House Government Appropriations Bill Would Bar FTC & FCC From Doing Anything Related To Trump's Inane Anti-230 Executive Order

It's appropriations season (isn't it always?), and as the House Appropriations Committee digs into the various ways in which it funds the government a friendly little birdie pointed me to a fun little tidbit buried in the House's Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Bill for 2021:

If you can't read that it says:

The Committee includes a new provision prohibitingthe Federal Trade Commission or Federal Communications Commissionfrom taking certain actions related to Executive Order13925 of May 28, 2020

And just what is Executive Order 13925? Why it's Donald Trump's inane anti-Section 230 Executive Order that, among other things, tries to order two independent agencies -- the FTC and the FCC -- to take certain actions regarding a made up, nonsensical interpretation of Section 230.

Of course, as we've pointed out, the President doesn't get to change the law all by himself -- and that includes the interpretation of the laws. And he's also not supposed to direct independent agencies like the FCC and the FTC to do things he wants them to do (hence the "independent" part of "independent agencies.") Congress writes the laws. Congress gets to handle what the FCC and FTC have authority over. And, at least on the House side, they don't think that either the FCC or the FTC should be doing anything at all regarding Section 230.

Now, it's unlikely this little tidbit survives to the final appropriations bill, but it is a little bit of a slap pointed at the White House for its weird nonsensical (and totally misguided) obsession with reinterpreting Section 230.