Finally, something both sides of the aisle can agree on: social media companies are too powerful.
According to a Pew Research Center surveyAccording to 78% of American adults, social media companies have too much influence on politics – to break it down by party, that is 84% of Republicans surveyed and 74% of Democrats. Overall, this view has grown 6% more popular since the last presidential election year.
Americans' feelings about social media mirror those of their lawmakers. Some of the few political activities that have recently received significant bipartisan support are efforts to hold social media platforms accountable. Senators Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) have been working across the board on their Kids Online Safety Act, a bill that would impose a duty of care on social media platforms to keep children safe. However, some privacy advocates have criticized the bill's potential to make adults more vulnerable to government surveillance.
Meanwhile, Senators Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) have also forged an unlikely partnership to submit a bill that would create a commission that would oversee major tech platforms.
“The only thing worse than me introducing a bill with Elizabeth Warren is her introducing a bill with me,” Graham said at a Senate hearing in January.
It's clear why Americans think tech companies have too much political power: Since the 2020 survey, social platforms were used to coordinate an attack on the Capitol, and as a result a sitting president was banned from those platforms for inciting those attacks. Meanwhile, the government is so concerned about the influence of Chinese-owned TikTok that President Biden just signed a bill that could ban the app for good.
But the views of conservative and liberal Americans diverge when it comes to tech company bias. While 71% of Republicans surveyed said big tech favors liberal perspectives over conservative perspectives, 50% of Democrats said tech companies support each set of positions equally. Only 15% of adults overall said tech companies support conservatives over liberals.
These survey results make sense given the rise of explicitly conservative social platforms, such as Rumble, Parler, and Trump's own Truth Social app.
During Biden's presidency, government agencies such as the FTC and DOJ have increased their focus on technology companies. Some of the country's largest companies, such as Amazon, Apple and Meta, have faced major lawsuits alleging monopolistic behavior. But according to the Pew survey, only 16% of American adults believe tech companies should be less regulated than they are now. This percentage has grown since 2021, when Pew found that value to be 9%.
Liberals and conservatives may not agree on everything when it comes to technology policy, but the overriding perspective from this survey is clear: Americans are tired of the outsized influence of big tech.
