Romney slams piracy bill authored by backer

{mosads}All four Republican candidates announced their opposition to the legislation during the debate.

The White House expressed concerns with the legislation in a statement on Saturday, but administration officials said they are committed to giving law enforcement officials new tools to combat online copyright infringement.

Support for SOPA and its Senate counterpart, the Protect IP Act, began crumbling on Wednesday when thousands of websites staged an unprecedented protest against the measures.

Google, the most visited site in the world, plastered a black censorship bar over its logo. Wikipedia blacked out its English-version site and greeted visitors with an ominous warning: “Imagine a world without free knowledge.”  

The piracy bills are designed to go after foreign websites that offer illegal copies of movies, music and TV shows. Smith argues his bill would not target legitimate websites and would protect jobs.

But Web companies warn the bills would stifle innovation and censor free speech. They say the legislation would impose an unreasonable burden on websites to police user-generated content and could lead to legitimate websites being shut down.

Smith plans to press ahead with the legislation next month.

The Senate is set to vote on the Protect IP Act on Tuesday.

Justin Sink contributed to this post.