{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.hawley.senate.gov/kids-deserve-protection-hawley-launches-investigation-into-meta-for-training-its-ai-chatbots-to-target-children-with-sensual-conversation/", "\u2018Kids Deserve Protection\u2019: Hawley Launches Investigation into Meta for Training its AI Chatbots to Target Children with \u2018Sensual\u2019 Conversation", "2025-08-15", "2025", "2025-08", "Republican", "Senate", "MO", "Josh Hawley", "H001089", "www.hawley.senate.gov", "hawley", "https://www.hawley.senate.gov/press-releases/page/", "scraper", "This morning, U.S. Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) penned a letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, demanding the company hand over all relevant documents and communications related to new disturbing reporting that its AI chatbots engage children in \u201cromantic\u201d and sensual\u201d online exchanges.\n\n\u201cParents deserve the truth, and kids deserve protection,\u201d Senator Hawley wrote.\n\n\u201cThe Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, which I chair, will commence an investigation into whether Meta\u2019s generative-AI products enable exploitation, deception, or other criminal harms to children, and whether Meta misled the public or regulators about its safeguards,\u201d he continued.\n\nSenator Hawley first sounded the alarm on this explosive reporting yesterday, pointing out that \u201conly after Meta got CAUGHT did it retract portions of its company doc that deemed it \u2018permissible for chatbots to flirt and engage in romantic roleplay with children.'\u201d\n\nAs Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, Senator Hawley recently led a separate oversight hearing into Meta that exposed the tech company\u2019s stunning complicity with China.\n\nRead Senator Hawley\u2019s full letter from today here or below.\n\nAugust 15, 2025\n\nMark Zuckerberg\n\nFounder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer\n\nMeta Platforms, Inc.\n\n1 Meta Way\n\nMenlo Park, CA 94025\n\nDear Mr. Zuckerberg,\n\nReports indicate that Meta approved internal rules for its AI chatbots that would allow \u201cromantic\u201d and \u201csensual\u201d exchanges with children, while green-lighting other harmful content behind legal word games. Your company has acknowledged the veracity of these reports and made retractions only after this alarming content came to light. It\u2019s unacceptable that these policies were advanced in the first place. Meta must immediately preserve all relevant records and produce responsive documents so Congress can investigate these troubling practices.\n\nTo take but one example, your internal rules purportedly permit an AI chatbot to comment that an eight-year-old\u2019s body is \u201ca work of art\u201d of which \u201cevery inch . . . is a masterpiece\u2014a treasure I cherish deeply.\u201d Similar conduct outlined in these reports is reprehensible and outrageous\u2014and demonstrates a cavalier attitude when it comes to the real risks that generative AI presents to youth development absent strong guardrails. Parents deserve the truth, and kids deserve protection.\n\nThe Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, which I chair, will commence an investigation into whether Meta\u2019s generative-AI products enable exploitation, deception, or other criminal harms to children, and whether Meta misled the public or regulators about its safeguards. We intend to learn who approved these policies, how long they were in effect, and what Meta has done to stop this conduct going forward.\n\nAccordingly, produce the following no later than September 19, 2025:\n\n1. \u201cGenAI: Content Risk Standards\u201d\u2014All Versions\n\nEvery draft, redline, and final version of \u201cGenAI: Content Risk Standards,\u201d including all regional variants, appendices, and preceding and succeeding policies.\n\n2. Scope, Deployment, and Enforcement:\n\nA list of every Meta product/model governed by these standards.\n\nEnforcement playbooks, guardrail/classifier specs, refusal policies, evaluator guidelines, and known gaps/exceptions.\n\nAll age-gating/minor-protection controls for chatbots, including all documents related to how Meta prevents, detects, and blocks \u201cromantic\u201d or \u201csensual\u201d exchanges with users under 18, as well as documents relating to what Meta does when age is unknown.\n\n3. Risk Reviews and Incident Reports:\n\nAll documents relating to safety reviews, red-team reports, risk registers, incident logs, and post-mortems referencing minors, sexual/romantic role-play, in-person meetups, medical advice, self-harm, or criminal exploitation.\n\nAny materials provided to or prepared for senior leadership on these risks.\n\n4. Public Claims and Regulator Communications:\n\nAll drafts, talking points, or statements to users, advertisers, app stores, the FTC, Congress, or other authorities about minor safety and medical-advice limits for Meta\u2019s chatbots.\n\n5. Identities of Individuals and Actions Changing Policy:\n\nDocuments sufficient to establish the decision trail for removing or revising any portions of the standards: who decided, when, why, who was notified, and what changes were actually implemented across products.", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T19:02:47Z"]], "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/kids-deserve-protection-hawley-launches-investigation-into-meta-for-training-its-ai-chatbots-to-target-children-with-sensual-conversation/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.9403652511537075, "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"}