On a recent episode of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, Oliver made a strong case for Congress to act now to pass two bills that would help break up Amazon, Facebook, Google, and the Big Tech monopolies:
"It's not that tech companies are inherently bad because they are big, it is that they are engaging in anti-competitive behavior. And here's where, unusually, I actually have some good news.
Because there are two bills before Congress right now with bipartisan support that could curtail some of Big Tech's excesses. But for reasons that we will get into later, if they don't pass in the next month, they are unlikely to pass at all."
Oliver then called on Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to bring the bills to a vote now. "We have a very small window right now to actually do something about this," Oliver said. Will you help take up his call and urge the Senate to act?
Sign the petition: Tell Senators to vote YES on legislation that would help break up the big tech companies!
One of these bills, S.2992, would help protect the small businesses that sell their goods on Amazon. Many of them have complained for years that Amazon abuses its power to undermine to their businesses. Here's how Oliver explained it:
"Basically, it is Amazon's playground, they make the rules, and they do seem to win a lot of the time. And as this expert points out, if they are competing with you, you're basically dead."
Amazon is busy lobbying hard to prevent these antitrust bills, which have bipartisan support, from coming up for a vote -- because they know the bills will pass. These bills will help reclaim our economy, our democracy, and even the internet itself from corporate monopolists. As Oliver put it:
"These bills would crack the door back open for innovation and nudge the internet back toward what it was supposed to be from the start. A revolutionary tool that expanded global access to information."
We need to make sure Senators hear that message from constituents like you. Will you speak out in this critical moment?
Add your name: Tell your Senators to ignore the corporate lobbyists and instead vote to break up Big Tech!