Pod Insights Decoder Sen. Ed Markey wants media companies to fight for the First Amendment About this episode Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey and I agree it seems like democracy is on the line right now, especially around the First Amendment and the increasing pressure the Trump administration — especially FCC chair Brendan Carr — is putting on free speech. I also had a lot of questions for Sen. Markey about the supposed TikTok ban, which no one seems to know anything about, and all the other problems we’re facing in 2025.
Links:
Even the lawmakers behind the TikTok ban have no idea what’s going on | The Verge
Carr’s FCC is an anti-consumer, rights-trampling harassment machine | The Verge
The FCC is a weapon in Trump’s war on free speech | Decoder
Here’s the Trump EO that would ban state AI laws | The Verge
Silicon Valley is rallying behind a guy who sucks | The Verge
Silicon Valley’s man in the White House is benefiting himself and his friends | The New York Times
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Credits:
Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.
Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and edited by Ursa Wright. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane.
The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.
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Transcript 10,500 words · 13 speakers
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1:32 Speaker 04 Hello and welcome to Decoder. I'm Neelai Patel, editor in chief of The Verge, and Decoder is my show about big ideas and other problems. Today, I'm talking with Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts. Well, you'll hear me start with the only question I think anyone should be asking of any politician in federal government: What the hell is going on here? Senator Markey did not mince words with his answer. You'll hear him compare the Trump administration to the fascist dystopia in Orwell's 1984, and say that democracy itself is on the line. And one of the places that Senator Markey and I agree that democracy seems most on the line is when it comes to the First Amendment and the increasing pressure the Trump administration has put on free speech in America. If you've been listening to this show or the Vergecast this year,
2:15 Speaker 04 you know that I've been particularly focused on FCC Chairman Brendan Carr and the pressure that he is putting on free speech. Carr talks like a mobster when it comes to threatening broadcasters with fines and overbearing merger conditions if he doesn't like the speech they promote. And many media companies, like CBS parent company Paramount, go along with it to get what they want. Senator Markey has a lot to say about all this, especially ahead of Chairman Carr's upcoming appearance in front of Congress on December 17th. But there's more going on in the world of free speech. I also have a lot of questions about the supposed TikTok ban, which no one seems to know anything about, even though the House and Senate actually passed a law that would force ByteDance, TikTok's parent company, to either sell some assets or stop operating in the United States entirely.
2:59 Speaker 04 That law was held to be constitutional by the Supreme Court, even though it has profound free speech implications for all of TikTok's users. But despite being the original proponent of a TikTok ban during his first term, President Trump has now promised to deal with ByteDance that would keep TikTok operating in some way. So instead of enforcing the law, his administration simply hasn't. And having an administration flat out ignore laws it doesn't like for political reasons is a pretty big problem. Now Senator Markey actually voted against banning TikTok, and I wanted to know if he's heard anything about the status of the app or the status of a deal. And if anything he's learned since that vote has changed his mind about the potential national security issues that were the argument for a ban. Of course, Senator Markey and I also talked about the bigger picture, especially as we
3:44 Speaker 04 head into an election year. His answers about how to push back against authoritarianism were pretty forceful, although I pushed him pretty hard on whether the rest of the Democratic Party, especially its current leadership, is as interested in fighting back as he is. Senator Markey doesn't hold back on this show. He doesn't hold back with me. I think you're really going to like this episode. Okay, Senator Ed Markey, here we go.
4:18 Speaker 04 Senator Ed Markey, you're a senator from the state of Massachusetts. Welcome back to Decoder.
4:22 Speaker 05 It's great to be with you again. It's been four or five years now, but I loved it the last time and I've actually been looking forward to it.
4:31 Speaker 04 Yeah, I'm excited to talk to you. I have to reveal something to you. The last time we spoke, the last time I interviewed you, in the background, I was furiously refreshing a window to buy Taylor Swift tickets.
4:39 Speaker 05 [laughing]
4:41 Speaker 04 And I was like, I can't, I'm interviewing, I have to sound smart, but my niece and nephew want these tickets. I got the tickets and I think the interview went well, but I've always wanted to let you know that.
4:51 Speaker 05 And I will say that it was a brief interlude in the middle of a political race that I was in against Congressman Joe Kennedy to win the Democratic primary for the Senate seat in 2020. So I'll be honest about that, too. I actually, it was like, it was almost like a palate cleanup on me because otherwise I'm right back into the nitty gritty of a campaign. So I loved it the last time, too. You were thinking about Taylor Swift at the same time. And I have to admit, while I would have liked to have thought of only the questions that you were asking me about technology and its role in modern American life, I was also thinking about my campaign at the same time.
5:36 Speaker 05 So I guess we all have to multitask in a world of social media distraction and I've learned how to at least minimally cope with it.
5:47 Speaker 04 Sadly, we have only distractions to talk about once again here on Decoder. There's a lot to talk to you about. I want to talk about Brendan Carr and the FCC. I've covered the FCC very deeply over the years, as you know. I want to talk about AI regulation, which seems to be coming up in a lot of different ways lately. I want to talk about the TikTok ban. But first, I want to ask a question that I've been asking basically every politician that comes on Decoder that I think really sums up what I've been hearing from our audience, which is simply, Senator, what the hell is going on?
6:14 Speaker 05 Donald Trump is channeling
6:19 Speaker 05 Big Brother from George Orwell's 1984. He wants to control. He wants thought police to be in charge of who we are as a country. And he has weaponized the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission to enforce his goal to have thought control over the American people. He's turned the Federal Communications Commission into the Federal Censorship Commission and installed Brendan Carr as the chairman.
6:57 Speaker 05 And it's all towards the goal of ensuring that no one is ever able to criticize effectively Donald Trump, Big Brother. And there is a backlash to that overwhelmingly as people learn about what he is doing in weaponizing his administration. But it's not going to stop. It's who he is. He admires Putin. He admires authoritarian leaders in countries around the rest of the world. He just doesn't understand why he can't do the same thing that they do in their countries. And all we can really do is fight him every single day. Democracy is on the line.
7:42 Speaker 05 The First Amendment is the beating heartbeat of democracy, of freedom in our nation. And as he seeks to inject himself into the business of the media in all of its forms, it's really just meant to give him absolute authority to become King Donald. And that's why we saw the No Kings Movement be created and put five, six, seven million people out on the streets of America a few weeks before the election. That's why we saw the election result in the first week in November across this country, repudiating this political philosophy. But we're not done.
8:24 Speaker 05 We're in a battle and we just have to do it every single day because he's not going to stop. Therefore, we cannot stop.
8:31 Speaker 04 I want to ask you about that. I want to ask about specifics. Obviously, there are specific areas where Trump and the Trump administration's use of power is succeeding and failing. There are... Just the general nature of Americans not liking to be told what to do seems to be pushing back. There's a structure of the American government itself and whether that is holding fast in the face of an authoritarian leader. The thing that strikes me, though, is it turns out there's a lot of latent power in the executive in the United States. And Trump and the people in his administration are just trying to use that power as aggressively as possible, in a way that maybe is new, but relies on that power existing. I think Brendan Carr is actually a great example of this, right? His thesis of the FCC is, look at
9:15 Speaker 04 all this authority we have that we don't use. Look at my interpretation of news distortion to go and punish broadcasters who have licenses. Look at the authority that I might give up in terms of making telecom providers do cybersecurity measures. There's a lot of authority there, and at least what Trump and his administration have figured out is, we should try to use it in a way that other administrations have not tried to use it. Do you think the presence of that authority itself is a problem, or is it just the judgment of Trump in using that authority?
9:45 Speaker 05 Yeah, the judgment of Trump using it, but it's also, from my perspective, it's the judgment of CBS or other networks or other social media companies to just roll over and not contest what the government is trying to do. They have First Amendment rights. First Amendment rights are preeminent. And unfortunately, what we're seeing in 2025 increasingly are companies, media companies, who are willing to bend a knee, willing to
10:24 Speaker 05 pay the fine, willing to accept the, actually, illegal use of power by the Federal Communications Commission or by the White House, and rather than contest it, instead just try to put it behind them. And I think it's pretty clear that in each of these instances, they had a very high probability of winning in court.
10:53 Speaker 05 In terms of the exercise of their First Amendment rights. In the same way that Will Mahal, the law firm in Massachusetts who contested Donald Trump won in court, law firms from New York City, like Paul Weiss and others, they instead bent a knee. But there's no question that if they had taken the same kind of strong defense of their First Amendment rights, their due process rights, as did Will Mahal, the law firm in Boston, they would have won. I would say the same thing for all of these media companies. They would win ultimately, because the First Amendment is what is at the heart of the protection of our democracy.
11:36 Speaker 05 And because these companies are so wealthy or so afraid, they don't exercise the right and instead they just pay the piper. They pay Donald Trump whatever tribute that he is looking for, but ultimately it's a disservice to our country, especially given the role which those companies play in providing the ability for the voices of the American people to be heard.
12:00 Speaker 04 So let me complicate this a little bit. I want to come back to the relative strength of the media industry, its appetite for fighting Trump, its ability to pay the bill for fighting Trump, compared to the tech industry, which certainly has the money to pay to fight. There's some structural stuff I want to dive into with media versus tech there. But let me complicate this by asking about TikTok. You talk about the voices of the American people and the First Amendment being preeminent. I think a lot of young people, particularly in our audience, saw TikTok as being the channel for their voice, as being where they actually got their news. We just ran a story on The Verge about young people overwhelmingly preferring news influencers on TikTok to traditional media like the New York Times. I have a lot of thoughts about that, but the data is clear, the sentiment is clear. They preferred TikTok.
12:44 Speaker 04 The Congress of the United States passed a law banning TikTok, or at least forcing a sale of TikTok. That went to the Supreme Court. It was upheld as an appropriate use of power to perhaps silence the speech of Americans on certain platforms. Trump stated, we don't know, he basically told the Department of Justice not to enforce the law. What is going on with TikTok right now? Do you know? Because that, it feels like a lot of this is wrapped up in, hey, we have this power and we're choosing not to use it. And we have this power that isn't traditionally used this way and we're using it as aggressively as possible.
13:13 Speaker 05 Trump is seeking to cut a deal with Oracle and others in order to resolve the issue. What I've done is, you know, introducing legislation just to say very clearly, where is the transparency? What are the protections that have been built in? In order to protect against a compromise of the information of American citizens? And at the same time, how do we protect our national security? The details are going to be very important in this deal that Trump wants to cut with Oracle. There's actually a deadline in another couple of weeks, the middle of December, in terms
13:58 Speaker 05 of the expiration of the negotiating period. He could extend it again, of course. He's in complete violation of the law to begin with. He doesn't seem to be bound by that and the Republicans are not in any way holding him accountable under that law. Our goal has to be to keep TikTok alive, to make sure that it continues to exist, but to also deal with these national security and transparency issues. And until, and unless Trump reveals what are the details of the deal, then it's no different than the deal that he says he's going to be able to cut with Ukraine and Russia
14:41 Speaker 05 and he's very close to a big deal. And yet it never happens. It's a, it's a, it's a, it ever. Disappearing almost oasis in the long distance. So that's where we are right now. We don't have the details. We don't know. It is possible that we could resolve this in a way that deals with the issues that revolve around it, and that's what I want. But at the same time, the American people have to know the details in order to ensure that our interests are being protected as well.
15:13 Speaker 04 We are aware of that deadline in mid-December. Last month, Lauren Finer, our reporter, went and asked about a dozen lawmakers what's going on. Basically, no one answered. And then we got a statement from Senator Cantwell saying this is a problem, but no answers. Have you heard any answers? Have you heard from the Trump administration about what the deal could look like or if there's even any progress?
15:33 Speaker 05 No, I have written to the Trump administration. I've asked them for the answers. I have not received any answers from them. So it's still impossible to evaluate the overall quality of the deal, which Trump says that he's got with the Chinese. And unless and until all of the details are made public, no one else is going to be able to do that kind of evaluation either.
15:58 Speaker 04 One of the proposals that we've heard floated is that Oracle will take over the data, but the algorithm will get split up and everyone will have to download a new app. TikTok, as we know it, will be shut down. There'll be some new Oracle version of TikTok, Larry Ellison Talk, and then that will be what we have. Would that be acceptable to you?
16:16 Speaker 05 Well, I haven't seen it. I don't know what the details are. I don't know what the safeguards are. I don't know what kind of transparency it will have. I have no idea what the national security implications of it are. So only at the point at which you can actually see the contract, which has been agreed to, would it be possible to do an evaluation. So otherwise, we're just playing fantasy baseball. You know, we're talking about, you know, any kind of, you know, potential, you know, construct that may or may not ever happen. And the only thing we can really deal with is the actual deal that's put on the table for the consideration by the American people and the United States Congress.
16:57 Speaker 04 The reason the United States Congress felt comfortable passing a bill that would force the sale of TikTok, effectively banning the app in some way, and the United States Supreme Court felt comfortable saying that law was constitutional, was the national security concerns that you're talking about, right? That the Chinese government controlled an algorithm that would shape what people would see, that they would collect a massive amount of data on the American people, that was not transparent, it could not be controlled, and having that in American hands, or at least allied hands, would be safer. That hasn't changed, right? I mean, this is why the law was passed, this is why the Supreme Court upheld the law. The Chinese government and ByteDance still have an awful lot of control over the algorithms. Why has that not been a concern for your Republican colleagues? Is it just wiped away, or is it just TikTok is too popular to deal with?
17:39 Speaker 05 Well, Congress is hiding. They're afraid of Donald Trump. They pass a law when Joe Biden is president, but once Donald Trump takes over, they're afraid of him. So, again, I voted no on that ban, by the way. So, to the extent to which I have been trying to police this issue effectively, it is to get the information which the Congress should have. And unfortunately, that's not what the Republican chairman and the House and Senate are doing. And it comes to me to be writing these letters, to be demanding the answers. But we will not know if the national security of our country is threatened unless and until
18:23 Speaker 05 we actually see the details. And Trump is not sharing that with anyone, except for his business buddies, who he's trying to make happy and even more super wealthy than they already are. But beyond that, the rest of us is still operating in the dark.
18:39 Speaker 04 I want to zoom out and connect this to the selective enforcement of power at the FCC and other agencies, because it does all feel like a piece to me. But I just want to ask one more question here. Our young audience is convinced that the reason TikTok got banned was because lawmakers saw how young people were talking about the war in Gaza, and how pro-Palestinian they were, and anti-Israel's actions in Gaza, which... Rise to war crimes in some cases it appears. And that the United States government decided to shut that avenue of discussion down. And that they see that very clearly. Looking back on it, that seems to be what drove a lot of the conversation inside of Congress, even though that was never really revealed to us. That the Chinese government was somehow fomenting anti-Israel sentiment with their algorithm. So we got to ban this app.
19:24 Speaker 04 Have you seen anything else besides that that would lead to a ban? Because that is very much what our audience believes.
19:30 Speaker 05 Again, I absolutely strongly believe in the robust debate over Gaza. In fact, there was a young woman, Romeza Osturk, who was a graduate student at Tufts University, who was whisked off the streets of Tufts University back in the spring, and then moved to a prison 100 miles outside of Baton Rouge. And I had to go down and visit her in order to put a spotlight on her. She was a Fulbright scholar, working on her PhD thesis, which was going to be the positive uses of social media for children. Clearly a real danger to our country.
20:10 Speaker 05 She had co-authored with five other people an op-ed in the Tufts undergraduate newspaper on Gaza. And that was the crime that she was being charged with. And she was actually never charged with the crime legally. And because of the spotlight I helped to put upon her, they had to release her. But that just reemphasizes what you're saying about this whole subject of Gaza. And how there has been an effort to try to suppress the kind of discussion which we need
20:47 Speaker 05 about what was occurring in Gaza on behalf of Netanyahu and Minister Smotrich and Ben-Gavir throughout the entirety of this war. So we have to defend free speech in order to ensure that
21:09 Speaker 05 We have, not just on TikTok, but everywhere, the ability to have our voices be heard.
21:16 Speaker 04 Do you think that the public perception of Gaza, the public opinion has shifted so much that that's why there isn't more pressure to make TikTok divest itself and be sold? That's the dynamic that I'm really asking about. Has public opinion moved so far that fighting that fight on that grounds is no longer politically viable? So we're just not going to enforce the law?
21:36 Speaker 05 I'll be honest, Neelai, it's very hard for me to get inside the internal workings of the cerebral mechanism of MAGA right wing Republican senators. Okay, that's uncharted territory for me. So understanding the totality of all of their thinking and motivations is just impossible for me to dissect. Beyond the fact that we need free speech. And the only answer to any attacks on free speech is more free speech so that the American people can have the information they need in order to make decisions on important public policy issues. So I don't know the answer to that. I wouldn't, I wouldn't rule it out as a motivation then and now. But to be honest with you, I just don't know.
22:20 Speaker 04 We have to take a quick break. We'll be back in just a minute.
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25:02 Speaker 04 Welcome back. I'm talking with Senator Ed Markey. Before the break, we were talking about all the chaos around the TikTok ban, which in turn led me to ask about an even bigger issue in the United States right now: the tendency of the Trump administration, especially FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, to attack media companies in a way that is not at all compatible with the First Amendment.
25:21 Speaker 04 The reason I started there and the reason I said I think I'm going to complicate this to begin with is because the theme for me really is selective and perhaps unconstitutional enforcement of the law. And so here you have a very clear law. Like, the outcome was obvious. The goal was obvious. The Supreme Court was asked to rule on it, and it is being unenforced, maybe for political reasons, maybe because we can't get a deal on, maybe because of public opinion on Gaza. On the other hand, you have Brendan Carr. Who is taking a bunch of laws that have not been enforced for decades, who is reasserting the authority of the FCC over content in a way that even previous Republican chairs of the FCC walked away from and saying, I have all this authority. I'm going to use it to make sure the speech is correct. How are you interacting with the FCC? How is Congress overseeing the FCC?
26:06 Speaker 04 Is there a sense that his actions are appropriate or need oversight?
26:10 Speaker 05 Obviously, whether it be TikTok, that's 170 million American users, 7 million small businesses. They have a right to be able to think that the government would be able to find a solution so that our national security concerns could be dealt with. And then over on the broadcast area, you have Brendan Carr, who, you know, honestly threatened, ABC threatened Jimmy Kimmel with almost a Godfather Part One offer they can't refuse. Either you punish him or the FCC will punish you, ABC. So they responded to that.
26:52 Speaker 05 Now, I'm thinking back to when I was a boy, that if Johnny Carson ever told a joke about a president, it would have been unimaginable. The next day, the President of the United States and his FCC commissioner would say, we gotta just shut down NBC. We gotta shut down Johnny Carson and the Tonight Show. They can't be allowed to do it. So this is a hypersensitive president who believes that he is all powerful and he has an FCC commissioner who is now suffering from invasion of the body snatchers. He's no longer the Brendan Carr of the previous era, which was kind of a good conservative Republican lawyer.
27:34 Speaker 05 He is now willing to do the bidding of Donald Trump in any way that he wants if Donald Trump is offended. So unfortunately, that
27:44 Speaker 05 Is a condition that we are going to have to live with. We CBS bent the knee in terms of its 60 Minutes programming. NBC was threatened by the president saying that jokes by Seth Meyers should be illegal. And you have, kind of in the background, you have a FCC chairman who's nodding his head the whole way, you know, very, very concerned about your local TV stations whose licenses might be put in jeopardy if you allow that kind of programming to be on TV anymore. So there is a very serious, powerful threat to the economic well-being of these companies
28:28 Speaker 05 that they're weighing compared to their First Amendment rights of free speech. Telling jokes on television about a president is not illegal and can never be illegal, any more than telling jokes about senators can be made to be illegal. That's all part of what they constructed into the First Amendment. That is the protection of our democracy.
28:48 Speaker 04 When I first started covering the FCC 15 years ago, I spent a lot of time with Michael Powell, who was a conservative FCC chairman. And what he had been trying to do is unwind the excesses of what you might call the Janet Jackson era of the FCC, right? Justin Timberlake pulls down Janet Jackson's shirt at the Super Bowl, the whole government goes crazy, we're gonna censor CBS and Viacom. Quite a lot happened in that time, and that case ran for a long time. And what Chairman Powell, I think it was former Chairman Powell when I was talking about it, his point was, this is ridiculous, right? The future of media is not on broadcast airwaves or TV stations. The future of media is on the internet. These broadcast companies are just part of the mix with internet content that Americans
29:32 Speaker 04 are getting, and we should deregulate them to let them compete more fairly and even let them get bigger, so they can go after the scale of Google and Facebook, which he saw is rising. I would say he was broadly correct. Right, the idea that the the delivery mechanism of the media should change how the government regulates it is is alien to a young American today as any other idea from the past, that because this is coming over the broadcast airwaves, the government gets to say what it is versus this is coming over my internet pipes and the government has no say. Brendan seems to be totally reversing that and saying if this is the broadcast airwaves, I have a lot of control over it. And if it's on the internet, I shouldn't have any. That seems untenable, right? Because Americans are largely on the internet.
30:16 Speaker 04 Do you see him trying to regulate the internet as well? Because that's actually the prize.
30:20 Speaker 05 Well, he he doesn't want to regulate the internet to protect against the harms which he says are emanating from broadcast TV. So to the extent to which the Republican Party, Brendan Carr, Donald Trump, shed their crocodile tears about the impact that broadcast television could have upon American society. When it comes to Meta, Google, all those people who are sitting right behind Donald Trump on inauguration day, we've got a crisis in our country.
31:00 Speaker 05 One in four teenage girls contemplated suicide in 2023 in our country. One in eight teenage girls actually attempted suicide in our country in 2023. One in five LGBTQ youth attempted suicide in 2023. And the Surgeon General of the United States has pointed an accusatory finger towards social media, not as the exclusive, but one of the principal culprits in this crisis that we have in our country. If the Republican Party, if the White House, if Brendan Carr really cared...
31:38 Speaker 05 About this issue, we'd be hearing them speak out on it. It's a crisis. We have a mental health crisis amongst teenagers and children in our country right now that goes unaddressed by this administration, by the Federal Communications Commission because of that information, which is being targeted towards young people in our nation. But at the same time, hypocritically, he's very concerned about jokes about the president and his, the president's eggshell psyche that he cannot bear to have anyone ever criticize him at any time. Grow up, Mr. President. Grow up, Brendan Carr. And by the way, you only need three things to be in politics: backbone, backbone, and backbone. Take on big tech. Take on where the real problem is. Take on where we have a culture
32:22 Speaker 05 that is undermining the, the mental health of children, undermining democracy, undermining the very well-being of our whole nation. That they're afraid to do because of the cash and carry nature of this administration, where the more money you contribute, the more money you pour into the coppers of Donald Trump, his campaigns, his presidential library is, the more likely you escape any scrutiny, notwithstanding the magnitude of the danger which you're posing to our society. And meanwhile, relatively benign comments made on, on traditional television is attacked as though it's, it's a, it's a, it's like a dagger to the heart of our democracy when
33:07 Speaker 05 it's nothing more than more jokes and more critical analysis of public policy, which is being broadcast by the traditional sources.
33:14 Speaker 04 This brings me to the structural question that I was thinking about earlier. The big tech companies, they have the resources. They're, they're, they're getting ahead of the regulation and the potential for regulation by building the ballroom today, right, by buying the crypto on the side today. They're the ones who are most able to fight. I think in your estimation, they're also the ones where they most definitely need to be regulated, right? You see a mental health crisis, there needs to be some regulation of these platforms to address that crisis. That has some connection to the First Amendment in some meaningful way, and they will fight that fight, and they will spend the resources to fight that fight. And thus far, they have escaped almost all regulation in this country. And the other idea of the media companies, who are as weak as they have ever been, who
33:57 Speaker 04 do not have the resources, who are lacking trust from the American consumer in real ways, who do not have the distribution, who depend on the platforms to distribution, and Trump is putting pressure on them because they absolutely cannot fight. I don't know how you fix that structural problem, right? If you want to go after one of the big media companies, the idea that they have unlimited money to fight the fight all the way up and survive along the way, that's a little shakier than if you want to go fight a Google, or a Meta, or an Apple, or whoever else, who do have unlimited resources to just wait you out, to just spin you in litigation until you go away. How do you resolve that structural discrepancy?
34:33 Speaker 05 Well, I don't think there's too much of a difference, to be honest with you. It's clear, they allow themselves to be extorted to big tech companies. You know, they walk in with presents for Trump into the Oval Office. You know, they pay whatever they are asked to pay in tribute, but they simultaneously then take down, you know, the safeguards that were built in, you know, in an earlier period before Trump, in order to ensure that there is some, you know, protections that are built into these online social media sites. They just give. They're folded. And what's happening over on the traditional broadcast side, looks
35:16 Speaker 05 very similar. They are responding in the same way. They're saying, we'll pay the fine, or, you know, we'll accept the chilling effect that you're now creating in terms of our ability to program entertainment or news for the American people. And that chilling effect is impossible to fully
35:39 Speaker 05 Quantified, but we know it's real. We know both the broadcasters and the social media companies are now very afraid of what the consequences could be from an out of control Justice Department and out of control Federal Communications Commission that can easily be weaponized by the White House. So I think in terms of the impact on the American people and their ability to receive information unfettered, it's now the same in both sectors. And it's a systematic attack that has been made, unfortunately, successfully by the Trump administration. There are some notable exceptions, I will say, but in general, he's having the intended
36:20 Speaker 05 effect be put into place across the entire media spectrum.
36:25 Speaker 04 One of the weirder aspects of this FCC, Brendan Carr in particular, you mentioned earlier that he used to be a fairly traditional conservative lawyer, and now he's, you know, fire breathing MAGA. He's cutting against some of his own positions from the past. Some of the positions from the first Trump administration that his predecessor Ajit Pai used to take, like disclaiming all authority over state-level net neutrality rules, right? They got rid of net neutrality by saying, "We actually have no authority over broadband." And now I've seen floated Chairman Carr say, "Well, we should have authority to preempt state AI regulations because that's part of broadband." Which makes no sense in the context of, "Well, you disclaimed all your authority. How can you possibly now have the authority to narrowly preempt AI regulations?"
37:10 Speaker 04 Has this been presented to you in any way that makes coherent sense? Or is this just more, "Let's see how much power we can acquire and use"?
37:18 Speaker 05 Yeah, I think that's all you have to understand. What you're saying is that it's all about power, and it's the power of whoever can pay the most to the White House. The AI industry wants state preemption. The AI industry wants preemption of state privacy laws, California, New York, other places. And this administration is, without question, not interested in the public policy consequences of those kinds of repeals, but they instead are interested in what kind of monetary benefit can flow to the Republican Party at the highest levels because of the capacity of these companies
38:03 Speaker 05 to pay. So there's a reason for us to really be concerned right now. We have an industry, this social media industry, that right now is unwilling to stand up to the president in any meaningful way. And simultaneously, the most extreme elements amongst that social media industry is coming to Washington and asking for an override of all state legislation across the board on everything that could in fact deal with protection against AI and the environment,
38:42 Speaker 05 AI and its impact on workers, AI and its impact on civil rights, AI and its impact on children. All of it is now subject to a real threat from the Trump administration, from the most extreme elements in the Trump administration, and from the most extreme elements in the AI industry. We're at a real juncture right now where the power is now concentrated so fully in the hands of those who have great wealth that there is a real danger that we could have an AI revolution be unleashed without the safeguards that we know have to be put in place.
39:27 Speaker 05 Yesterday, I did a press conference introducing my AI Civil Rights Act with the civil rights leaders of the United States, Black Caucus members from the House of Representatives, Cory Booker and others, talking about the need for us to have a movement of all of those civil rights protections which have been out in the physical world be moved over to AI. Otherwise, we're going to see discrimination in housing, in education, in applications for financing, for mortgages, all across the board. And we have to act right now. In the early, in earlier eras of the introduction of new technologies.
40:12 Speaker 05 The federal government, state and local governments, they moved in. When the automobile was deployed, public policymakers said, you got to have brakes, you got to have airbags, got to have seatbelts, got to have rearview mirrors, got to have some Godreals, got to have some safety. We like the idea of an automobile, we just don't like the idea of the law of unintended consequences being unleashed to the max. That's what's happening with AI right now. We know what the safeguards have to look like. We know what protections have to be built in. It would not inhibit our ability to compete against the Chinese.
40:49 Speaker 04 One of the functions here is congressional oversight, which is, I would say, has been at a low point throughout the Trump administration so far. But Brian Carr is coming to testify in front of Congress on December 17th. What's your goal there? Do you think you can meaningfully get him to change his behavior, or are you just trying to figure out what he's doing?
41:06 Speaker 05 Well, I was heartened that Senator Cruz was very critical of the Kimmel controversy. So I'm hoping that it's bipartisan. I'm hoping that people are willing to stand up and to ensure that the Federal Communications Commission knows that there is bipartisan concern about this censorship that Carr is seeking to impose upon the media. At the same time, I brought out two resolutions onto the Senate floor, one on the Kimmel situation, a resolution condemning it, and a Republican senator got up and objected. Then, when the Seth Meyers situation unfolded, I brought out a resolution onto the Senate
41:51 Speaker 05 floor, debated it, then the Republican got up to just object to it even being considered. So while I appreciate the fact that Senator Cruz stepped up, I'm still awaiting any evidence to convict other Republicans of being guilty of actually standing up for the First Amendment, standing up to fight for the rights of comedians and news gatherers to be able to present the information as they see fit and not after having received a permission slip from the White House or the FCC.
42:24 Speaker 04 We have to take another short break. We'll be right back.
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45:05 Speaker 04 Welcome back. I'm talking with Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey. And I wanted to ask him how he perceives the apparent split in the Trump coalition between the hardcore tech bros on one side and the America First MAGA caucus on the other.
45:20 Speaker 04 I know you said it's hard for you to read the minds of MAGA members of Congress. But at least from where I sit, there's a pretty notable split between what you might call the tech part of Trump's coalition and the MAGA part, the populist part of Trump's coalition. And the idea that the tech companies and the AI companies should run unfettered over public policy is running directly into the more populist impulses of the Trump coalition, the MAGA part of the coalition. Are you experiencing that split in the Congress? Certainly, we've seen, you know, Marjorie Taylor Greene is going to retire from Congress. There's something happening there where it seems like the tech bros are not as ascendant or is not as unchecked as they might have been early on in the Trump administration.
46:03 Speaker 05 Well, you're right. Hell was freezing over back in July when there had been an insertion of an AI moratorium into the one big, beautiful bill coming over from the House that the Republicans really didn't know about at the rank and file level. But when it came over to the Senate, it was Marjorie Taylor Greene and Ed Markey. Yeah, hell's freezing over. Pigs are flying. We're agreeing that that language should not be allowed to pass in the Senate as well, and it was taken out. So there is some recombinant political DNA that is now being created. And it's, I think...
46:45 Speaker 05 Kind of heartening at a certain level that some Republicans at some level are willing now to stand up to the tech bros and to say, no, we need some safeguards, we need some protections. To the extent to which Marsha Blackburn is doing it, Marjorie Taylor Greene is doing it. We actually then had a vote on the Senate floor at like two in the morning on that provision and it passed ninety-nine to one on the Senate floor to delete that moratorium on a ban on AI at the state level in terms of new legislation. Right now, they're trying to insert that into the Defense Bill.
47:21 Speaker 04 Yep.
47:22 Speaker 05 And my own belief is that, go ahead, test us. I think we can put together a coalition here to really raise such a stink about the sanct or sanct Defense Bill that if you try to include a ban on any, you know, AI legislation at the state level, that you just might run into a bipartisan coalition that no one has seen on a Defense Bill in the history of our country.
47:45 Speaker 04 The architect of that bill, we've heard, is David Sacks, who is the White House crypto and AI czar. There's a lot of conversation about his investments, about his potential conflicts of interest, just about what kind of character he is inside the Trump administration. The distinction I've been drawing is there's sort of the formal policymaking process, right? There's the front door. There's the FCC and there's Congress and there's bills and committees. And then there's the Trump world, the back door, right? Where things happen and don't happen, things are announced on Truth Social and maybe they're real, maybe they're not. And that's the David Sacks world. Have you interacted with David Sacks? Have you seen how that side of the House is operating? And how much is it influencing what Congress is actually doing?
48:26 Speaker 05 No, I have not met David Sacks. I would have a fifty percent chance of picking him out of a lineup of two people. So I have absolutely no idea who he is and what he does in the White House, except to the extent to which that eye-opening expose in the New York Times last week laid out.
48:46 Speaker 05 What he is doing that enriches himself, enriches Trump's allies, is almost indifferent to what the impact might be upon a policy that serves the American people rather than the enriching of a small number of well-connected Americans and overseas allies. So that needs a lot more attention. We're limited in terms of our ability to actually subpoena people as Democrats. The Republicans control the House and Senate, although I would say the election in the first week of November is highly predictive that that will not be the case in one more year, and they should start to get ready in the Republican Party to have
49:29 Speaker 05 a blizzard of subpoenas be sent their way. They're now under a year away from having those subpoenas be sent their way. But yeah, it's frightening what is going on. And at the bottom line, I just see self-enrichment as the core of what the agenda is.
49:48 Speaker 04 I'm really just trying to draw the connection. The reason that preemption of state AI laws keeps coming back up again is because of whatever is happening in Trump world, right? Like, that group of people has this idea that there should not be state-level AI laws, and then it keeps showing up in the Congress, and you might have to keep voting it down. Can you make that connection more clear for your colleagues, for the American people? Because it is strange that there are shadowy back rooms full of special advisers to the President who might have conflicts of interest, getting bills on the floor of the Congress in this way, over and over again, even after they've been voted down.
50:22 Speaker 05 Well, I think that happens on every bill. We can't quite see what Stephen Miller does every day.
50:31 Speaker 04 Well, he's on X. He's just being racist on X.
50:34 Speaker 05 What I'm saying, just in terms of what conversations preceded whatever call that is then made by Steve Miller up to the leadership of the House and Senate Republicans. We don't know everything that is going on. But Sacks fits into that profile as well as several other people who work in the White House right now. And it's all part of this kind of very... You know, very clandestine, cozy coterie of people who are very close to the president, who slosh between public policy and private self-aggrandizement, who do the bidding of
51:13 Speaker 05 the president, who understands what the agenda is for Trump's children and for the children of others who are inside of the Trump administration in terms of their ability to become fabulously wealthy. And I think everyone understands it. There's an old saying that it's hard to understand something when you're paid not to understand it. That's where we are right now with the Republican leadership. They're paid not to understand it. They can see it on a daily basis, and the revolt has to come from the rank and file. The revolt comes from Marjorie Taylor Greene, it comes from Marsha Blackburn inside of their own party. And my own belief is that they're in very dangerous terrain right now with this AI
51:58 Speaker 05 revolution. Very, very dangerous terrain. They don't understand the public revolt which is building against a small coterie of super wealthy people in conjunction with the Trump administration making decisions for 340 million people. They're going to pay a big political price down the line.
52:15 Speaker 04 Let me ask about that revolt more generally, and specifically about the Democrats. You brought up midterms. Obviously, there was the election just recently. The Verge is based in New York. We're inundated with Sirhan Mindani every day. He's obviously a phenomenon in the party, appears to be a phenomenon with Donald Trump himself. Those are some adorable photos of the two of them together. You know, our audience perceives both parties as being out of touch, as being beholden to billionaires or outside interests in some way. You're obviously, you've been in the Senate for a long time, you're turning 80 next July, you have a primary opponent in Seth Moulton, who's 47. Does the current Democratic leadership have the fight it needs? Are they also paid to not see it? Because I hear from our audience that what they want is younger, more energetic people who are going to take the fight to Trump more directly, in maybe a way that Chuck Schumer hasn't.
52:59 Speaker 05 Well, first of all, it's not your age, it's the age of your ideas. So I'm still the youngest guy in the room. I've introduced the legislation, AI and workers, AI and the environment, AI and social media, AI and civil rights. So I've introduced the legislation. It's not easy to get cosponsors, by the way. People don't really want to sign up. Young or old, okay? Just so you understand, it has nothing to do with age. It has to do with, as I said earlier, backbone, backbone, backbone. I'm willing to take on the most powerful, wealthy people in the history of the world. That's what it's all about. And I think that's what the public is getting very, very concerned about. It's that they see a government unable
53:39 Speaker 05 to muster the courage to take on these powerful forces that are basically reshaping our society. And so that's been at the heart of my entire career, building in the safeguards from the E-rate to make sure that every kid gets the education they need, paid for by the media companies, paid for by the communications companies, safeguards for children online. That's my 1998 law, which I'm trying to update up to age 17 and under for families. It has nothing to do, though, with what the age is of people who are willing to step up and fight the... A lot of young people, actually, they're kind of enthralled by the AI industry.
54:21 Speaker 05 You know, they kind of buy into this whole idea that, oh, if there's any regulation at all, you'll be responsible for not finding the cure for cancer. And so they want to be part of this generation. And so what we need is young and old willing to stand up to them. That's what it's all about.
54:39 Speaker 04 Let me take age out of it. The thing people are really seeking is vigor and values, right? You mentioned that there's probably some sort of tsunami coming for Republican leadership as the rank and file splits, as MAGA splits from the tech bros. Do you think there's one coming for Democratic leadership? Do you think the current Democratic leadership can lead this fight?
54:56 Speaker 05 Well, we're fighting on healthcare. We're fighting on these tech issues. We're fighting on environmental, educational issues. We just saw a big return on that on election day in November of 2025. That exceeded the expectations of all of the experts out there observing what was going on. Thirteen and 15-point victories in Virginia and in New Jersey. And... There's now polling out there at 12, 13 points that people are more likely to vote for a Democrat for the House and for the Senate next year.
55:39 Speaker 05 And so that is what I think is going to frighten the Republican Party. Because that translates into a 60-seat victory for the Democrats next year. 60-seat victory. So our message is working, but Democrats just have to stand up, they have to fight to make sure that AI is controlled in a way that is compatible with our American political and moral traditions. We have to stand up to ICE. We have to make sure that we're not allowing for masked agents to be sweeping people up off the streets the way they did with Ramazza Öztürk and thousands of others across our
56:23 Speaker 05 country on an ongoing basis. We have to show that as a Democratic Party, that we understand, that Donald Trump is a walking, talking constitutional crisis every day that he's in the Oval Office. And we have to align ourselves with the No Kings movement. We have to align ourselves with Indivisible. We have to align ourselves with 50/51 and all the other organizations which are out there, who are standing up and saying, "No, we're going to fight for democracy. We're 250 years in." And those... I'll tell you what people want to hear. Those minute men and minute women, they got knocked down, but they got back up and they fought and they won against King George. The abolitionist movement, they got knocked down. They got back up, they fought, they won.
57:07 Speaker 05 The suffragette movement, they got knocked down. They were not knocked out. They got up, they fought, they won. The civil rights movement, Martin Luther King Jr., that whole movement, they were knocked down. They were not knocked out. They got up, they fought, they won. That's where we are right now. We were knocked down, but we're not knocked out. And that's what the No Kings movement is all about. That's what the Democratic Party has to be all about. Has to be about that movement.
57:31 Speaker 04 Let me just push you on this a little bit. Do you think Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries are as aligned with that messaging and with the No Kings movement? And that the aggressive fight against this administration is you are right now, the way you're talking to me?
57:44 Speaker 05 Well, it's what won the election on.
57:47 Speaker 04 That's not what I asked. I asked if the leaders of Congress, the Democratic leaders of Congress are aligned with what you're saying.
57:52 Speaker 05 Well, I'll tell you what. I think a year from today, we're going to see that we've won the House overwhelmingly and we very well may win the United States Senate. And let's, at that point, then be making our judgments about what this movement is and what the message has been that is now winning out there. The Republicans have a big problem in the next four weeks because 22 million Americans are about to lose their healthcare or see a 50 to 75% increase in their healthcare premiums. So they're about to have nitro meat glycerin political. And, and the Democrats are aligned 100% on that issue to ensure that the Republicans are made accountable for the pain they're about to inflict upon the American people. So that's our job. We have to, we have to stay organized.
58:37 Speaker 05 We have to stay focused. And if we do it, I think that the American people next year will resoundingly throw out the Republicans and then in the House and Senate, give us the subpoena power we need to ultimately have to almost buy a paper mill for all of the subpoenas we're going to be sending over, not just to the Trump administration, but to all of those people out there who have been enriching themselves at the expense of the American people.
59:02 Speaker 04 Yeah. Senator Markey, this has been a great conversation. You gotta come back faster than five years next time. I look forward to the oversight you intend to conduct.
59:08 Speaker 05 Love you and thank you.
59:12 Speaker 04 I'd like to thank Senator Markey for taking time to join Decoder and thank you for listening. I hope you enjoyed it. Now is the best possible time to drop a slime. We're about to record our end of year special with your questions and comments, so get them in while you can. You can email us at [email protected] . We really do read all the emails. Or you can hit me up directly on Threads or Blue Sky. We're also on YouTube. You can watch full episodes at DecoderPod. We also have a TikTok and an Instagram. They're at DecoderPod as well. A lot of fun. If you like Decoder, please share it with your friends and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Decoder is production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. The show is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt. It's edited by Ursa Wright. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. We'll see you next time.
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