Congress demands social media reveal mental health ad spending
S. 414 — ADS for Mental Health Services Act · Filed by Dan Sullivan (R-AK) · 1 cosponsor · Introduced Feb 5, 2025 · Passed chamber
Your members of Congress
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What it does
This bill requires large social media and digital advertising platforms (those with over 100 million monthly users) to report annually to the Federal Trade Commission on their public service advertisements related to mental health, including how many such ads they ran, their estimated value, and how many promoted free or local mental health resources. The FTC then summarizes these reports for Congress. The requirement sunsets after 5 years.
Why we flagged it
The bill's core function is to require disclosure and reporting of mental health public service advertising on major digital platforms to the FTC and Congress, creating a transparency mechanism rather than imposing restrictions or subsidies.
What the text implies
- Platforms may face pressure to increase mental health PSA placement to improve reported metrics, potentially crowding out other public service content or creating appearance of compliance without substantive resource commitment.
- The 5-year sunset means the reporting requirement disappears unless Congress affirmatively reauthorizes it, creating a window for platforms to reduce mental health advertising after the oversight period ends.
- Definition of 'public service advertisement' requires SAMHSA approval for local/regional resources, centralizing gatekeeping authority and potentially excluding grassroots or non-approved mental health organizations from being counted or promoted.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
The bill creates transparency about mental health advertising on major platforms without restricting citizens' rights or imposing costs on the public. It enables oversight of whether platforms are adequately promoting mental health resources and holds them accountable through reporting, which supports public health awareness and accountability.
Named in the bill
Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, House Committee on Energy and Commerce, Social media platforms, Digital advertising platforms
Where it stands
1 cosponsor: 1 Democrats.
- Feb 5, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
- Feb 5, 2025 — Referred to Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation”
- Mar 12, 2025 — Reported out of committee · Congress.gov: “Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. Ordered to be reported with an amendment in the nature of…”
- Dec 9, 2025 — Passed the Senate · Congress.gov: “Passed Senate with an amendment by Unanimous Consent. (consideration: CR S8581-8582; text: CR S8581-8582)”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
2 lobbying clients named this bill on 3 disclosure filings across 2 quarters, Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $110,000 in lobbying spend. A filing names 9 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 41% of bills with at least one filing.
Dan Sullivan, the sponsor, reported $2,224,700 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- Google Client Services — $90,000 on 2 filings
- National Alliance on Mental Illness — $20,000 on 1 filing
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 20, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (3,413 characters) on Aug 20, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 20, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
“Congress demands social media reveal mental health ad spending” QuorumCivic. https://share.quorumcivic.app/bill/119/s414 Report an error
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