Last year, the rightwing think-tank the Heritage Foundation launched Project 2025, which laid out much of the policy blueprint for the current Trump administration. One of the project’s espoused goals was to permanently criminalize all pornography. Now, a Republican senator with kind words for Trump has introduced a bill that would do just that.
Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) recently introduced the Interstate Obscenity Definition Act (IODA), which would effectively criminalize all pornography nationwide by legally redefining what it means to be obscene. For years, “obscenity” has been all but a defunct legal category that narrowly defines speech that remains unprotected by the First Amendment. Lee would explode this legal category, expanding it to encompass virtually all visual representations of sex.
I’m not personally concerned about them banning actual porn, I’m more concerned about the part of the plan where they’re going to classify LGBT media as porn and ban it.
A lot of great content will either be pulled from streaming or heavily edited. Agatha All Along, one of the best Marvel shows, will be on the chopping block. And so will innocent preschool shows like Young Jedi Adventures because it features lesbian parents.