In one of the most significant 1st Amendment victories in years, a 5th Circuit panel (only one of whom is a Trump appointee) rules that the Biden WH, the FBI, CDC, and Surgeon General violated Americans' core free speech rights by coercing Big Tech to censor on their command.
The appellate court largely upheld a court ruling from June. In doing so, it explained: courts have "rarely been faced with a coordinated campaign" of censorship "of this magnitude orchestrated by federal officials." The result was "suppressing millions of free speech postings."
The court barred the agencies it found to have threatened and "commandeered" Big Tech censorship -- the WH, the FBI, the CDC, and the Surgeon General -- from further coercion of this type.
It was particularly scathing about the FBI's censorship of domestic political speech.
The appeals court -- finally -- gave the lie to the defense of Democrats that this censorship was merely Big Tech acting on its own.
False, said the court: US officials constantly "threatened" and thus forced these platforms to censor in accordance with government demands.
In 2021, I argued that Democrats' explicit threats to Big Tech -- either censor how we want or face reprisals -- constituted censorship of the kind banned by Bantam Books and the 1st Am.
The court yesterday applied the 2nd Circuit's Bantam test to rule.
greenwald.substack.com/p/congress-esc…
Congrats to @JeninYounesEsq and all the lawyers who scored this massive free speech win, and to @DrJBhattacharya and the other Americans who sued their government for demanding censorship of their speech.
"Journalists" told everyone this was a "nothing burger." Courts disagree.
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