Chairman Cruz: KOSMA Meets Parents Where They’re At, Protects Kids Online

Hearing examines risks of rising screen time for kids, teens

WASHINGTON, D.C. - In his opening statement at today's Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee hearing, "Plugged Out: Examining the Impact of Technology on America's Youth" Chairman Ted Cruz (R-Texas) stressed the toll a "phone-based" childhood can take on kids' development and mental wellbeing. The hearing will also explore how to equip parents as the U.S. education system provides personal devices to children.

In one of his first moves as chairman, Sen. Cruz, with Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), reintroduced the Kids Off Social Media Act (KOSMA), bipartisan legislation to help protect kids from the harmful impacts of social media. KOSMA would set a minimum age to use social media platforms at 13, prevent social media companies from using algorithms to feed addictive content to users under the age of 17, and take actions to remove cell phones from classrooms. KOSMA passed out of committee with overwhelming bipartisan support in February 2025.

Here are Sen. Cruz's remarks as delivered:

"It's incredibly hard to be a kid right now. All the parents I know-myself included-are concerned about the time their kids spend glued to screens, watching and reading insidious content that puts their minds and bodies at risk.

"Parents are fighting a constant battle to keep their children safe in a rapidly evolving digital world. For instance, there's been a stunning increase in exploitative AI-generated deepfake revenge porn and images of victims-often teenage girls. Thankfully, Congress rose to meet this challenge and passed my and Sen. Klobuchar's bill, the Take It Down Act, which makes clear that if you create and spread these heinous images of anyone, you'll face the full force of the law.

"But there's clearly more work to do to protect children online. Given the prevalence of online devices, children are often introduced to screens at a young age and use them for a significant portion each day.

"Children ages 8 to 12 now use screens on average five and a half hours each day. For teens, it's even higher at eight hours and 39 minutes. Put another way-over half the time a teenager is awake is spent staring at a screen!

Parents intuitively know that excessive use of internet-connected devices like smartphones and tablets poses significant physical and mental health risks to children. Even many kids know it's a problem. Surveys routinely show large numbers of teenagers admit to spending way too much of each day on a smartphone.

"Kids need time to be kids-to experience the real world, not get lost in the virtual one. This 'phone-based' childhood-predominantly spent on social media-has been documented to lead to social awkwardness, reduced self-confidence, a more sedentary childhood, fragmented attention, disrupted learning, addiction, and social withdrawal.

"With the introduction of the smartphone, we've also seen a rise in teen mental health disorders, anxiety, and depression.

"In 2023, one out of five children had a mental or behavioral problem diagnosis. We've also seen increases in child and teen suicide rates.

"Something is very wrong. And I don't believe it is merely a coincidence, as our witnesses will discuss today, that these harms are rising alongside the early and excessive use of screens.

"Sadly, parents face further challenges in monitoring and limiting their children's screen time, in part because our education system-fueled by federal subsidies and incentives-has increasingly required the use of internet-connected devices in schools. Most students are now assigned laptops or tablets-often without guardrails or parental controls-in order to complete their schoolwork. There aren't many parents who think it has become easier to help with schoolwork or cut down on screen time when schools send their kid home with a personal tablet.

"There's a role for technology in the classroom, but we should discuss whether assigning personal devices to children is actually improving academic outcomes, or doing more harm than good.

"During the Biden administration, not only did Congressional Democrats give billions of dollars to the FCC to buy personal internet devices for children, but the Biden FCC sought to bankroll kids' unsupervised internet access and undermine parental rights by expanding the E-Rate program to install Wi-Fi hotspots off campus, including on school buses and in students' homes.

"I was proud that the Senate passed my legislation to repeal this program, and I hope House lawmakers pass it now and send it to the President's desk.

"Sen. Schatz and I have also advanced the Kids Off Social Media Act, which this committee passed overwhelmingly back in February of last year, to help protect kids from social media-the predominant use of a smartphone.

"KOSMA meets parents where they're at. It's a real struggle to keep your kid offline when you're told that 'all of my friends are on Instagram and TikTok.' It's incredibly hard to be the 'one parent' who won't let your kid have a phone or a social media account.

"So KOSMA says, we're going to hold Big Tech accountable to their terms of service. Big Tech says no one under 13 can set up an account. KOSMA makes that the law-no more social media for children and no more addictive algorithms for teens.

"KOSMA also gets cell phones out the classroom. No school getting federal taxpayer dollars would allow kids to access social media in the classroom. I am hopeful we will send this bill to the President's desk to become law.

I want to thank the witnesses who are here with us today, and I look forward to this critical discussion about how we can protect children and empower parents."

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