Press Release from Texas U.S. Senator Ted Cruz
11-13-24
Last week, the Senate unanimously passed my TAKE IT DOWN Act—a monumental step toward empowering innocent victims, particularly teenage girls, to seek justice against those who exploit them by publishing abusive images. This week, I stood proudly with my colleagues, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.), and alongside courageous victim advocates to urge the House of Representatives to take immediate action and pass this legislation. The TAKE IT DOWN Act will criminalize the publication of non-consensual intimate imagery, including AI-generated “deepfakes,” ensuring that perpetrators are held accountable. At the press conference, victim advocates shared powerful stories, highlighting how this legislation can spare countless women, teenage girls, and boys from enduring similar trauma. I am determined to see it passed into law before the end of this Congress. The time to act is now.
“[The TAKE IT DOWN Act] has passed the Senate unanimously. 100 to nothing. Amy and I worked on both sides of the aisle. Every single Democrat in the Senate supported it. Every single Republican in the Senate supported it. … All of us have spoken to House leadership urging the House to take it up and pass it before the end of the year. … If this bill gets a vote in the House it will pass. The only question is, will it get a vote or not? We’re here today on behalf of the victims, on behalf of women, on behalf of teenage girls across this country to say: bring this up for a vote. Pass it and put it on the President’s desk. We can get it done and we can get it done before the end of the year.”
As a father of two teenage girls, I am appalled by the pain and trauma inflicted upon women and teenage girls who experience non-consensual AI-generated intimate images published of them on social media. In today’s hyperconnected world, such exploitation is not just harmful—it’s devastating. This year, I had the privilege of meeting fifteen-year-old Elliston Berry, a courageous victim advocate from Aledo, Texas, whose story exemplifies the urgent need for change. When Elliston was in 9th grade, she became the victim of a deepfake image. Despite her mother’s repeated pleas to Snapchat, it took over nine agonizing months—and one call from my office—to have the image removed. It should not require intervention from a sitting senator to achieve what Big Tech companies are fully capable of doing immediately. The TAKE IT DOWN Act will mandate that social media platforms and similar websites promptly comply with users’ requests to remove non-consensual imagery, ensuring no one else endures what Elliston and her family went through.
This legislation is essential to holding tech companies accountable and protecting victims.
“I will say one of the real keys to this getting passed has been Elliston just telling her story. There’s another, another teenage girl [in New Jersey], Francesca Mani who had almost the identical thing happen to her, at almost the exact same time. Both of them were freshmen in high school, [and] both of them [experienced] a boy in their class taking innocent pictures from social media and using an AI app to create fake naked pictures of them. In Elliston’s case, [the photos were] sent to everyone of her classmates. It is hard to be a teenager period today, but the nightmare of going through that it’s fundamentally wrong.
“When Elliston and her mom came to meet with me several months ago in my office, … I asked, ‘What’s happen with the pictures now?’ They said, ‘They’re still up [and] it’s been nine months.’ Elliston’s mom said she’d called Snapchat, she’d email them, and they wouldn’t do anything. I turned to my team, and I said, ‘I want you to get the CEO of Snapchat on the phone today. I want those photographs down today.’ Within an hour, they pulled them down. … It shouldn’t take a sitting senator making a phone call. Elliston should have the right to say, this is garbage. This is me. I didn’t consent. Take it down.”
I am confident that with President Trump back in the White House and a Republican majority in both chambers of Congress, we will deliver real and meaningful change for the American people. The nation has spoken with a clear mandate: it’s time to restore order, accountability, and common sense to Washington. Together, we will secure our borders, tackle inflation, and wars across the world. The failures of Joe Biden and the Democrats have left America weaker and more vulnerable, but we stand ready to clean up their mess and rebuild a stronger, safer, and more prosperous nation. The time for action is now, and we are ready to get to work.
“We have a real obligation to deliver on our promises. … Number one, we will secure the border. I think Texans and people across the country are deeply dismayed with Joe Biden and the Democrats open borders. … We’re going to follow it up by having Congress pass legislation providing funding to ensure that we secure the border and keep our communities safe.
“I think there’s also a clear mandate to get the economy moving [and] to get inflation under control. There are a lot of elements of that. One is reining in out-of-control spending from Washington, but another critical element of that is ending the Biden administration’s war on energy and Texas oil and gas.
“And finally, when it comes to foreign policy and national security, when Trump was president last we had peace and prosperity. We saw peace flowering in the Middle East, and [then] Joe Biden and the Democrats came into office. They produced utter chaos [and] two major wars waging simultaneously across the globe. I believe [both of those wars] … because that’s what happens when you have a strong commander in chief who our enemies are afraid of.”
The chaos at our southern border under Democratic leadership is unprecedented and unacceptable. As of July 2024, ICE has released an astonishing 650,000 criminals into the United States—14,944 of them murderers, 20,061 convicted of sexual assault, and 105,461 with assault charges. This staggering failure has put countless American lives at risk. Under a renewed Trump administration, we will take decisive action to deport illegal aliens and restore safety and security to our communities.
This week, the Senate Judiciary Committee heard the devastating testimony of Patty Morin, the mother of Rachel Morin, who was tragically murdered by an illegal alien due to Joe Biden’s reckless open border policies. Patty’s story is a chilling reminder of the human cost of this administration’s negligence. I am confident that with President Trump’s leadership, we will end the wave of violence, murders, and assaults to ensure that no other American family endure such unimaginable loss.
“Elections have consequences. For the last four years, we have seen the most radical experiment in open borders this nation has ever seen. … I would ask my Democrat colleagues if they were here, why does the Biden administration not go and arrest every one of these criminals and deport them? What rational world says America is better off with more criminals?
“Ms. Morin, thank you for being here. The country grieves the loss of your daughter. Your daughter was beautiful. She was a mom, who I know loved her kids, and she’s not with us today. She was raped and murdered because this administration chose to release a violent criminal into America. … I cannot imagine the pain. … No parent should have to bury their child. Children should bury their parents, not the other way around.”
Rest assured; change is coming for our country. God Bless!
