Appeals court: Florida law on social media unconstitutional

[Roland99]

https://www.clickorlando.com/business/2022/05/23/appeals-court-florida-law-on-social-media-unconstitutional/

A Florida law intended to punish social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter is an unconstitutional violation of the First Amendment, a federal appeals court ruled Monday, dealing a major victory to companies who had been accused by GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis of discriminating against conservative thought.

A three-judge panel of the Atlanta-based 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously concluded that it was overreach for DeSantis and the Republican-led Florida Legislature to tell the social media companies how to conduct their work under the Constitution's free speech guarantee.

“Put simply, with minor exceptions, the government can't tell a private person or entity what to say or how to say it,” said Circuit Judge Kevin Newsom, an appointee of former President Donald Trump, in the opinion. “We hold that it is substantially likely that social media companies — even the biggest ones — are private actors whose rights the First Amendment protects.”

The ruling upholds a similar decision by a Florida federal district judge on the law, which was signed by DeSantis in 2021. It was part of an overall conservative effort to portray social media companies as generally liberal in outlook and hostile to ideas outside of that viewpoint, especially from the political right.

Suck it, moRon!

[calimary]

1. Trying to muzzle free speech, DeSanctimonious?

You LOSE.

[Walleye]

2. They will appeal all the way to the handmaiden, the drunk, and the insurrectionist's spouse

[Effete Snob]

3. It's funny that people think he cares about the loss

He doesn’t give a shit.

It’s depressing to me the extent to which people don’t grasp that what matters with performative stunts like this dopey law is the performance itself.

MAGA types don’t actually follow what happens with this stuff. They don’t even care. Months back he took a stand against “Big Tech” and the circus has moved on to other shiny objects since then.

The actual point is the constant spew of noise from these types, and the pointless taking of stands on the dopey thing of the moment for them, whatever it happens to be.

[lpbk2713]

4. How much time and resources did the Florida legislature waste on this?

Did they even take high school Civics?

This is pathetic. They wanted to deny the right to free speech by act of law.