Hillary Clinton Wants To Repeal Section 230
Hillary Clinton said on CNN this weekend that repealing Section 230 of federal communications law should be a top political priority.
The former secretary of state’s comments are a reminder that this vital protection for free speech is far from safe, even if we seem to be on the other side of peak anti-230 politics.
Why Politicians Hate Section 230
For anyone who needs a quick refresher: Section 230 protects digital service providers and users from liability for the speech of others. It’s really that simple, despite a lot of misinformation about Section 230 that gets thrown around. Section 230 is why Facebook isn’t liable if someone uses its messaging system to set up a drug deal; it’s why Reason isn’t liable if one of our commenters posts an actionable threat.
The law is vital for allowing free speech to flourish online, because without it companies would have a strong incentive to suppress much more user-generated content. It’s vital for companies that want to rein in certain sorts of speech on their own specific platforms as well—allowing them to moderate and suppress spam, hateful rhetoric, pornography, or any other types of speech they find objectionable. (It does not require the moderation of these types of speech. It merely makes it OK for companies to do so without taking on additional legal liability.)
A lot of politicians hate Section 230 precisely because it makes it more difficult for them to censor what is said online, while others hate Section 230 because it allows private companies to avoid hosting speech the politicians like. The bottom line is that both Democrats and Republicans would like to weaken or abolish Section 230, and that doing so would give government authorities more control over the internet.
During Donald Trump’s presidency, he was an enthusiastic advocate for repealing Section 230. This sort of anti-230 sentiment and action from both major parties has continued into Joe Biden’s. And while anti-Section 230 sentiment has quieted down a bit in recent years, Clinton’s comments serve as a good reminder that a lot of powerful people still have it out for this law.
Clinton’s Recent Comments
“We should be, in my view, repealing something called Section 230, which gave, you know, platforms on the internet immunity because they were thought to be just pass-throughs, that they shouldn’t be judged for the content that is posted,” Clinton told CNN host Michael Smerconish on Saturday.
Clinton makes this sound like some sort of aberration or anomaly. But a lot of platforms are basically “pass-throughs” for the speech of others, and not holding them responsible for content they didn’t create themselves isn’t crazy at all. If a person on private property engages in speech that is somehow criminal, we don’t hold the property owner liable. If people use the telephone to hatch criminal plans, we don’t arrest the phone company. If I use a Sharpie and to write you a threatening letter and then send it in the mail, you can’t sue the makers of Sharpie or the U.S. Postal Service.
Some argue that entities like X and Instagram and TikTok are more like a newspaper than the postal service or a phone company or a physical building. But newspapers em
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