The Right Wing Origins Of Age Verification Laws Don’t Disappear Just Because They’re Going Bipartisan.

(Mis)Uses of Technology

from the pull-the-receipts dept

I think it’s important to understand that, despite claims to the contrary, age verification is, inherently, a right-wing effort. While it’s currently true that age verification laws are being supported globally by those on the political right and left, they started as very much a right wing effort to suppress disliked speech by claiming it was harmful to children. Even if some of the laws now have bipartisan support, we need to understand its origins.

People will point to the bipartisan nature of many of these current laws to push back on the idea that it’s truly a right wing effort. Australia’s monstrosity of age-gating laws was adopted by the collective efforts of center-left and left-wing political parties part of the ruling government. The Online Safety Act in the United Kingdom was the brainchild of Conservative Party MPs under former Prime Minister Theresa May, but the Labour government under Prime Minister Keir Starmer is now carrying out the policies of the sweeping digital regulatory measures in national law.

But age verification laws, today, originate from right-wing and far-right efforts to restrict access to porn and other content that could be classified as “harmful to minors.” As documented extensively by academics, cybersecurity experts, folks here at Techdirt, and in my own investigative journalism, these laws define content as “pornographic” or “harmful to minors” under such broad definitions.

For example, the age verification law in Kansas defines the material on the internet covered by the harmful classification to include “acts of homosexuality.” That terminology is a clear nod to the not-too-long-ago era of unconstitutional state sodomy laws that made it a criminal offense to have same-sex sexual activity. The Texas age verification law intended to compel online adult entertainment platforms to plaster public health warnings about the ostensibly addictive nature of watching pornography. There is no accepted evidence of this.

It is also worth noting that out of the 26 U.S. states with age verification laws that explicitly target pornography and adult content on the books, are regarded as “red” states with Republican-controlled state legislatures. Many have a one-party rule in both the legislative and executive branches, such as in Missouri, where I am based. Out of 26 states that enacted porn age-verification laws as of 2026, 25 voted Republican in the 2024 presidential election, indicating a strong geographic overlap with red states*. While I do hold that this doesn’t suggest strong ideological clustering, it shows a strong partisan alignment.

Many of the age verification laws that cover pornography originated in Republican-controlled legislatures, but a few Democratic governors — including the one who signed the first such law in Louisiana — approved them. This reflects bipartisan expansion in some capacity, but this is certainly not a consistent statement of bipartisan effort. Rather, it is partisan pressure patterns. If you consider the bipartisan adoption of age verification laws, this could reflect a familiar pattern of support during the passage of the FOSTA-SESTA statute.  Early religious conservative and right-wing efforts to curtail sex trafficking on the internet built up broader support as political pressures mounted on left-wing politicians by organizations like SWERF feminist groups to be early supporters to the law as well (e.g. Richard Blumenthal). While this does not prove that Democratic officials supported such measures because of clear pressure, the political pressure dynamics rely on the framing that age verification laws should be a no-brainer in “protecting kids” across the internet.

The simple reality is that the right wing strongly backs age-verification laws in the United States. It is a major enterprise dominated by social conservatives, MAGA supporters, Christian nationalists, and anti-LGBTQ+ activists, among others. Yes, they have convinced some centrists and progressives to join in, but it’s difficult to ignore where this entire push came from and who supported it initially.

Case in point: Project 2025 and the coalition of organizations tied to the Heritage Foundation-led effort. Much has been written on the Project 2025 and its so-called “proposals” to outlaw online pornography and deprive such speech of First Amendment protections. One of the architects of Project 2025, Russ Vought, was caught on hidden camera explaining how age verification laws could be used as a “backdoor” to adopt the demanded porn prohibitions nationally. Through this lens, the backdoor approach seems to be working, and those on the left wing further advance the efforts by further encompassing entire swaths of the internet that aren’t even remotely classified as pornographic and “adults-only.” The trade group representing many of these age verification companies has openly lobbied alongside many of these groups in favor of age verification laws.

And the efforts are now proving successful, despite the clear implications on freedom of speech, especially for individuals who are a part of the LGBTQ+ community. In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom is openly endorsing an Australia-style social media ban for individuals under the age of 16. Evidence continues to grow that Aussie-style bans can easily be circumvented, proving age gating is still not a “settled” tech. It is not “settled,” despite what proponents of these laws and the companies that develop this technology continue to claim. Congressional proposals like the Kids Online Safety Act were introduced with bipartisan co-sponsorship led by Sens. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn. Blackburn, specifically, began courting anti-LGBTQ+ groups to back the Kids Online Safety Act by presenting the proposal as a means to block forms of LGBTQ+ speech—all expression with First Amendment protections.

And once these types of frameworks exist, the history suggests they rarely remain limited to their original targets. Obviously, not every supporter of age verification laws shares the same goals and ideology. But it does mean we should be honest about where these laws came from and who built the playbook that others are now following. Bipartisan support doesn’t erase these glaring origins and how right wing religious groups have laundered this into more progressive spaces by claiming it’s all about protecting children. Is it currently and exclusively right-wing? No. Is it right-wing in nature and origin? Yes. If these policies do carry the DNA of earlier right-wing efforts to regulate sexuality and expression, then we should not be surprised when they expand beyond pornography and into other forms of the lawful speech we all consume. There is a real danger here—not just who supports these laws today, but what they are capable of becoming tomorrow. Bipartisan support may change the optics, but it does not change the reality: this is still, at its core, a right-wing effort. Nothing changes that.

Michael McGrady covers the tech and legal sides of the online porn business.

Correction: The original article said all 26 states with these laws voted for Trump but it was actually 25, as Virginia did not. We have updated the post accordingly and regret the error.

Filed Under: age verification, censorship, left wing, protect the children, right wing, speech control