AICOA Rises from the Grave, Still Looking for a Theory of Harm
AICOA is back from the dead, and this time it has learned a few new tricks—mostly how to lower liability thresholds, raise defense burdens, and keep treating “Big Tech” as if capitalization were a theory of harm. The American Innovation and Choice Online Act has failed twice before. Its latest incarnation is not so much a fresh start as a sequel nobody ordered.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) “introduced” AICOA last week. Co-sponsors include Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), and Cory Booker (D-N.J.). Here is the bill’s text, at least as introduced.
“Introduced” is technically correct as a matter of process. And, as far as I know, this precise text string has not been introduced before. But we have seen pretty darn similar bills, under the same title, from Klobuchar before. AICOA appeared as S. 2992 in the 117th Congress (we’ll call that AICOA 1.0) and S. 2033 in the 118th Congress (AICOA 1.1). There have been changes along the way, but the essentially bad idea remains, in essence, bad.
I don’t know whether AICOA 1.2’s bite at the apple will lead to anything more than the others did. There’s rather a lot going on, and I think I read something about an election to be held in November of this year. My best guess is that this version, too, will not pass.
Then again, I lack a crystal ball. And there is bipartisan interest—not least among populists on the right and the left—in doing something to the sector. So I’m less sanguine about all this than I’d like to be. Is the third time the curse?