The Texas House moved this week to crack down on social media companies, passing two bills that would ban kids from the platforms and require warning labels.
The votes followed the Senate’s April 16 passage of a bill that would require app stores to verify users’ ages and require parental permission for minors to download apps.
The push to regulate online spaces is just the latest effort by Texas lawmakers to protect youth. They enacted in 2023 the Securing Children Online Through Parental Empowerment Act, which is aimed at protecting minors’ data and preventing their exposure to harmful content. The tech industry sued last year to overturn the law, and a second 2023 law requiring age verification for adult websites is also under challenge.
“Social media is having a deadly impact on young people,” Rep. Jared Patterson (R), the sponsor of the social media ban bill, said in a floor speech. “This legislation will allow today’s kids to be kids again.”
Patterson’s bill, which he also introduced in 2023, is notable because no state has enacted a blanket ban on minors accessing social media. Last year, Florida lawmakers barred teens under 14 from most platforms while allowing 14- and 15-year-olds to access them with parental permission. That law is also being challenged.
In recent weeks, courts have overturned laws in Arkansas and Ohio requiring parents to sign off on their kids’ use of social media. Trade industry group NetChoice has spearheaded those lawsuits and on Thursday sued Georgia over its 2024 parental permission law.
“Texas lawmakers seem to be not paying attention to recent court decisions which have blocked similar legislation,” Amy Bos, director of state and federal affairs for NetChoice, said in a statement.
She encouraged lawmakers to instead pursue “constitutionally-sound policies” focused on enforcing existing child protection laws and educating kids and parents about digital safety.
The same day Patterson’s bill was passed, the Texas House also approved Rep. Mary González’s (D) social media warning label bill, which would enact a 2024 recommendation from former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy.
Similar bills have been introduced in California, Minnesota and New York this year. The labels would warn users that excessive social media use can lead to mental health issues.
The Texas vote drew praise from the Kids Code Coalition, which advocates for youth online security and privacy and has backed the Age-Appropriate Design Code regulations in multiple states.
“Parents and kids deserve to know that there’s more evidence every day about serious risks social media use poses to kids’ health and wellbeing. That’s why it’s so encouraging to see momentum building in Texas, as well as across the country, to make social media warning labels a reality so kids, parents, and families can stay informed,” Marjorie Connolly, a Kids Code Coalition spokesperson, said in a statement.
The Texas House also passed a pair of González-sponsored bills to regulate AI platforms that allow users to generate sexually explicit deepfakes by uploading a photo of a real person. One of the bills would bar minors from using the apps. The second would allow victims of unauthorized intimate deepfakes to sue for damages.
Read more: Texas bill requires age restrictions on explicit AI sites
While the Texas House is targeting online platforms directly, the Senate’s approach moves upstream to the app stores that are the gateway to social media sites. Utah passed the nation’s first App Store Accountability Act this year, and similar bills have been introduced in more than a dozen states. A federal version of the bill was introduced Thursday.
Texas Sen. Angela Paxton (R) said she modeled her bill on Utah’s law, which places the burden on the app stores to identify users who are minors and require parental permission for them to download apps or make in-app purchases.
“What this bill is doing is … linking the parent and the child so that anytime the child wants to download an app, the parent gets a notification and then can approve it or disapprove it,” Paxton recently told the Texas Public Policy Foundation.
Leading social media companies Meta, Snap and X and a coalition of child advocacy organizations support app store age verification. Apple and Google oppose it. After Utah’s law was enacted, Google proposed an alternative legislative framework aimed at splitting responsibilities between app stores and developers.
The App Association trade group is currently running ads opposing the Texas bill.