State Dept. cancels election meetings with Facebook after “free speech” ruling
US aims to block injunction after judge ruled White House coerced social networks.
JON BRODKIN – 7/6/2023, 11:21 AM, ARS Technica, 76/23
EDITORIAL: Talk about election interference.
The Biden administration is appealing a federal judge’s ruling that ordered the government to halt a wide range of communications with social media companies. President Biden and the other federal defendants in the case “hereby appeal” the ruling to the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, according to a notice filed in US District Court yesterday. The US will submit a longer filing with arguments to the 5th Circuit appeals court.
On Tuesday, Judge Terry Doughty of US District Court for the Western District of Louisiana granted a preliminary injunction that prohibits White House officials and numerous federal agencies from communicating “with social-media companies for the purpose of urging, encouraging, pressuring, or inducing in any manner the removal, deletion, suppression, or reduction of content containing protected free speech posted on social-media platforms.”
Doughty found that defendants “significantly encouraged” and in some cases coerced “the social-media companies to such extent that the decision [to modify or suppress content] should be deemed to be the decisions of the Government.” The Biden administration has argued that its communications with tech companies are permissible under the First Amendment and vital to counter misinformation about elections, COVID-19, and vaccines.
Department of Justice lawyers are expected to seek a stay of the preliminary injunction. The 5th Circuit court that will handle the Biden appeal last year upheld a Texas law that prohibits social media companies from moderating content based on a user’s “viewpoint.”
State Dept. cancels Facebook meetings
In the meantime, the Biden administration is taking steps to avoid violating Doughty’s injunction. According to The Washington Post, “the State Department canceled its regular meeting Wednesday with Facebook officials to discuss 2024 election preparations and hacking threats.”
“State Department officials told Facebook that all future meetings, which had been held monthly, have been ‘canceled pending further guidance,'” the Post wrote, citing a source at Facebook.
Doughty, a Trump nominee, made the ruling in a lawsuit filed by the Missouri and Louisiana attorneys general. Doughty ruled that plaintiffs “are likely to succeed on the merits on their claim that the United States Government, through the White House and numerous federal agencies, pressured and encouraged social-media companies to suppress free speech.”