The veto might be overturned by a 2/3 majority of the state legislature though.
The bill requires social media platforms to investigate allegations that a user violated state law, to suspend their account while investigating, and permanently ban the account if the investigation finds that the law was violated. Allegations can be made by virtually any member of the public.
Part of the governor's statement at the time of veto:
> "This law imposes sweeping requirements that social media platforms, rather than law enforcement, enforce state law. It mandates a private company to investigate and impose the government’s chosen penalty of permanently deplatforming a user.... In our judicial proceedings, people receive due process when they are suspected of breaking the law. This bill, however, conscripts social media platforms to be judge and jury when users may have broken the law or even a company’s own content rules. This proposed law would incentivize platforms, in order to reduce liability risk, to simply deplatform a user in order to comply with this proposed law."
> "Further, the costly and mandatory data and metadata collection requirements in this bill throw open the door for abuse by guaranteeing the availability of sensitive information such as user age, identities, and content viewed, and these reports could even be made public at the discretion of the Attorney General."
(The full statement is in a PDF linked in the article)
The veto might be overturned by a 2/3 majority of the state legislature though.
The bill requires social media platforms to investigate allegations that a user violated state law, to suspend their account while investigating, and permanently ban the account if the investigation finds that the law was violated. Allegations can be made by virtually any member of the public.
Part of the governor's statement at the time of veto:
> "This law imposes sweeping requirements that social media platforms, rather than law enforcement, enforce state law. It mandates a private company to investigate and impose the government’s chosen penalty of permanently deplatforming a user.... In our judicial proceedings, people receive due process when they are suspected of breaking the law. This bill, however, conscripts social media platforms to be judge and jury when users may have broken the law or even a company’s own content rules. This proposed law would incentivize platforms, in order to reduce liability risk, to simply deplatform a user in order to comply with this proposed law."
> "Further, the costly and mandatory data and metadata collection requirements in this bill throw open the door for abuse by guaranteeing the availability of sensitive information such as user age, identities, and content viewed, and these reports could even be made public at the discretion of the Attorney General."
(The full statement is in a PDF linked in the article)