The Senate is scheduled to advance legislation meant to give a boost to local and smaller news outlets in bargaining with Big Tech.
A bipartisan collection of senators unveiled updated text for the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act, legislation that would allow local, independent, and conservative outlets to band together in negotiating with Big Tech companies without running afoul of antitrust laws. The updated bill is now set to be advanced by the Senate Judiciary Committee in September.
“Because Google and Facebook simply take news content for free and have monopolized the digital advertising market, newsrooms today are in dire economic peril—with regional and local news publishers downsizing or shuttering at alarming pace,” said Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI), a co-sponsor of the House version of the bill, in a press release.
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The bill was also co-sponsored by Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), John Kennedy (R-LA), Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO), and Senate and House Judiciary Committee Chairpeople Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Jerry Nadler (D-NY).
The revised version of the bill would empower eligible outlets to form “joint negotiation entities” to negotiate collectively with tech companies over their access to the outlets’ content. It would also require those companies, if they have at least 50 million U.S.-based users or are owned by an individual with annual sales of more than $550 billion, to negotiate in good faith with the outlets. It would also offer the eligible outlets an eight-year safe harbor and the ability to withhold content amid joint negotiations if necessary.
The legislation also includes multiple concessions requested by Republicans, including a limitation that would bar more prominent outlets that employ 1,500 or more from receiving benefits from the bill. This would block some of the largest news outlets from eligibility, including Fox News, CNN, the New York Times, and several others. Other outlets, including conservative ones like the Daily Wire and the Washington Examiner, would be allowed to negotiate with tech companies under this bill.
News advocacy organizations praised the decision. “We applaud Chairwoman Klobuchar, Senator Kennedy, Chairman Cicilline, and Ranking Member Buck for their leadership in progressing the JCPA and for their hard work and dedication to fighting for the future of local journalism through pursuing fair and just compensation for news publishers,” said David Chavern, president and CEO of the News Media Alliance. “The time to act is now.”
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Other conservative analysts see the bill as covering up for the role that Congress has played in weakening the media ecosystem. “Politicians think this bill is necessary in part because of the death of local journalism but refuse to acknowledge their role in its demise,” said James Czerniawski, a senior policy analyst at Americans for Prosperity. “By trying to make everything a national issue and taking away things for states to handle, it undermines local journalism to a degree by pushing the accountability measures away from state legislatures to Congress, when the relationship should be in reverse.”
The proposed act draws inspiration from Australia’s recently passed legislation to change how local outlets were funded and would likely require Big Tech companies to pay outlets for their content.
