The legislature’s letter asked companies: “What steps have you taken before, on and after the November 3, 2020 elections and January 6, 2021 attacks to monitor the spread of disinformation, respond to it, and them? including encouraging or inciting violence through channels your business distributes to millions of Americans? “
“Are you planning to keep Fox News, OANN and Newsmax on your platform now and after the renewal date?” The letter goes on. “If yes why?”
Blair Levin, who served as the FCC’s chief of staff under President Bill Clinton, said a hearing could be a first step towards meaningful action. “You have to establish a state of affairs that in both the election and Covid, millions of Americans believe things that are just factually not true, and then try to figure out, ‘What is the appropriate role of government in changing these dynamics? ? ‘”Said Mr. Levin.
Harold Feld, senior vice president at Public Knowledge, a nonprofit group focused on telecommunications and digital rights, suggested that lawmakers may not have easy ways to influence Fox, Newsmax, or OAN.
“You have a lot of people who are very angry about it, you have a lot of people who want to show that they are very angry about it, but you still don’t have a lot of good ideas about what to do about it,” he said.
Currently, defamation lawsuits filed by private companies have taken the lead in the fight against disinformation, which is being broadcast on some cable channels.
Last month, Dominion Voting Systems, another voting technology company that played a prominent role in conspiracy theories about voting in 2020, sued two Trump legal representatives, Rudolph W. Giuliani and Sidney Powell, in separate lawsuits, each more than $ 1 billion claimed in damages. Both appeared as guests on Fox News, Fox Business, Newsmax and OAN in the weeks following the election.
On Monday, Dominion sued Mike Lindell, the managing director of MyPillow, on the grounds that he defamed Dominion with unsubstantiated allegations of voting fraud on its voting machines.
