Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by thanking Congressman DeSaulnier not only for organizing this important Special Order hour and saving local news, but for his enthusiastic and really passionate leadership on this issue. I think the graphs that my friend from California presented tonight are an illustration of how grave the problem is and how essential it is that we develop a solution to help preserve our local newspapers, because I think we all recognize that our democracy is strongest when we have a free and diverse press that informs citizens, holds concentrated power accountable, and roots out corruption. There are examples all across the country of local newspapers doing heroic investigative work uncovering corruption, holding power to account, and sharing important information with folks at the local level. As Justice Brandeis wrote in 1927, those who won our independence believed that public discussion is a political duty, that the greatest threat to freedom is an uninformed citizenry, and that the freedom of thought and speech are indispensable to the discovery and spread of political truth. But today, as you have so eloquently argued, these bedrock constitutional values are facing existential threats by the new gatekeepers of information, the dominant platforms. Last year, Facebook and Google amassed more than $60 billion from online advertising, the majority of all online ad revenue.…”