Mazie Hirono Quotes

There is so much we don't know about Facebook. We know we have a corporate monopoly that has repeated serious violations that are threatening our democracy.

New York state's Donnelly Act gives power at least as great - many think greater - than that of the Sherman Act. We have strong consumer protection laws that can be used to protect against scams and frauds by corporate monopolists.

The Dodd Bill does very little to reduce financial risks. What it will do is make Wall Street even more the servant of bureaucrats in Washington and the political party in power. That is not in the best interests of the American people.

One day, people in China may be able to see the records of conversations between multinational tech companies and the Chinese authorities.

As premiums continue to skyrocket, we must ensure that health insurers are not engaging in anticompetitive behavior and unfairly driving up health care costs.

Once Google is selected to run the infrastructure on which we are changing the world, Google will be there for ever. Democratic accountability will not be prevalent. You cannot file a public information request about Google.

It isn't citizens, or Congress, who decide how our information network regulates itself. We don't get to decide how information companies collect data, and we don't get to decide how transparent they should be. The tech companies do that all by themselves.

It's not in my mission to work against Euroskepticism; it's my mission to work for fair markets. In antitrust, what is at stake is, in some ways, as old as Adam and Eve because it is about greed, to get more.

When the government mandates that everyone must buy a product, its sellers can, and will, increase its price, potentially without limit.

…diligently investigate all complaints which may come to you from any source…and upon your own initiative of violations of the Elkins Act which prohibited “rebates and other discriminatory practices” on the part of corporations.

[The beef trust is] an atrocious conspiracy of greed against need…. Can anyone deny that such absolute control by a few men over the food supply of the nation is in the highest degree hostile to the public welfare.

Pure-food laws have become necessary to keep manufacturers from poisoning their customers; child labor laws have become necessary to keep employers from dwarfing the bodies, minds and souls of children; anti-trust laws have become necessary to keep overgrown corporations from strangling smaller competitors, and we are still in a death struggle with profiteers and gamblers in farm products.

Our system of market capitalism wasn't handed down, in perfect form, on stone tablets. We wrote the rules. We broke them. And we can fix them.

The tell the regulators that they’re cost cutting, and then they tell their customers they have to increase their prices after the deal is done.

On the social media front, governments may attempt to monitor and repress citizens’ postings or discredit incriminating reports with misinformation, but such efforts buck technological trends that are empowering consumers, such as strong encryption.

Just because you can’t execute collusion well, doesn’t mean that it isn’t collusion.

We need to pressure lawmakers to hold hearings on pending mergers, and pressure federal and state enforcers to use their full powers.

I think that whenever businesses harm the economy, harm workers, harm consumers, or undermine human rights in any way, then it is the role of the government to make sure that they don't do that and to make sure that markets are fair and they operate properly.

I'm all in favor of the FTC investigating companies when it believes there is proper cause to do so. An investigation, however, can lead to political pressure to bring a case, even if such a case is unwarranted.

Facebook is a known behemoth corporate monopoly. It has exposed at least 87 million people's data, enabled foreign propaganda and perpetuated discrimination. We shouldn't be begging for Facebook's endorsement of laws, or for Mark Zuckerberg's promises of self-regulation.

Dominant companies can't abuse their position to create advantage in related markets.

Now I know that Wal-Mart's policies do not reflect the best way of doing business and the values that I think are important in America.

The federal government has shown little willingness to stand up to corporate monopolies, and use its powers under the existing antitrust statutes, including the powerful Clayton Act and Sherman Act.

Apple chief executive Tim Cook is such a respected figure that it's easy to overlook the basic problem with his argument about encryption: Cook is asserting that a private company and the interests of its customers should prevail over the public's interest as expressed by our courts.

I think it's a mistake for the American public to constantly be told that if you work for an oil company or you work for a bank, that automatically makes you bad. I think a lot of these people are very qualified people who are patriots. They're going to want to help the country.