Trump urged to restrict video games
At White House meeting, industry execs push back
Some are urging president to consider regulations that would make it harder for children to buy games.
WASHINGTON — Republican lawmakers and conservative media critics pressed President Donald Trump on Thursday to explore new restrictions on the video game industry, arguing that violent games may have contributed to mass shootings like the attack in Parkland, Fla., last month.
In a private meeting at the White House, also attended by several video game executives, some participants urged Trump to consider new regulations that would make it harder for children to purchase those games. Others asked the president to expand his inquiry to focus on violent movies and TV shows too.
Trump himself opened the meeting by showing “a montage of clips of various violent video games,” said Rep. Vicky Hartzler, a Republican from Missouri. Then, Hartzler said the president would ask, “This is violent isn’t it?”
“They were violent clips where individuals were killing other human beings in various ways,” she said.
Trump’s roundtable on Thursday marked his latest listening session on gun violence in the aftermath of last month’s shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, which left 17 students and teachers dead. In recent weeks, Trump has suggested a number of ideas to address gun violence — even arming teachers at schools — while lawmakers have explored their own solutions.
In doing so, the president has expressed deep unease with violent video games, at one point contending last month that they are “shaping young people’s thoughts.” He also proposed that “we have to do something about maybe what they’re seeing and how they’re seeing it.”
Video game executives who were scheduled to attend the meeting Thursday included Robert Altman, the CEO of ZeniMax, the parent company for games such as “Fallout”; Strauss Zelnick, the chief executive of Take Two Interactive, which is known for “Grand Theft Auto”; and Michael Gallagher, the leader of the Entertainment Software Association, an industry lobbying group.
Each organization did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
Those who did join Trump said he appeared open-minded, seeking solutions from everyone —
including executives from the video game industry. It was “respectful but contentious,” said Melissa Henson, program director for the Parents Television Council.
Henson said that she and her peers argued that a “steady diet of media violence is having a corrosive effect on our culture,” while video game executives were “every bit as firm in their conviction there is no relation.”
And at times, calls for greater scrutiny and regulation came strong.
“I think he’s deeply disturbed by some of the things you see in these video games that are so darn violent, viciously violent, and clearly inappropriate for children, and I think he’s bothered by that,” said Brent Bozell, the president of the Media Research Council, who joined the meeting.
Bozell said he also communicated to Trump a need for “much tougher regulation” of the video game industry.
For now, the White House already has hinted at sustained, broader scrutiny still to come. A day before the meeting, a spokeswoman for Trump said the sit-down with video game executives and their critics is “the first of many with industry leaders to discuss this important issue.” Privately, lobbyists for tech giants and movie studios quickly expressed early unease that they might soon be dragged up to the White House, too.
On Thursday, though, the White House did not respond to questions about
the meeting, which had been closed to reporters hours before it took place.
Along with Bozell and Hartzler, Trump also included GOP lawmakers Sen. Marco Rubio and Rep. Martha Roby. Their offices did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment.
But one Democratic lawmaker who was not in attendance, however, quickly derided Trump’s efforts, arguing it overshadowed the real issue in Democrats’ minds — seeking new restrictions on gun sales.
“Focusing entirely on video games distracts from the substantive debate we should be having about how to take guns out of the hands of dangerous people,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal in a statement.
“I think (Trump’s) deeply disturbed by some of the things you see in these video games ...” — Brent Bozell, president, Media Research Council