GOP NOT SURE ABOUT BREAK-UP PLANS

GOP senators on Tuesday signaled they are divided over whether to pursue antitrust enforcement against the country’s largest tech companies.

At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing about data privacy and competition policy on Tuesday, some Republican lawmakers slammed the enormous market power of companies like Facebook and Google, while others questioned whether “breaking them up” would be useful.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), the chairman of the committee, expressed concern that Google and Facebook “own 70 percent of digital advertising in the world,” asking witnesses for potential “antitrust remedies” to apply to advertising practices.

But he stopped short of calling for any specific actions. “My job is to make sure we have a viable industry when all of this is over with,” Graham said.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) focused his remarks on the “size, power [and] market cap” of Google, calling the company “larger than Standard Oil was when it was broken up and larger than AT&T was when it was broken up.”

“There are many on this committee, including myself, concerned about potential anticompetitive conduct from Google,” Cruz said.

Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) echoed his sentiments, saying she is concerned “there are openings for market abuse and exploitation of consumer data and also for being able to use these platforms and then drive out competition.”

On the other side: Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) at the hearing said he thinks “the discussion of breaking up a Google or breaking up a Facebook is not what we should be doing.” He called for giving users “more information” about how the companies use their data rather than imposing stringent regulations on how they operate.

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) engaged in a similar line of questioning, asking the witnesses why consumers remain on the platforms if their practices are harmful.

“They like the content, the convenience associated with that platform,” Lee said