Bulletins

Senator asks Zuckerberg or Mosseri to testify on Instagram and kids

The Facebook CEO could be headed back to Capitol Hill.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg appears on a screen behind a lawmaker's empty chair as he testifies remotely during Senate hearing.

Zuckerberg has become something of a Capitol Hill regular in recent years.

Photo: Bill Clark/Getty Images

Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal is urging Mark Zuckerberg or Adam Mosseri to testify on Instagram's impact on kids following the revelations from Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen.

In a Wednesday letter to Zuckerberg, Blumenthal said that Facebook's CEO or Instagram's head should "testify to set the record straight and provide members of Congress and parents with a plan on how you are going to protect our kids."

Blumenthal, who chaired the panel that heard from both Haugen and Facebook official Antigone Davis about the effect of Instagram on kids, also said Davis seemed "to have provided false or inaccurate testimony to me regarding attempts to internally conceal its research."

Zuckerberg once seemed ill-at-ease in Washington, but he's become something of a regular fixture on Capitol Hill. Members of Congress have secured high-profile testimony from the CEO to address concerns over Cambridge Analytica, antitrust and Facebook's cryptocurrency plans, among other issues.

The CEO has rarely made gaffes or groundbreaking confessions during the showdowns, however.

Blumenthal has also set a hearing for next week on social media and kids with representatives from Snap, TikTok and YouTube.

Ben Brody

Ben Brody (@ BenBrodyDC) is a senior reporter at Protocol focusing on how Congress, courts and agencies affect the online world we live in. He formerly covered tech policy and lobbying (including antitrust, Section 230 and privacy) at Bloomberg News, where he previously reported on the influence industry, government ethics and the 2016 presidential election. Before that, Ben covered business news at CNNMoney and AdAge, and all manner of stories in and around New York. He still loves appearing on the New York news radio he grew up with.

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