Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome alix fraser, the honorable richard gephardt, farrow candace, eli frazier, anatole and nicole tisdale. [applause] just waiting on one more here. Mic challenges. While were waiting, its a pleasure to be with you, audience, but for me personally, its a true privilege to be with this panel, an Incredible Group of people, many of whom i get to work with on a regular basis on the council for responsible social media. As ive sat here these last few days and listened to these conversations and grappled with the core of what were trying to do and understand, ive come to one central question, can our democracy survive if something isnt changed in our information environment . And of course at the core of that is social media, which is what were here to talk about today, technology. And its become the dominant form of communication. Its becoming the predominant way in which people get their information and news, particularly for young people. And what has this world resulted in today . Very different conversation if we were having this conference 20 years ago. Well, what it resulted in is mass spread of false information flooding the airwaves, creeping into our minds. It resulted in the worst Mental Health crisis ever for young people where we see 2 3 of young people saying theyre anxious more than half of the time. Self harm has increased threefold for young girls. Its remarkable what happened to our democracy. We think where congressman gephardt served in the United States house of representatives. We find it hard to understand how these are the same institutions. You think of how practitioners it is. We didnt have a speaker of the house for three weeks. Bipartisanship seems to have died. So much more has changed in the era of social media, not to mention our foreign adversaries are licking their chops and using every opportunity they can to divide us further, to spread disinformation and so much more. So i paint this picture for you all because its really important to understand what the center of this is, which is a broken Business Model we heard a lot about last night from cara swisher, which is about engagement. Keeping your eyes on the platforms with the most powerful, addictive technologies ever created, sucking you in to they earn more money. And through those Business Models, we see then powerful algorithms to keep us in information silos or worse, radicalized people in very profound ways. Now we have to deal with degenerative a. I. And all that thrown in the mix of this cycle. I just painted a dreary picture for you. But i promise you this is the optimistic panel. Were here to tell you theres real genuine hope because we can im seeing signs every day for the possibilities of change. With that im going to turn now to our distinguished panel and start with the issue of kids. Many of you may have seen in january, the c. E. O. s of the Big Tech Companies came to washington and were dressed down universally across the aisle, so much so Mark Zuckerberg was compelled to apologize to grieving parents in the room. It was a rare moment of bipartisanship, a glimmer of hope there is possibility to do stuff with both parties. And that is best demonstrated by the kids Online Safety act which has 67 cosponsors in the senate, just introduced in the house this weekend, something we have been working on very intensely. While we care about the future of our kids and the health of their mental state and so much more, it has profound effects for democracy and what were talking about as well. My question, well start with congressman gephardt. Outside of the Immediate Impact on our children and safety, why is kosa so important for our broader tech reform effort and how can it have a bigger impact on our information environment and democracy . Mr. Gephardt we need a win. We have not had a win since the beginning of social media. They run the show. They have got all of the money. We have not had a win. We believe that kosa can be passed this year and sent to the president. Crs and is crsm is a totally bipartisan organization. We have 40 to 50 members, very diverse, from all different selectors of this problem, and were working topdown, a lot of the groups that are great that are here are working bottomup to fix this problem. You need both topdown and bottomup. And we go up on the hill and talk to republican members, democratic members, and ive never been more optimistic than i am today that were going to get legislation done this year as the beginning of dealing with this problem. [applause] alix anyone else want to chime in on the importance of kids Online Safety and how this could impact the environment . Having worked on the issue of young people getting radicalized for the last 20plus years since 9 11, is that we learned a lot about the process of radicalization and how ideas can be weaponized. We have across the board, both from conservative and liberal entities, universities, as well as think tanks and nonprofit organizations done a lot of thinking around what we can be doing to be able to protect young people. What was just said about we need a win is extremely important because theres been so much failure along the way. Weve failed our children and failed the future of the american leadership, whether or not they are going into the Public Sector or private sector, were looking at generations of young people for whom these ideas are really compelling and if we dont do more today to be able to build a safety net for our future generations of americans, what are we doing . So i couldnt agree more on the issue of we need a win. But i will also say that win can be backed up by data we didnt have 20 years ago and we have today. Eli i really appreciate the optimism. Theres kind of been a learned helplessness about this problem, that, like, we cant do anything about it. And i think thats pernicious and starting to change. And, you know, the conference has democracy in the title, but digitally we live essentially in kind of these autocracies. We operate in, you know, corporate environments that people have no say in, they have no rights in. I think shaking that off and starting to think about how do we as citizens govern our information environment is a really critical step that we need to kind of take. So this is a start to that. Nicole ill add to what everyone is saying. But also, i want our optimism to the empowering. I always tell people these social Media Companies owe us, yall. We use their the platform, they make money off of us, they operate in an open society. All of that is the foundation of a democracy. So while im very optimistic, im also really forceful about this is no longer were asking you, we are demanding accountability and were demanding transparency. We are demanding these social Media Companies do their part to uphold democracy. Im very forceful and passionate about that because i think thats also included in how we get the win. We stop asking and start demanding. [applause] alix more collapse. Lets go now to National Security and were fortunate enough to have some real National Security experts with us here on stage. Russia, china, iran, and others regularly interfere in our elections, polarize us further, spread false information through disinformation campaigns and much more. The house recently passed a bill to essentially ban tiktok. Its taken up to the senate and President Biden said hell sign this bill into law. The reason for this is there are concerns about data, the c. C. P. Access to Sensitive Data and the ability to manipulate the algorithm advantageous to the communist party and not american policy. Farah, starting with you, does this approach make sense and expanding that further, what else can congress and the u. S. Government do to most effectively protect u. S. National security when it comes to foreign platforms like tiktok and our own companies domestically . Farah thats a real critical question youre asking and i want to scope out a bit before i get into the nittygritty of what we can do in terms of solutions. Because solutions are available and affordable right now. Thats the headline. Lets take a step back and think about what human aspects we assets we have. Outside of time, which is in fact the most precious asset that we have, our own human data and information is the next in line. And what we are talking about today in the world we have constructed, and its not just america but around the world. That data has been used and its part of our daily life. We cant live without sharing data and what food you eat or what clothes you buy, all this stuff. Its part and parcel of how we live. But for the average american, we arent they arent waking up every day wondering what russia and china and other nonstate actors like an isis or hamas or a neonazi group might be thinking. For those of us who have been doing foreign policy, we think about those alongside whats happening domestically and that domestic piece for me is part of what i think is most compelling. Because we are not living in the in the 1950s. We are in 2024 where international and domestic have emerged. I remember very strongly when i was working in the bush administration, during 9 11, you guys will remember perhaps the danish cartoon crisis, where something that happened in copenhagen affected lives in kabul. We were ready as america to understand, we didnt know what viral meant. We didnt understand something that had moved along in europe could make our troops vulnerable. People lost their lives. All over the world because of that cartoon. Begin to understand that in fact, these ideas and the ricocheting effect of how these things get spread, this is way back in 2006, 2007 when we did not have twitter or x, and other social platforms. Even the most basic things. For me, as i think about this, and is somebody who has spent my career thinking about the ideas about extremism and how bad actors use these platforms, i think about my own country and i think about what do americans need to understand about things that are being shown on youtube, or conversations happening on discord, or conversations happening on twitch, if you dont know what twitch is, take a look. And why that matters to their daily lives. Because your ability to behave as americans can be manipulated by states and nonstates. Away we are as americans will change because there are adversaries that want that to happen. If we begin to understand that we should not be duped, and if we begin to understand that we have an opportunity today to take everything that we have learned about all of the things that we know, and to build fortifications away are not duped, that we are protecting american societies, that we understand very critically that there is not this moment where we put our hands up and think, oh my goodness, it is too hard, we are boiling the ocean. No, we are not boiling the ocean. We are taking a very confident, and very focused approach to how we build resilience. That resilience can happen the way i described it to people is there are nano interventions, there are micro interventions, there are micro interventions, and there are mega interventions. It is not just government that needs to make laws or policymakers that need to move. It is also regular citizens who think about their own fortification of their communities, and what we stand for as americans. For me, the National Security point, yes, of course, we are worried about china taking advantage of an american society, of course we care that a platform like tiktok can mobilize a change in american behavior. Of course we care that there is propaganda being put forward by russia that is making us think differently and act differently. But we should also care that the very nature of who we are as americans are changing. People who are not americans are deciding that is what they want to do. The way in which we approach this, the solution side, one piece of this, of course, is the tiktok component. But it is much bigger than that. It is a holistic assessment of who we are, what we stand for, and what guardrails we want to put on society so we are not duped. Alix thank you for that. Nicole, you spent time in the white house and Congress Working on these issues directly. Tell us your perspective what can we do and what are the biggest cap biggest threat . You are concerned about . Nicole just to echo her point, i want to say this. Im comfortable because im from mississippi and in front of a texas crowd, but two things can be true. We are all getting these questions about, what about the tiktok ban . You can support, which i support the tiktok ban and decentralizing who owns tiktok and who has the ability to demand the data of the people who are on the platform, and it is not enough. That is what i tell people. This false equivalent that people are giving you that you can only have one. Thats not true. We can do hard things. Yes, its going to be hard to decentralize tiktok and hold American SocialMedia Companies responsible. But we can do that. When i think about from a National Security standpoint, one of the reasons im so passionate about this is because farahs point is right. It is not just the peoples republic of china, its not just iran or russia. These influence campaigns, and im cognizant to not call them disinformation, because all of the information is not all not false or misleading. Some of the best influence campaigns are because they are spreading kernels of truth, they are saying things that are not totally false. They are not totally misleading. The examples i use are i am a black woman. When i hear people say it is disinformation to say that some people dont want you to vote. I look around and see what is happening to black voters, hispanic voters and indigenous voters. It is not false or misleading to say that some people dont want us to vote. The source matters. If russia is saying that they dont want you to vote, the american politicians dont want you to vote, i know what happens in russia. No people vote out of fear of being jailed. It matters to me when russia is spreading influence operations and spreading information because the source matters. When you hear i am also a woman. When you hear that the peoples republic of china are doing influence campaigns saying american politicians dont care about a womans autonomy of her body, it matters because it is coming out of china. That is true that also doesnt care. Difference between when russia says it, when china says it, and when it happens in the United States as we live in a democracy. There is an option, there is a process, there is due process for a change. I tell people, im not happy with what the Supreme Court did as it relates to womens rights. But there was a process. We are in a place now where congress can come in and asking in that process and change. You dont have that in russia. You dont have that in china. Whatever they say is the law or is the rule, that is the role. Think getting people to be empowered to understand, sources matter, also our communities are not in a place where we cant understand that. I think that was a very quick summation of what happens in russia and china. Is see people nodding. I know people understand that. You have to be able to, from a National Security standpoint, but this stuff and context for people so that they understand that we cant have this on our social media platforms. These companies have a level of her sponsor ability that we are just enforcing. If you are going to operate, if you are going to have us on your platform, you have to acknowledge when your platform is being used for bad. Alix im going to pivot us to another creative and optimistic possibility. Elizabeth warren, lindsey graham, dont have much in common. Pretty much dont agree on anything. Last year, they came together and proposed to the creation of a new Digital Regulatory Agency to oversee technology and social media. It is the most clarifying. When one issue happened on Alaska Airlines flight, one issue, no one is hurt, but it is one serious issue, hundreds of planes are down for months, billions of dollars in lost revenue for companies. Lasting applications for boeing. Yet when products are wreaking havoc on social media causing immense harm in summoning ways that we have talked about, there is nobody that oversees that dedicated just to that cause to say, we will take down this product, test this product. My question, lets start with eli. Do you think some sort of structural change like this agency is necessary to bring oversight, and beyond this proposal, are there any other Structural Solutions you make a great point. We have federal bodies, just about anything you can think of, but we dont have a body that is holistically responsible for regulating the place where i have young kids. This is a big part of the environment that unfortunately, they will be growing up into. We dont have anyone who is at the wheel of the ship there. So yes. I want to stretch the conversation a little bit, because i think these questions of regulation are absolutely in, in the sense that if we were talking about Public Education and we were only talking about regularly regulating private schools, that would not be a full conversation about how you secure education for a population. If we were talking about making sure everyone had access to information in libraries, regulating stores will not get you to the goal. Regulating bookstores will not get you to the goal. I think we need to think about it that way for our Digital Spaces. Our friend has a great story about ben franklin in the post office. Ben franklin is mostly known for her keys and lightning, but the post office was a critical visionary invention in early america that subsidize the ability of people to very easily trade information. So many people worked for the post office, that you can describe america in the early days, and this is his words, as a post office with a small military. That is what we wear. That was critical, when you talk about going around america and seeing this Civic Society that was emergi