The Porn Industry Is Worried That a Republican Senator Wants to Ban Porn

Some members of the adult industry are worried that a prorposed federal bill that’s going after content that aims to “arouse, titillate, or gratify” sexual desires has the potential to outlaw porn nationwide.

This week, Republican Sen. Mike Lee, from Utah, introduced the Interstate Obscenity Definition Act (IODA), which seeks to “establish a national definition of obscenity that would apply to obscene content that is transmitted via interstate or foreign communications,” according to a statement from Lee’s office. 

Technically, a federal standard that defines obscenity already exists. Under the decades-old Miller Test, content is obscene if it hits certain conditions, including that the content in question depicts sexual conduct “in a patently offensive way.” At the moment, producing and distributing sexual content is legal in the U.S.