We oppose the Securing Children Online through Parental Empowerment Act (SCOPE Act), a Texas law that is set to impose severe restrictions on internet freedom.
The law resorts to a sledgehammer approach to internet speech control. The SCOPE Act forces adults to undergo intrusive age verification to access legal content that is protected by the First Amendment. It also cuts off young and old alike from online content that might help people battling mental illness or dealing with sexual abuse, for example.
Texas lawmakers are censoring first and asking questions later. This doesn’t make anyone safer; it just silences essential conversations.
The Constitution protects free speech regardless of age. Adults cannot be treated like children, and children don’t need a parental "permission slip" to exercise their First Amendment rights. The SCOPE Act disempowers parents by replacing parental authority with state control.
Texas jumped on the same misguided bandwagon of recent efforts to childproof the internet, ignoring similar measures that have been blocked in states including California, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Ohio. However, the SCOPE Act combines these states’ worst internet restrictions into a Frankenstein’s monster of internet speech restriction.
We believe in defending everyone’s right to access information and express themselves freely. The SCOPE Act does the opposite—it burdens us all and cuts off an essential resource. We stand firmly against this dangerous law and fully support the efforts of FIRE and many others to challenge it in Texas and anywhere else these types of laws rear their ugly heads.