Senators advance contempt resolution in trafficking investigation

A Senate effort to hold an online classified site in contempt of Congress is moving forward.

Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) asked the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee to sign off on a resolution holding Backpage.com and its CEO in civil contempt on Wednesday. Since it was approved by the committee, it now must be voted on by the full Senate.

{mosads}The contempt resolution stems from Backpage’s refusal to provide the Portman-chaired Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations with documents as part of an inquiry into underage sex trafficking. Portman has questioned whether the website does enough to screen ads for those connected with child trafficking rings.

“These are questions about their internal practices,” he said Wednesday. “How does it work? How does their screening process work?”

Last year, the subcommittee called Carl Ferrer, Backpage’s chief executive, to testify. His lawyers said he was out of the country and would have invoked his fifth amendment right to avoid self-incrimination and refused to answer questions.

It also requested documents from the company; the website refused to hand them over, according to Portman.

Portman said last year that he was concerned about reports that employees of the website had edited some ads, potentially to hide evidence of illegal conduct.

He also raised the prospect last year that the company could be held in criminal contempt. However, the resolution approved on Wednesday is a civil matter.

“Unlike the case with most subpoenas, where the subpoena recipient can obtain a judicial review prior to having to comply, for a Senate subpoena only the Senate can initiate that review,” said Steven Ross, counsel to Backpage and a partner at Akin Gump, in a statement. “The Company, which recently prevailed before the Seventh Circuit in a case that presented many of the same online free speech issues, looks forward to a proper consideration of these important First Amendment constitutional issues by the judiciary — the branch of government charged with protecting the constitutional rights of all Americans.”

—Updated at 7:04 p.m.