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"House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is pushing to strip out sweeping legal protections for online content in the new trade pact with Mexico and Canada, in what would be a blow for big technology companies," the Wall Street Journal reports.
The big picture: There is ongoing debate over exporting the all-important Section 230 provision of the 1996 Communications Decency Act — which protects Facebook, Google and other platforms from legal responsibility for harmful content that its users post — across North America in a trade agreement.
- The current iteration of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) would uphold Section 230, but Pelosi and other lawmakers say it would be "inappropriate" for the U.S. to export such a law while the policy is still under review domestically in Congress.
- Big Tech firms wanted the language included in the agreement, creating a "broad umbrella of legal protection" throughout the continent.
What's next: "There is no guarantee that Mrs. Pelosi and like-minded lawmakers will be successful," but if they are, it could preview another political front in the ongoing techlash.
Go deeper: A new attack on social media's immunity