee said the issue is whether Google is a monopolist whose conduct in the online ad market has harmed competition and consumers. But he also said more broadly the hearing was about the larger public debate about antitrust policy. He said markets, like governments, don't keep themselves free and that liberty is only secure when power is diffused. He warned against "fetishizing" freedom to the exclusion of that security.

But on the other side of the spectrum, he argued as strongly against transforming antitrust laws into a panacea cure for labor, income and racial disparities, based on the myopic view that big is bad. He said there would be scores of unintended consequences of repurposing antitrust into a social reform tool.

Lee said he was for vigorous enforcement of antitrust laws, which serve to diffuse power.

He said that in contrast to the Democrat-controlled House's Big Tech hearings, he was not out to turn the hearing into a spectacle to attack or condescend to or talk over witnesses. He said the hearing was about the state of competition in digital markets, specifically the complicated online ad market, which has facilitated an explosion of content.

Lee said the issue was that the online ad growth and expansion was primarily on one platform, Google. He said what has also expanded are complaints that Google has conflicts of interest and has rigged online ad tech to favor its own interests and protect market share. Less said whether that was true or not matters. He said if the marketplace has been manipulated, everyone loses.

Klobuchar said they were not holding the hearing because Google was successful or because it was big. She said it was because even big and successful and innovative companies are subject to antitrust laws. "The law can't be blinded by Google's innovation and past successes if the company, in its zeal for financial success, crosses the line into anticompetitive behavior."

Klobuchar pointed out that while the pandemic has led to smaller companies closing their doors, the largest tech firms continue to thrive. "We have to start looking at whether the laws match that situation, even if the original intent of Big Tech when they were still small tech was to be innovative. At one point have you crossed the line into squelching competition," she said.

She pointed out that Google controls the services on both sides of the ad tech "stack," the publishing and advertising side, taking by some estimates up to 70% of the ad dollar for its services, "depriving publishers [news and other content producers] of that revenue."

When he had the floor, Harrison billed the company as building tools to help businesses of all sizes grow, including small firms. He said ad tech--helping with the ad buy and sell side on other websites and mobile apps--was only a small fraction of its revenue and that the majority of that was shared with publishers.

Harrison argued that the ad tech space was crowded and competitive and it competed with a host of other large companies, including Oracle, Comcast, Facebook, AT&T and Verizon.

The husband of Minnesota Senator and former presidential candidate Amy Klobuchar has tested positive for the coronavirus, the senator said Monday (March 23). 

“I have news that many Americans are facing right now: my husband John has the coronavirus," she said in an emailed statement. "We just got the test results at 7 a.m. this morning. While I cannot see him and he is of course cut off from all visitors, our daughter Abigail and I are constantly calling and texting and emailing. We love him very much and pray for his recovery. He is exhausted and sick but a very strong and resilient person." 

Klobuchar said she does not plan to get tested for the virus. 

"Since John and I have been in different places for the last two weeks and I am outside the 14-day period for getting sick, my doctor has advised me to not get a test. As everyone is aware, there are test shortages for people who need them everywhere and I don’t qualify to get one under any standard." 

A handful of legislators have tested positive, most recently Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who was getting criticism for reportedly having gone to the Senate gym and elsewhere between the time he got the test and the results, a test he said he took out of an abundance of caution.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) plans to join South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg and billionaire financier Tom Steyer in exiting the Democratic presidential race before Super Tuesday (March 3), according to various news outlets including CNN. 

But her TV ads are a gift that keeps on giving to media outlets. In a commercial break in a CNN newscast on Klobuchar's exit, there was Klobuchar talking in an ad about the kind of President she would be. 

Related: Klobuchar Proposes Aggressive Election Counter-Interference Operation

Email solicitations from the campaign were still going out midday seeking contributions to the Klobuchar candidacy, but that was also the case with the campaign of Buttigieg Sunday (March 1), even as he was dropping out. 

Klobuchar is a familiar face to media companies. The senator recently supported a bill that would re-regulate cable franchise fees, and one that would created a privacy bill of rights. She has long been a critic of media consolidation and supporter of "dig once" policies directing broadband deployments to be coordinated with road construction and improvements. 

She had also promised universal broadband access by midpoint of a Klobuchar presidency. 

Look for Klobuchar to continue to be involved in election issues, at least in pushing for her Honest Ads Act. 

The Honest Ads Act, which was proposed in the wake of that 2016 meddling and introduced two years ago in tandem with Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), ranking member of the Intelligence Committee, would create online political ad public files (Facebook has already voluntarily created one of those) and bar foreign entities from ad buys to influence elections. 

Broadcast nets planning special reports on the Iowa Caucus results got to stick with regular programming and cable outlets providing wall-to-wall coverage were having to scramble for snippets of info and vamp as Caucus organizers appeared to be having major problems with tabulating the results of the first Democratic preference poll of the presidential race. 

According to multiple nets, the Iowa Democratic Party said it was still doing quality control hours into a process where the rules of the caucus had changed and new data sets were supposed to be released for the first time. 

CNN was reporting that there appeared to be issues with a new app being used to record precinct results, as well as a backup hotline to call in the results. 

The party said it was validating inconsistencies in reporting of three sets of data and that the app had not been hacked or failed.

But while a precinct captain in Story County was on the phone talking with CNN's Wolf Blitzer about how he had been on hold for an hour trying to call in his results after the app did not work when he suddenly got through, but before he could stop talking to CNN and answer the voice on the other end, they hung up. 

Wolf Blitzer lamented to John King at about 12:20 a.m.: "We should be at the "magic wall," where King tracks the candidates' performance at ground level, "instead we got nothing."

Candidates were waiting to speak to their supporters when the results came in, then head to New Hampshire. At press time, Fox News was reporting that candidate Amy Klobuchar was going to speak anyway as the delay continued. 

She took the opportunity to thank her supporters, and said that while she does not know the results, she knows her campaign "is punching above our weight." She said she was heading overnight to New Hampshire, suggesting she was not waiting around for the final tally. 

Klobuchar's move appeared to be a good one, drawing live coverage on CNN, Fox and MSNBC, all looking for news to report out of a caucus without any other than the delay.

Fox's Juan Williams, a Democrat, called that reporting delay in this day and age "unbelievable." 

"Democracy in action in Iowa," said one WJLA-TV Washington local news anchor of the caucus in a story on the 11 p.m. news,  with 0% of precincts reporting--compared to 90% that reported at the same time four years ago--but it appeared to be more like "democracy inaction." 

At about half past the hour ET, candidate Joe Biden followed Klobuchar's lead to thank his supporters. He said the party was working to get the results straight and he would get his share of delegates, whatever that was, and in the meantime it was "on to New Hampshire."

Bernie Sanders followed suit about 15 minutes later, with Mayor Pete Buttigieg queued up behind him to get airtime. Sanders said he had a strong feeling that, eventually, the results would be announced and at that time he would do very well. He said the message that Iowa had sent the nation, which it had actually not yet sent, was that they wanted a candidate that represented all of them, not just the rich 1%.

Amidst cheerleader-like chants from wildly enthusiastic supporters, Buttigieg spoke as though there were some definitive answers out of Iowa, and that he would be the winner: "What a night," he said. "Tonight an improbable hope became an undeniable reality." He said that by the time all was said and done, Iowa will have "shocked the nation." By all indications he said would be going on to New Hampshire 'victorious." He thanked his competitors for a hard-fought race, but said Iowa had chosen "a new path."

CNN and MSNBC carrier his "victory" speech, while Fox went with pundit commentary about the delay instead. 

According to Fox and CNN, the campaign of Joe Biden, which did not look to be doing particularly well according to news reporting--rather than results reporting--wrote a letter to the Iowa Democratic Party expressing its displeasure with the delay and saying it wanted a chance to review the results when they were eventually tabulated, and before they were released.

Fox's Chris Wallace said he would take the "over" in betting on when the results would be released, speculating that the other campaigns would also want such an accounting before the results were released.

And elsewhere on the political wagering front, looking to capitalize on the delay, Predictit, which runs an online trading site for small dollar "trades" on the potential outcomes of political events, was emailing the news that Buttigieg was surging in its market, while Sanders remained in the lead among its traders.

Celebrating the Iowa Democrats' problems was Donald Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale, who tweeted:

[embed]https://twitter.com/parscale/status/1224549934575378434[/embed]

A pair of powerful Hill Dems from both side of the aisle applauded the FCC for voting Thursday (June 6) to clarify carriers' ability to block robocalls by default--before they reach the customer--but also said they would have preferred that it had also made clear those customers would not be paying for the privilege.

“Today, the FCC made an important new ruling to help protect consumers from robocalls—by allowing carriers to block robocalls, consumers will be free from annoying, unwanted, and potentially fraudulent calls," said Minnesota Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Amy Klobuchar. "While this is a promising step, we still must make sure we are protecting consumers’ choice and ensuring that the price of using these call-blocking technologies does not pass to the consumers. That’s why I’ve supported bills like the Telephone Robocall Abuse Criminal Enforcement and Deterrence (TRACED) Act, bipartisan legislation that gives regulators more time to find scammers, increases civil forfeiture penalties, and promotes call authentication and blocking adoption.”

Related: Senate Bulks Up Robocall Fining Authority

“I’m glad the FCC took action to allow more blocking of robocalls, but I’m disappointed the Commission’s ruling doesn’t ensure consumers don’t foot the bill for stopping these calls," said Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.). "Consumers should not have to pay one cent more of their hard-earned money to get rid of these illegal and unwanted calls," he said, adding: "The Committee will markup consumer-focused legislation soon to stop the robocall epidemic.”

Both FCC Democrats--Jessica Rosenworcel and Geoffrey Starks--voted in favor or the item  but dissented in part because it did not make the service free.

Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), who co-chair the Senate Broadband Caucus, have introduced the self-evidently named Measuring the Economic Impact of Broadband Act, just the latest effort in a political season where broadband access is an election issue--Klobuchar is running for President.

Currently the FCC is collecting input on how to better gauge where broadband is or isn't by collecting more accurate and reliable data. The bill's goal is to gauge the consequences of deployment and the lack of it by collecting such data on the digital economy.

Related: Senate Democrats Introduce Digital Equity Act

It would require the Bureau of Economic Analysis, with input from the Department of Commerce, whose NTIA arm is also charged with getting a better handle on where broadband is or isn't, to conduct the study of "broadband deployment and adoption of digital-enabling infrastructure, e-commerce and platform-enabled peer-to-peer commerce, and the production and consumption of digital media."

The bill suggests doing so in consultation with ISPs, infrastructure providers, governments and civil society.

According to Klobuchar, the bill is backed by Connected Nation, NTCA – The Rural Broadband Association, WIA – The Wireless Infrastructure Association, ITTA – The Voice of America’s Broadband Providers and CCIA.

“In the 21st century economy, broadband is a critical force for creating jobs, leveling the playing field, and increasing opportunity,” Klobuchar said in a statement. “This bipartisan legislation will ensure that we have more reliable, publicly available economic data in order to make informed decisions about expanding broadband, connecting our communities, and keeping us competitive in an increasingly digital world.”

Original co-sponsors include Sens. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) and Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.).