The RESTRICT Act

From Katherine Tangalakis-Lippert's 4-22-23 BUSINESS INSIDER article entitled "RESTRICT Act Explained: Proposed TikTok Ban Is 'A PATRIOT Act for the Digital Age,' Some Lawmakers Say":

While advocates for [Senate Bill 686] say it would protect Americans from foreign threats, critics argue its negative impacts could range from diminishing cultural exchange to outright violating the First Amendment

"A US ban on TikTok is a ban on the export of American culture and values to the billion-plus people who use our service worldwide," CNN reported Brooke Oberwetter, a spokesperson for TikTok, said in a statement about the legislation.

Even those who support a TikTok ban, such as Senator JD Vance of Ohio, don't see the RESTRICT Act as an appropriate solution.

"One group of people is very worried that it's too weak on the TikTok issue," Insider previously reported Vance said. "Another group of people is very worried that you're creating, effectively, a PATRIOT Act for the digital age," referencing a controversial law passed after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, that granted wide-reaching surveillance powers to the federal government [...].

Eric Goldman, law professor at Santa Clara University School of Law and co-director of the High Tech Law Institute, told Insider the goal of the RESTRICT Act is to allow the government to veto software that allows people to talk to each other and poses a major threat to Americans' First Amendment rights.

"I reject the premises of the law entirely. And so the details don't really matter to me, because I don't think the government should be able to do what the RESTRICT Act would authorize — under any circumstance at all," Goldman told Insider, adding: "The argument is that there's some countervailing social policies that should give the government the right to simply kick software out of the country. And, to me, that's a non-starter. That's just a flat-out invasion of our free speech rights."

Through the bill, the legislators are saying there are conversations taking place in the software that the government finds fundamentally unacceptable based on where the software comes from, Goldman said — which he argues is absolutely unacceptable.

"That's worth fighting for, a grab the pitchforks type of moment when the government says we're just going to stop people from talking to each other," Goldman said. "I mean, everything about that is corrupt."

To read the entire article, click HERE.