Committee Advances Curtis Priorities to Strengthen Online Safety for Children

WASHINGTON— U.S. Senator John Curtis (R-UT) today praised the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee’s bipartisan advancement of several online child safety bills, including the Children’s Health, Advancement, Trust, Boundaries, and Oversight in Technology (CHATBOT) Act , co-led by Senator Curtis. In delivered remarks, Curtis called the Committee’s action an important step toward giving families the tools they need to better protect children in an increasingly complex digital world.
Video of the Senator’s Committee remarks can be found here , and a transcript is below.
As we all know, the digital world is changing faster than parents can keep up with it. And our kids are growing up in an online environment that barely existed a few years ago.
My wife and I raised six children, and we thought it was complicated when we raised them. And now I am expecting my 19th grandchild in a couple of weeks, and I can’t fathom what they have to navigate to get through this environment.
The bills we advanced today are an important step toward giving families the tools and transparency they need to keep their kids safe.
I want to thank the Chairman, Ranking Member Cantwell, and everyone who worked together in good faith to get us here.
I’m especially proud to be a lead cosponsor of the CHATBOT Act with Chairman Cruz and Senators Schatz and Schiff.
Chairman Cruz was collaborative throughout this process and incorporated several ideas Senator Schiff and I advanced in our SAFE KIDS Act .
I’m also proud to partner with Senator Lee on the SCREEN Act and commit to work with him and my other colleagues to advance that to the Senate floor.
We have to get this right.
That means protecting children without stifling innovation, empowering parents without leaving them on their own, and writing laws that will still make sense years from now.
But our work isn’t finished today.
I’m continuing to push to advance bipartisan bills from my colleagues and me to hold platforms accountable for the harm their products create, help users distinguish authentic content from AI slop, and close loopholes that allow youth to access content they shouldn’t see.
Parents shouldn’t have to carry this burden alone.
Platforms have a responsibility, Congress has a responsibility, and we should keep working together to build a safer digital world for our kids.
Today’s votes are meaningful progress, but they’re not the finish line.
Background:
The Committee passed the Kids Online Safety Act; Youth AI Privacy Act; CHATBOT Act; and Children’s Artificial Intelligence Toy Safety Act of 2026. Included in the CHATBOT Act were several key provisions from Curtis’ bipartisan SAFE KIDS Act , introduced with Senator Adam Schiff (D-CA).
The provisions adopted from the SAFE KIDS Act include:
In addition, several other priorities championed by Senator Curtis in the SAFE KIDS Act were advanced through Senator Ed Markey (D-MA)’s Youth AI Privacy Act , including:
Together, these provisions represent significant bipartisan progress toward establishing stronger safeguards for children online, increasing transparency around AI systems, strengthening parental awareness, and protecting young users from harmful or exploitative practices.