Ranking Member Johnson: Protecting Creators in the Age of AI

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. When the modern Internet was born in January of 1983, many considered it just another Department of Defense project for the military. But thanks to taxpayer funding, the United States was able to partner with research universities and, eventually, private companies to harness this innovation for use by the general public. Over its first 10 years, the Internet evolved from an application to compete with the Soviets to a place where people could socially connect, conduct business, and communicate with others, and even it evolved into a medium for artistic expression. Today, it's hard for many of us to imagine a world without new recipes at our fingertips, instant news updates, or pictures of our friends and family on our social media news feeds. Good or bad is no longer the question. The Internet is inescapable from modern society. This is quickly becoming the same with generative artificial intelligence, which has been adopted by businesses and consumers alike in just a few short years. Even with widespread adoption of transformative technology, it is imperative that we continue to protect rights holders when technology is used to steal intellectual property, defraud consumers, and increase inequality. Products available online from a trusted website can seem identical to those at brick-and-mortar stores, but instead are produced with harmful chemicals or contain dangerous malware. These nearly identical knockoffs can damage your favorite brand's reputation and harm their ability to stay in business. Websites that miraculously have Project Hail Mary streaming for free really are too good to be true. And that product, with Tom Hanks in the commercial, may not have actually been endorsed by Tom Hanks, just a replica created with AI. Some of these may seem harmless at first glance, but they matter to me and my constituents. Film and TV spending in Georgia, the Hollywood of the South, hit $4.4 billion in 2022 with 412 productions. But increased costs have devastated our film and TV market. Spending was down $2.3 billion in the last fiscal year with just 245 productions. Our writers and actors need jobs to keep creating, and market changes have made that all the more difficult to achieve. Across creative industries, innovators from writers and software developers to musicians and painters are watching their works used to train AI models for free, while the barrier to entry gets higher and higher. If Congress's role today is to play armchair psychologist to the Internet's midlife crisis, it is imperative we view harms to creators as the symptom of a more pernicious disease. The question we should be asking ourselves is, are the innovations before us serving the American people, or do they exclusively benefit a small handful of the wealthiest, most powerful corporations and individuals in the world? Georgia's 11 million-plus residents have a medium household income of just under $82,000. Mark Zuckerberg is worth $220 billion as of December 2025. Groceries in Georgia were found to be the 11th highest in the country earlier this month. Elon Musk just became the world's first trillionaire. Homes in 79% of Georgia's counties are considered unaffordable for the average worker. Jeff Bezos just spent an estimated nearly $50 million on his wedding. Americans are clearly facing an affordability crisis, but those at the very top are doing well and getting wealthier and wealthier every day. The price of everyday consumer devices, such as your laptops and computers, have continued to climb now to an estimated 15% to 25%. Data centers are driving up utility costs, straining the grid, and degrading the quality of the everyday appliances families depend on, like our air conditioning and heating systems. Senior citizens are having to choose between paying their utility bills and their prescriptions, and the rich get richer, the middle class shrinks, and the poor get poorer. The benefits from technological innovations, while impressive, are minimized if everyone can't enjoy their benefits. We can do this by meaningfully deploying technology in a way that uplifts us all. This means acknowledging creators as a key part of the ecosystem that is building AI and compensating them as such. This means enacting protections for American workers, building responsibility, and deploying equitably. I look forward to hearing from the witnesses how we can better protect America's artists, innovators, and the creative fields. I thank Chairman Issa for holding this important hearing, and I yield back the balance of my time.