Democrats and Republicans Will Try to Ram Through Big Tech Reform Without a Single Hearing – Opinion

Yesterday, Joe Biden traveled to Georgia to push for federal election “reforms” that critics say would federalize elections and take power away from states like Georgia and Texas where setting their own election laws are concerned.

This is a major priority for Democrats; the general perception among them is that they cannot win in 2022 unless they force at least some of these “reforms” through. Republicans will oppose these changes, knowing that elections were always state affairs and they prioritize federalism. Republicans are also cognizant that Democrats have also been monkeying around with congressional procedure in order to jam the massively expensive “Build Back Better”/“Build Back Broke” bill down everyone’s throat. The Democrats opted to not run the bill through its normal committee process. This led Joe Manchin to bail on the bill.

So, there is plenty of evidence the Democrats want to break all the rules in order to achieve their goals (though they will continue to make erroneous claims that it’s the RepublicansWho are trying to destroy democracy and the norms of society?

All of this is to provide context to something more procedurally corrupt that Democrats will try to do this week. On Thursday, Senate Judiciary Committee (which is opposed to staunch conservatives such as Sen. Mike Lee), will begin to mark up the antitrust legislation Amy Klobuchar has pushed. It won’t even hold a hearing.

Once again, it’s all part of an overall pattern. Democrats have abandoned the norms of Congress in favor of passing legislation they believe will benefit them politically. This is happening because polls show Joe Biden is in serious trouble and Republicans hold a significant advantage which is likely to result in them winning an overwhelming majority of the November elections. It’s not accidental that it occurs at a time voters are worried about inflation, and Biden appears set to worsen it.

Although conservatives have spoken out loudly about Big Tech, they now support Democrats as they see the opportunity to regulate these tech companies.

What’s more, the BBB plan figures into all of this: Biden currently has no legislative accomplishments for Democrats to run on in 2022. So they urgently want to pass BBB so they can say they did “something,” even if that “something” will worsen and not alleviate inflation.

This is antitrust legislation. Here’s how it fits into the plan: Far-left Democrats like Elizabeth Warren have convinced the President that if he gets tough on antitrust enforcement, he can tame inflation. This, of course, is not true: As Bill Clinton’s former Treasury Secretary, Larry Summers, has noted, no actual economists— even on the left— think this will be effective and there is a huge degree of unanimity in economists believing antitrust enforcement is useless for controlling inflation. But as we all know, the Democratic Party isn’t exactly in touch with reality, so they’re going to try to make it look like Biden is an inflation hawk who has a handle on the situation by bypassing normal Senate procedure to ram through this antitrust legislation.

Senators Cornyn, Cruz will hold the key to stopping this end run around and forcing hearings on legislation. Rumours have it that both Senators Cornyn and Cruz oppose the procedural move. However, neither has demanded a hearing. I did reach out to Cruz’s office but have thus far not heard back.

Very possibly, in the end, some Republicans will support the bill whenever it eventually comes to a vote anyway, but Republicans— especially from states like Texas— should not be complicit in letting Chuck Schumer and his pals bypass normal Senate practices to help speed up a Joe Biden political win. This is especially true when it comes to the crucial topic of inflation.

Big Tech reform is an issue that Republicans often speak out about. However, I am wary of allying myself with Democrats on this matter. The two parties have very different ways of tackling these issues, and the Democrats’ way of doing it is rarely something Republicans should want to be tied to.

Again, the bill will not succeed in taming inflation, but that’s no reason to speed things up and give Democrats a talking point on their biggest vulnerability any sooner, or aid and abet them as they attempt to dismantle the way the Senate does business.