{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.hawley.senate.gov/icymi-chairman-hawley-exposes-ai-chatbots-for-harming-children/", "ICYMI: Chairman Hawley Exposes AI Chatbots for Harming Children", "2025-09-17", "2025", "2025-09", "Republican", "Senate", "MO", "Josh Hawley", "H001089", "www.hawley.senate.gov", "hawley", "https://www.hawley.senate.gov/press-releases/page/", "scraper", "\u2018Every Parent\u2019s Worst Nightmare\u2019\n\nU.S. Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, held a hearing to expose the growing harms to children posed by online chatbots like Character.AI, OpenAI\u2019s ChatGPT and Meta.\n\nThe hearing featured new testimony from parents of chatbot victims as well as AI safety experts and psychologists\u2014one of whom recently issued a health advisory for AI chatbots.\n\nOne mother testifying under the alias \u2018Jane Doe\u2019 stated during her opening testimony, \u201cCharacter.AI was marketed in the Apple Store as \u2018fun and safe\u2019 with an age rating of 12 plus. My son downloaded the app, and within months, he went from being happy, social teenager to somebody I didn\u2019t even recognize\u2026 My son developed abuse-like behaviors and paranoia, daily panic attacks, isolation, self harm and homicidal thoughts. He stopped eating and bathing. He lost 20 pounds. He withdrew from our family\u2026 And one day he cut his arm open with a knife in front of his siblings and me. I had no idea the psychological harm an AI chatbot could do until I saw it in my son and I saw his light turn dark.\u201d\n\nSenator Hawley concluded the hearing by saying, \u201cIf we\u2019ve learned anything today it\u2019s that these companies cannot be trusted with this power. They cannot be trusted with this profit. They cannot be trusted to do the right thing. They\u2019re not doing the right thing. They are literally taking the lives of our kids. There is nothing they will not do for profit and for power\u2026 I\u2019ve introduced legislation that would allow every victim and every parent of a victim to be able to go to court and sue these companies, because it is my firm belief that until they are subject to a jury, they are not going to change their ways. And it is past time that they changed their ways. We cannot go on like this.\u201d\n\nFollowing testimony, Senator Hawley doubled down on his invitation to Zuckerberg, daring him to answer to the witnesses\u2019 damning accusations.", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T19:10:29Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.hawley.senate.gov/icymi-chairman-hawley-exposes-ai-chatbots-for-harming-children/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.7521579973399639, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}