AEI Report Highlights First Amendment Hurdles for Antitrust Actions Against Tech Platforms, Cites ICLE
Ben Sperry, ICLE Senior Scholar for Innovation Policy, was cited in a new report from the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). The report explores First Amendment challenges to using antitrust law to regulate the content-moderation decisions of social media platforms. Sperry’s work is cited to explain that, while many conservatives allege collusion, the similarity of platforms’ content-moderation standards may simply represent common responses to similar market demands.
“Antitrust concerns expressed in the Technology Platform Censorship RFI didn’t come out of left field. The RFI simply brought into high relief “a years-long, escalating series of claims that digital platforms systematically censor conservative political speech.” As Ben Sperry of the International Center for Law & Economics (ICL&E) wrote in 2021, “Many conservatives . . . see multiple platforms all engaging in very similar content-moderation policies when it comes to certain touchpoint issues, and thus allege widespread anti-conservative bias and collusion.” Sperry points out, however, that “those claims [don’t] have much factual support, but more importantly, the similarity of content-moderation standards may simply be common responses to similar demand structures—not some nefarious and conspiratorial plot.” Nonetheless, the theory that platforms collude to stifle conservative opinions gained traction among Republicans, including those at the FTC.”
Read the full report here.