• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, February 5, 2025

The Senate Commerce Committee on Wednesday approved a controversial bill that would prohibit social media platforms from allowing children under 13 to create accounts, and prohibit platforms from algorithmically recommending content to teens under 18.

The Kids Off Social Media Act, introduced last week by Senators Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Chris Murphy (D-Connecticut), and Katie Britt (R-Alabama), also would require schools to limit social media use on their networks as a condition of receiving broadband funds.

The bill's sponsors stated the bill would help “protect kids from the harmful impacts of social media,” and “stop taxpayers from funding tools that allow kids to doomscroll in their classrooms.”

Sponsors also contendthere is “a strong relationship between social media use and poor mental health, especially among children.”

But critics argue the measure would violate the First Amendment and could, counterproductively, expose young users to harassment.

“Algorithmically curated feeds can protect users from harassment and cyberbullying,” the tech industry funded Chamber of Progress says in a letter to Schatz.

“Content curation allows platforms to downrank or even remove unwanted interactions like coordinated racial or gender-based harassment,” the letter continues.

Digital rights groups including the Center for Democracy & Technology, Electronic Frontier Foundation and American Civil Liberties Union, said in a letter to Cruz and Cantwell -- chair and ranking member of the Commerce Committee -- that the measure would violate the First Amendment.

“All U.S. residents, including minors, have First Amendment rights to access information and express themselves,” the organiations said. “Banning kids from creating an account, including ones with appropriate safeguards, would cut them off from online expression, political engagement, news and even essential educational resources on platforms like YouTube, Pinterest, and GroupMe.”

The federal Children's Online Privacy Protection Act already prohibits operators of websites and apps from knowingly collecting data from users under 13, without parental consent, but doesn't require companies to ban those users.

Lawmakers in California and New York have passed laws restricting platforms from recommending content to minors, but those statutes might not survive court challenges.

The tech industry group NetChoice recently sued to strike down the California law, arguing it violates teens' First Amendment right to receive information and web publishers' right to curate posts. A federal appellate court has temporarily blocked enforcement of that law.