MSNBC "The Rachel Maddow Show" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Amy Klobuchar

Interview

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Joining us now is Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota.

Senator, it`s good to see you again. Thank you for joining us tonight.

I have to wonder, you get so granular. Pleasure to have you here.

(CROSSTALK)

KLOBUCHAR: I enjoyed it. Thank you.

VELSHI: You get so granular in your discussions. I`m grateful that you do. But if you pull back, the issue is in hearing after hearing, there is an issue with tech companies writ large, not just Facebook, and the fact that they are helpful in some places and they are handy in some places. But they`re really dangerous.

And Roger McNamee was having whether or not there should be something like the FDA for technology in America, something that says this is dangerous, this is unsafe, and we need to figure out a way to regulate it.

KLOBUCHAR: So, I`m hoping that we broke the trend today. The trend is hearings. Maybe we get great information. Maybe the senators ask probing questions or the House member and nothing happened because every corner you turn is a lobbyist. More and more people that are paid for by tech, big surprise nothing`s gotten done.

And I think this witness today, Frances Haugen, is her name, I think she`s going to be a catalyst for change. Maybe people just had a step back sitting in that Senate hearing room and said wait a minute, this is my kids, this is my grandkids. They are putting profits in front of people. That is our own profit model, collecting data on you, targeting you with ads. And lo and behold, more suicidal thoughts on behalf of these young girls, targeting really bad information when it comes to eating disorders to kids.

And I think this is the moment that we need it because what can we do? Privacy legislation. A complete change in our economy over the last decade, no change to federal privacy legislation. We need to do something about our competition policy, Ali. That is what I`ve been advocating for, so these dominate platforms can`t decide to put their own products at the top or do things that will exclude competitors from succeeding at the cost of competition.

And then, finally, we have to do something more to protect kids online and make these algorithms which literally give profits to these companies to make them more transparent.

VELSHI: So, some of us -- it makes a lot of sense. In fact it seems to be a bipartisan slam dunk. In the world before the world we live in -- and you`ve been dealing with this for a long time. While there were people you could get on both sides of the aisle into this. Why isn`t this -- why doesn`t have this have overwhelming majorities in the house and Senate of people who get off the soap box about whether conservatives are being hidden behind serve things on social media and just say these things you just outlined -- algorithms, privacy, antitrust -- these seem to be easy.

[21:30:05]

KLOBUCHAR: Well, they`re not easy, and the companies have thrived on the fact that they`re not easy. And when things aren`t in immediate crisis sometimes -- and maybe people are starting to view what`s happening to our democracy, what`s happening to our kids as they make them addicted to these platforms. Maybe they are starting to see this as a crisis. And that will precipitate action.

So, what do I see? One, there`s bipartisan support for increasing resources to the agency. That`s about the agency. For Federal Trade Commission and for the Department of Justice and Trust Division, Senator Grassley and I passed a bill through the Senate that will add over 100 million to the agencies for enforcement. Number two, there`s bipartisan support as you can see from the word of Senator Blumenthal, Senator Markey and others on doing steps to protect kids. There are bipartisan action growing over in the house with Cicilline and Buck with Senator Lee and myself and many others to finally take on competition policy.

And again that means stopping this exclusionary conduct where we learn with the app stores that they`re charging certain companies like Spotify and match.com 30 percent of the revenue. This is from Apple and Google.

And finally, the privacy. That has been so incredibly frustrating. Recently Apple said to their customers, okay, we`ll protect your data and it`s your choice, 75 percent chose to protect their data.

VELSHI: Yeah.

KLOBUCHAR: Chose to not have their data be spread. We know the numbers. That`s why the rest of these platforms aren`t doing this, and I think that has to change.

VELSHI: There`s a Facebook post by Mark Zuckerberg with whom you`ve spoken with in many times in testimony. He said the argument that we deliberately pushed content that makes people angry for profit is deeply illogical. We make money from ads and advertisers consistently tell us they don`t want their ads next to harmful or angry content. And I don`t know any tech company that sets out to build products that make people angry or depressed. The moral business and product incentives all point in the opposite direction.

What do you make of that?

KLOBUCHAR: First of all, he was welcome. You know, we would love to see him, but he was sailing today.

But the second thing I would like to say is that the witness, the whistleblower so well addressed it. She said, look, they might not have intended to make their profit that way, but the metrics -- they give everything to these metrics, and they base it on the most heated and polarized content. Negative content, as you know. And that`s what got out.

And they have not done enough to police it. The whistleblower who are worked within the company, has suggested something like only 10 percent to 20 percent at most of this content gets caught. She talked about the fact that the violent content, they don`t have enough as I asked in that original question that you played. Human eyes, people looking at this.

This is over a trillion dollar company, Ali. And they don`t have enough people moderating this content and looking at this content. And so he may not have intended this, but what he intended to do, he`s done. And that makes tons of money to the tune of $50 for every user per quarter.

That is the stats they just put out. On you, Ali, 50 bucks a quarter, that`s what they`re making by getting your data.

VELSHI: That last point is very interesting, the fact they don`t have enough human eyes to curate the stuff.

Senator, always good to talk tow. Thank you for being with us tonight.

KLOBUCHAR: Thank you.

VELSHI: Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source