Senate Judiciary Committee chair Sen. Lindsey Graham said Friday that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey will testify before the committee after Election Day.
The South Carolina Republican said the two CEOs will appear voluntarily before his committee on Nov. 17, two weeks after Election Day.
“The hearing will focus on the platforms’ censorship and suppression of New York Post articles and provide a valuable opportunity to review the companies’ handling of the 2020 election,” Mr. Graham announced in a short statement.
On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 12-0, with no Democrats present, to authorize subpoenas against Mr. Dorsey and Mr. Zuckerberg after their companies restricted the distribution of news reports about Hunter Biden’s emails that could damage his father’s presidential campaign.
Senate Republicans have stressed the need to hear from the Big Tech CEOs before the election as the prompting their quick action to authorize the subpoenas.
The decision to hold the hearing after the election does not mean that Mr. Dorsey and Mr. Zuckerberg will evade congressional scrutiny before ballots are counted. Mr. Zuckerberg and Mr. Dorsey are already scheduled to appear alongside Google CEO Sundar Pichai on Wednesday at a Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation hearing focused on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which shields companies such as Facebook, Google, and Twitter from legal liability for material posted by users on its platform.
Several judiciary committee members are also on the commerce committee and will have the opportunity to grill the Big Tech executives, including Republican Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas, Mike Lee of Utah, Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee and Democratic Sens. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut.
• Ryan Lovelace can be reached at rlovelace@washingtontimes.com.
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