Biden Admin Launches Task Force to ‘Address Online Harassment and Abuse’

Vice President Kamala Harris, speaks during the Online Harassment and Abuse Task Force announcement at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington, on June 16, 2022. Roberto Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images

The Biden administration announced a new task force called the “White House Task Force to Address Online Harassment and Abuse.”

In a statement on June 16, the White House said that President Joe Biden would sign a presidential memorandum to establish the task force, “responding to the need for government leadership to address online harms, which disproportionately affect women, girls, people of color, and LGBTQI+ individuals.”

The new White House task force is co-chaired by the White House Gender Policy Council and National Security Council.

The task force is required to submit a blueprint “outlining a whole-of-government approach to preventing and addressing technology-facilitated gender-based violence” within 180 days of the presidential memorandum.

The recommendations in the blueprint will be for the federal government and state government, as well as technology platforms and schools, and other groups, to “prevent and address technology-facilitated gender-based violence, including a focus on the nexus between online misogyny and radicalization to violence,” according to the White House.

“Recommendations will focus particularly on: increasing support for survivors of online harassment and abuse; expanding research to better understand the impact and scope of the problem; enhancing prevention, including prevention focused on youth; and strengthening accountability for offenders and platforms,” the White House stated.

According to the memorandum, the task force will work across executive departments, agencies, and offices of the federal government “to assess and address online harassment and abuse that constitute technology-facilitated gender-based violence.”

It will do so in multiple ways, including by developing policies to “enhance accountability for those who perpetrate online harms,” and by expanding data collection and research into the issue, which includes studying the mental health effects of abuse on social media.

The task force will also help facilitate access to support services for victims of such online abuse.

Another function will be to develop “programs and policies to address online harassment, abuse, and disinformation campaigns targeting women and LGBTQI+ individuals who are public and political figures, government and civic leaders, activists, and journalists in the United States and globally.”

Surgeon General Vivek Murthy (C), Vice-President Kamala Harris (L), and Attorney General Merrick Garland (R) during the Online Harassment and Abuse Task Force announcement at The Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington, on June 16, 2022. Robert Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images

“One in three women under the age of 35 report being sexually harassed online. Over half of the LGBTQ+ people in our country are survivors of severe harassment,” Vice President Kamala Harris at an event to announce the task force on June 16.

“Nearly one in four Asian Americans report being called an offensive name, usually motivated by racism—being called an offensive name online,” Harris added. “And black people who have been harassed online in our country are three times more likely to be targeted, again, because of their race.

“No one should have to endure abuse just because they are attempting to participate in society,” she said.

Harris was joined at the event by Attorney General Merrick Garland, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, and tennis star Sloane Stephens. Stephens, a black professional tennis player, who publicized a torrent of angry messages she received on social media, including racist and sexist abuse, after her loss at the U.S. Open.

“I’m a daughter, a sister, a wife. And I am more than an athlete, more than a label,“ Stephens said. ”Yet all of that is disregarded when people online seek to harass me and harm me. No matter whether I win or lose, someone online is mad, and they will make it known.”

After matches, Stephens said, she is worried to pick up her phone because “I know what will be waiting for me when I unlock it.”

White House Cites Recent Shootings to Link Violence to Online Abuse

The White House asserted in a fact sheet that two recent mass shootings in Texas and New York have “underscored the connections between online harassment, hate, misogyny, and extremist acts.”

“The tragic events in Buffalo and Uvalde have underscored a fact known all too well by many Americans: the internet can fuel hate, misogyny, and abuse with spillover effects that threaten our communities and safety offline,” the White House announcement reads.

The mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas, saw the deaths of 21 people, including 19 children, at Robb Elementary School, on May 24. Another mass shooting in Buffalo, New York, killed 10 people and injured three others at a supermarket on May 14. Both shootings were carried out by 18-year-old males, officials have said.

“For example, the Uvalde shooter had a history of threatening girls online, yet these violent, sexualized harms and threats were dismissed and ignored when reported,” the White House said. The assertion appeared to be in reference to one case where a teenager reported the shooter, Salvador Ramos, on the social app Yubo, but said that nothing happened as a result.

Meanwhile, “The white supremacist who murdered 10 black people in Buffalo, New York, was first radicalized, by all accounts, online,” Harris said on June 16.

Officials believe that Payton Gendron, the 18-year-old that carried out the shooting in Buffalo, had written a 180-page manifesto and posted it online before the attack. The Epoch Times has not been able to independently verify whether the manifesto was written by Gendron.

The manifesto writer appeared to express support for a number of mass shooters including Brenton Tarrant who killed 51 people in Christchurch, New Zealand, in 2019, and live-streamed the killings on social media.

The alleged manifesto from Gendron also appeared to have been copied from a separate manifesto that was written and published online by Tarrant.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.