Sen Graham: Can't We All Get Along

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) is hoping to get key committees on the same page when it comes to the tech industry and data privacy. He’s drafting a letter to leaders on Senate Banking and Senate Commerce committees to sort out jurisdictional questions related to the sector. “I’m going to have Sen. [Dianne] Feinstein and myself, we’re going to write a letter to the other committees of jurisdiction and see if we can come up with sort of a common approach to the issues,” he said. Sen Graham said the letter will likely be sent next week. Chairman Graham cited recent hearings on data privacy held by all three committees as a sign lawmakers should coordinate their efforts. “I want to be very deferential to the other committees because I think they have primary jurisdiction but we do have some say,” he said. At least one Judiciary member — Sen. John Neely Kennedy (R-LA) — has raised the specter of his panel marking up potential privacy legislation instead of the Commerce Committee. But Chairman Graham recently affirmed that Commerce will take the lead on privacy markups. “It’s something I hope we can move on together with Commerce in the lead,” he said.