Newsom, Siding With Tech Giants, Vetoes Online Hate Speech Bill
SACRAMENTO, California — Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday vetoed a bill that threatened massive fines when social media companies intentionally feed their users violent or extremist content, avoiding a potential court fight over free speech rights.
The bill, SB 771, was framed as California lawmakers’ latest attempt to curb violent content and discrimination on social media platforms. Large social media companies would have faced penalties of up to $1 million if they promoted content that violated California’s civil rights laws in a way that harmed a user. The fines would have doubled if the person harmed was a minor.
It was partly a response to Meta, X and other social media companies relaxing their content moderation standards amid criticism from President Donald Trump and Republican allies, who claim stringent controls dampen conservative voices.
Newsom, in a statement explaining his veto, said he shared concerns about "discriminatory threats, violence and coercive harassment online” but called SB771 “premature.”
“Our first step should be to determine if, and to what extent, existing civil rights laws are sufficient to address violations perpetrated through algorithms,” the Democratic governor said.
Democratic state Sen. Henry Stern, who authored the measure, argued his bill targeted companies’ algorithmic design without directly regulating content moderation. But that didn’t stop tech groups from threatening lawsuits.
NetChoice, a tech trade group whose members include Google, Meta and Snap, all but promised to sue over the bill in a recent letter to Newsom. Elon Musk’s X and the social media site Parler also bashed the law, arguing it gives state Democrats unconstitutional authority to suppress speech they disagree with.
NetChoice and X have previously sued California over social media controls on First Amendment grounds. Judges in those cases blocked laws that aimed to impose kid-friendly design standards, regulate AI-generated deepfakes and impose anti-hate speech content moderation rules on social media platforms.
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