Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez spoke to the need for Congress to take on Big Tech just like they had taken on Big Tobacco and Big Oil in the past:
But, you know, I think this is what is kind of being revealed here, and what all the points that we're making here is that this is about how Congress and Congress's willingness to take on big industries and some of the biggest and most nefarious industries that have preyed on the American people and everyday working families. They don't have big money lobbyists, but Big Social Media companies do. Big tech does. Big Pharma does. Big Oil does.
And Big Tobacco does, and Big Tobacco was one of the first mega-predatory industries that wrote the playbook on how to dupe Congress, and to also perpetuate PR campaigns to actually trick the American people as well. I mean, we all can remember times, and it's in our history books, that Big Tobacco had originally convinced the American people that smoking cigarettes was healthy for you. They suppressed science, they suppressed evidence, and then they lobbied Congress to prevent any sort of regulation, and millions of Americans were diagnosed with cancer and got sick, and we found out decades after the fact how dangerous this was.
Big Oil did the same thing when we found out that burning fossil fuels contributed to carbon emissions back in the 1970s. Exxon's internal scientists determined this, and then they set out to bury that science and evidence. We're seeing this with opioids and opioid manufacturers that preyed on the American people, understanding and knowing how addictive their substances were.
And now we're seeing this with social media and big tech. We're seeing the crisis that's happening here with kids losing their lives and people losing cognitive function, increasingly in use of social media tools and other digital tools as well. So we have to stand up and say we see right through them, and that we're willing to stand up to big money behind this as well. And I yield back.
Of course, when it comes to Congress standing up for the people, it's the Democrats leading the way. I have yet to see a Republican turn down a large donation from anyone, including Big Business, the NRA, or AIPAC.
