Sen. Dick Durbin criticized Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s statement that there is “no causal link between using social media and young people having worse mental health outcomes,” comparing it to tobacco executives denying the addictiveness of nicotine.
During a Judiciary Committee hearing, parents testified about their children’s online abuse and suicides, holding up photos of victims.
Sen. Lindsey Graham condemned Zuckerberg, linking the platforms to deaths and calling for regulation.
“It harkens me back to when the tobacco executives came before us [in the 1990s] and swore nicotine was not addictive and their product was not killing people,” Durbin said. “It was an outrageous statement by Mr. Zuckerberg, and a man with the resources he has and the advisers he has should not have said anything like that.”
“Mr. Zuckerberg, you and the companies before us, I know you don’t mean it to be so, but you have blood on your hands,” Graham said.
“You have a product that’s killing people,” Graham said.
“When we had cigarettes killing people, we did something about it — maybe not enough. When you’re talking about guns, we have the ATF [Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives]. Nothing here. There’s not a damn thing anybody can do about it.”
Durbin believes there is bipartisan support in the Senate for measures to protect children online, citing five unanimously passed bills as a starting point.
“The good news is we start off with five bills that passed unanimously out of the committee,” Durbin said.
“That, I think, is our template we need to bring to the floor of the United States Senate. I know the Senate as well as most people. I will tell you to get this done you have to have a bipartisan measure and an agreement on time and amendments. That’s not easy in a Senate designed to stop and kill legislation right and left.”
“I think we can do it. I think the political force you saw in that hearing and in that room can make a difference.”
Meta cited reports to support Zuckerberg’s claim, but the debate on social media’s impact on mental health remains pressing.
