{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=386E8114-0640-4209-8357-F2F0A5917E84", "Thune Presses Big Tech Leaders on Consumer Transparency and Accountability, Perceived Political Bias", "2020-10-28", "2020", "2020-10", "Republican", "Senate", "SD", "John Thune", "T000250", "www.thune.senate.gov", "thune", "https://www.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases", "scraper", "U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), chairman of the Subcommittee on Communications, Technology, Innovation, and the Internet, today participated in a full Commerce Committee hearing, titled \u201cDoes Section 230\u2019s Sweeping Immunity Enable Big Tech Bad Behavior?,\u201d to examine Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act and discuss the need for potential reform in response to social media growth and advancement over the last few decades. During the hearing, Thune questioned CEOs from Google, Facebook, and Twitter on consumer transparency and accountability and the perceived political bias that exists on social media platforms.\n\nThune has introduced two bipartisan bills, the Platform Accountability and Consumer Transparency (PACT) Act and the Filter Bubble Transparency Act, that would help increase online transparency and accountability.\n\nEarlier today, Thune joined CNBC\u2019s \u201cSquawk Box\u201d to preview the hearing.\n\nThune\u2019s opening remarks (as prepared for delivery):\n\n\u201cMr. Chairman, I appreciate you convening this hearing today, which is an important follow-up to the subcommittee hearing we convened in July on Section 230.\n\n\u201cMany of us here today \u2013 and many of those we represent \u2013 are deeply concerned about the possibility of political bias and discrimination by large internet and social media platforms. Others are concerned that \u2013 even if your actions aren\u2019t skewed \u2013 they are hugely consequential for our public debate, yet you operate with limited accountability.\n\n\u201cSuch distrust is intensified by the fact that the moderation practices used to suppress or amplify content remain largely a black box to the public.\n\n\u201cMoreover, the public explanations given by the platforms for taking down or suppressing content too often seem like excuses that have to be walked back after scrutiny.\n\n\u201cAnd due to exceptional secrecy with which platforms protect their algorithms and content moderation practices, it\u2019s been impossible to prove one way or another whether political bias exists, so users are stuck with anecdotal information that frequently seems to confirm their worst fears.\n\n\u201cThat is why I\u2019ve introduced two bipartisan bills \u2013 the Platform Accountability and Consumer Transparency (PACT) Act and the Filter Bubble Transparency Act \u2013 to give users, regulators, and the general public meaningful insight into online content moderation decisions and how algorithms may be amplifying or suppressing information.", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-06-28T00:34:36Z"]], "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.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=386E8114-0640-4209-8357-F2F0A5917E84"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.8315439336001873, "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"}