A major piece of legislation that could reshape the tech industry is just a few steps away from becoming federal law. But advocates fear that if congressional leadership doesn't usher it through before the midterms, or at least the end of the year, it could die.
The American Innovation and Choice Online Act, a Senate bill that closely resembles an earlier House version, advanced out of the Judiciary Committee earlier this year by a wide margin.
Known among staff and lawmakers as the self-preferencing or anti-discrimination bill, the legislation would prohibit dominant tech platforms like Amazon, Apple and Google from giving preferential treatment to their own services in marketplaces they operate. If passed, it could prevent Google from having its own travel recommendations at the top of search results, for example. Or Amazon might have to ensure its own products are ranked by the same criteria as competitors' products.
The bill has overcome intense lobbying from the tech industry, and there are increasingly signs it will move forward before the August recess.
Advocates feel there's little time to spare. They cite the probability that with Republican control of the House following the November vote, the party would follow current caucus leaders who have signaled that antitrust reform would be a lower priority. In the digital space, Republican House leaders have been focused more on content moderation and privacy issues.
Given that backdrop, onlookers are wondering: What will it take for Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., or House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to give the bills time on the floor for a vote?
They're getting closer, sources tell CNBC. Schumer met about the status of antitrust legislation on May 18 with Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., chairs of the Judiciary Committee and subcommittee on antitrust, respectively, according to a Democratic source familiar with the conversation. (The source, like others who are not named in this article, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss behind-the-scenes conversations in Congress.)
Schumer asked Klobuchar, the bill's lead sponsor alongside Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, to release the latest version of the text that has input from members on both sides over the next couple of weeks, and Klobuchar released the latest language last Wednesday. Schumer told the pair he fully supports the bill and is committed to putting it on the floor for a vote by early summer, according to the source.
It's unclear if the bill has the 60 votes needed to pass the Senate. Some reports have suggested Democratic leaders are waiting to have enough votes to pass the bills before bringing them to the floor. But some advocates say it would be best to put lawmakers' feet to the fire by making them go on the record with their votes, gambling that many won't want to be seen as weak on Big Tech.
CNBC spoke with lawmakers, advocates and opponents of the legislation and congressional staffers involved in discussions around the bills to learn what it might take to move forward as Congress races against the clock to pass tech antitrust reform.
Proponents are optimistic
The window to pass significant antitrust reform is rapidly closing, but sponsors and advocates are still hopeful.
Jesse Lehrich, co-founder of Accountable Tech, expressed "cautious optimism" that this Congress would pass both the self-preferencing bill and a separate bill that is more specifically targeted at how companies display apps in mobile app stores.
Lehrich said he's even "bordering on confident" that the self-preferencing bill will be signed into law by August. "I do think that this is kind of like a make-or-break time where stuff's either going to start to move forward in this next upcoming month or two or the window is going to close quicker than people think," he said.
While it may feel like Democratic leadership is dragging its feet, Charlotte Slaiman, competition policy director at Public Knowledge, a nonprofit funded both by Big Tech firms like Google and their opponents like DuckDuckGo, said the timing has been "normal" given other high-priority measures and the need to get members up to speed on complicated tech issues.
"Some of those early hearings about the biggest platforms, people clearly didn't have a strong understanding," Slaiman said. "But if you compare that to the most recent hearings, the level of detail, and these senators really get it now, which is amazing. But it takes some time to bring the rest of Congress along to understand why it's so important to make these changes."
Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado, the top Republican on the House Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust and one of the chief champions for the bills, predicted in a CNBC interview in April the self-preferencing bill will "have the votes in both chambers to move forward," adding he believed it would pass before the August recess.
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