PHOENIX — Arizona Governor Kate Hobbs on Friday vetoed HB 2133, the “Protect Act,” which would have imposed new requirements for adult content uploaded online.
The bill was part of the current legislative trend aimed at addressing nonconsensual intimate images online, including those generated by AI. However, it also included new verification and consent requirements for adult websites.
Under those requirements, adult sites would have been required to use “reasonable” verification methods to ensure that any individual depicted in sexual material was over 18 and had provided consent, and to maintain records of such verification for at least seven years.
While those age and consent provisions reflect measures already considered standard in the industry, an earlier draft of the bill included a contradictory provision forbidding producers from retaining identifying information after model age verification was complete. This “catch-22” would have effectively made it impossible for adult sites to operate in Arizona, but was eliminated during the amendment process.
As XBIZ reported in April, the Free Speech Coalition (FSC) worked closely with Kupper on that and other substantive changes to the legislation.
FSC Director of Public Policy Mike Stabile told XBIZ that HB 2133 would have applied the consent and age-verification protocols that the adult industry uses to all platforms globally, and to any sexual material deemed “harmful to minors.”
“FSC worked with Rep. Kupper on amendments that preserved adult platforms’ ability to block and report illegal content, but I suspect mainstream tech platforms and media had concerns about our more intensive protocols being applied to them,” said Stabile. “A platform like X, for example, doesn’t want to have to collect model releases or IDs for everyone in every uploaded video, nor moderate every photo or video clip before it goes live.”
In her veto letter, Hobbs reassures the legislature that current state law already covers AI-generated images for revenge porn, and that the federal TAKE IT DOWN Act further protects Arizonans from being victimized online.
The letter also explains that Hobbs vetoed HB 2133 because the bill would have had a “chilling effect” on free speech, noting that the bill’s sponsor, Republican Rep. Nick Kupper, “stated in committee the legislation’s intent is to require the consent of an elected official before they are satirized on a show like South Park.”
“South Park” episodes have included satirical scenes of President Trump naked in bed with Vice President Vance, and with Satan.
Kupper, who also authored Arizona’s age verification law, had amended HB 2133 to include language exempting digitally manipulated material created for the purposes of parody, comedy, artistic expression or “criticism of matters of public concern.” However, Hobbs’ letter asserts that Kupper rebuffed her office’s efforts to “protect victims without shielding politicians from criticism,” and opted instead for “a partisan approach that attempts to make political satire illegal.”
Stabile observed that despite Kupper’s exceptions for specific types of content, negotiating what is or isn’t “comedy” or “artistic expression” can be subjective.
“It seems like the Governor felt that the potential for weaponization against non-adult, controversial content was too great,” Stabile said.
