Former President Donald Trump has asked a federal judge in Florida to force Twitter to restore his account, which the company suspended in January following the deadly storming of the U.S. Capitol.
Trump’s attorneys on Friday filed a motion in U.S. District Court in Miami seeking a preliminary injunction against Twitter and its CEO, Jack Dorsey. They argue that Twitter is censoring Trump in violation of his First Amendment rights, according to the motion.
Twitter declined to comment Saturday on Trump’s filing.
The company permanently banned Trump from its platform days after his followers violently stormed the Capitol building to try to block Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s presidential win. Twitter cited concerns that Trump would incite further violence. Prior to the ban, Trump had roughly 89 million followers on Twitter.
Trump was also suspended from Facebook and Google’s YouTube over similar concerns that he would provoke violence. Facebook’s ban will last two years, until Jan. 7, 2023, after which the company will review his suspension. YouTube’s ban is indefinite.
In July, Trump filed lawsuits in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida against all three tech companies and their CEOs, claiming that he and other conservatives have been wrongfully censored. The motion for a preliminary injunction was filed as part of Trump’s case against Twitter.
(AP)
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5 Responses
One cannot scream fire in a crowded theater.
Surprising that an experienced trial lawyer as John Coale would sign on to an argument that because Twitter’s decision was at least in part in response to pressure from Dems in Congress, they morphed into a “state actor” and thus are no different from the government in restricting Trump’s ability to communicate. Clearly, a private corporation cannot be sued under the First Amendment for deciding the types of messages and standards of conduct for access to their platform. Perhaps a better argument could be made of deceptive marketing if the denial was inconsistent with their “terms of service” but that is not the core argument in this litigaton.
The suit would seem to be frivolous, because Twitter is not bound by the first amendment. Even if it is acting on the instructions of the government, the proper defendant would be the agency that gave those instructions.
Only an absolute fool would take this case as the First Amendment only applies to the government and Trump has a long history of not paying bills including lawyers’ bills.
Today Twitter will be forced to publish violence-inducing nonsense of an election-losing crybaby, and tomorrow YWN will be forced to publish kfiradikkeh drivel by any random poster. Let’s hope that the courts stand up for the right of private people and companies to refuse to let others use their platforms for nefarious purposes.