The “secret company documents” that Elon Musk began releasing six weeks after buying Twitter in October “confirm everything” that former President Donald Trump and his co-plaintiffs alleged about the social media platform’s censorship conspiracy but that the district court deemed not plausible, Trump and his co-plaintiffs said in a reply brief Friday (docket 22-15961). It was filed in their 9th Circuit appeal of the District Court for the Northern District of California’s dismissal of their First Amendment complaint against Twitter and its former CEO Jack Dorsey.
Section 230
Twitter isn’t liable for sex-trafficking violations for allowing child pornography to circulate on the platform, the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled Wednesday in 22-15103 (see 2210310063).
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act doesn't preempt the California Age Appropriate Design Code (AADC), which addresses risks to children arising from data management practices of social media platforms, said a Friday amicus brief (docket 5:22-cv-08861) filed in U.S. District Court for Northern California in San Jose. The Electronic Privacy Information Center, Reset Tech, Facebook whistleblower Frances Hausen and a bipartisan roster of former elected and appointed state and federal government officials signed onto the brief.
Plaintiff Richard Jackson’s complaint is his second attempt to “vindicate grievances allegedly suffered” by Donald Trump-leaning Republicans “at the hands of a supposed collection” of tech companies, educational institutions, the Democratic National Committee and the Biden administration. So said defendants Alphabet, Google, Instagram, Meta, Twitter and YouTube in their joint motion Thursday (docket 2:22-cv-09438) in U.S. District Court for Central California in Los Angeles to dismiss Jackson’s complaint. Jackson first tried to bring his lawsuit in state court “but abandoned that effort and voluntarily dismissed the case in the face of a demurrer,” it said. His current second complaint “mushroomed” to 10 times the length of the state-court complaint, added two plaintiffs and “is replete with conspiracy theories, tabloid storylines, and haphazard copy-and-paste jobs from other lawsuits,” it said. Length “is no substitute for substance,” and on that front, the complaint “falls short,” it said. Jackson and his co-plaintiffs lack Article III standing, “including because they have not alleged particularized injuries that affect them in a personal way,” it said. They also can’t state a Section 1983 claim against the defendants, all private actors, for violating the First Amendment, it said. Section 1983 doesn’t create a cause of action for claims “under the color of federal law,” it said. The defendants don’t qualify as state actors “under any recognized theory of coercion or joint action,” it said. The plaintiffs also fail to allege a claim for election interference, it said. “Any such claim requires showing state action,” which the plaintiffs can’t do, it said. The complaint also contains no allegations “remotely suggesting any statutory or constitutional violation,” it said. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act bars the plaintiffs’ statutory claims, as courts in the 9th Circuit “have repeatedly held,” it said.
The roster of negligence and public nuisance lawsuits brought by U.S. school districts against social media platforms continues to spiral, with new cases filed this week in California, Florida, Indiana and Kentucky. Hendy Johnson added to the firm’s roster of nearly 20 public nuisance cases in federal courts in Kentucky and Indiana, some of which have been wrapped into Social Media Adolescent Addiction/Personal Injury Products Liability Litigation (docket 4:22-md-3047) under U.S. District Court Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Northern California, Oakland. The latest Hendy Johnson suit (docket 6:23-cv-00071), filed by Bell County Public Schools Tuesday in U.S. District Court for Eastern Kentucky in London, alleges Facebook, Instagram, Snap, TikTok and YouTube are contributing to a mental health crisis among American youth. The law firm filed a nearly identical suit Monday in U.S. District Court for Northern Indiana in Fort Wayne for plaintiff Fort Wayne Community Schools. The suits claim public nuisance and seek orders that defendants are jointly and severally liable and must end the described nuisance; equitable relief to fund prevention education and treatment for excessive and problematic use of social media; actual, compensatory and statutory damages; plus attorneys’ fees and legal costs. Frantz Law, which has filed about 20 lawsuits against social media companies on behalf of school districts in various states, filed (docket 3:23-cv-02015) its latest Tuesday for Florida’s Volusia County Schools, with over 62,000 students in 90 schools. In addition to public nuisance, it claims negligence and violation of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Frantz Law filed a nearly identical suit Monday on behalf of Evergreen School District, Clark County, Washington, requesting an injunction for actions contributing to public nuisance; relief to fund prevention education and treatment; actual, compensatory and statutory damages; plus attorneys’ fees and legal costs. The lawsuits anticipate defendants will raise Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act as a shield for their conduct, but the plaintiffs argue Section 230 is no shield for defendants' acts in designing, marketing and operating social media platforms that are harmful to youth.
PHILADELPHIA -- Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (D) challenged state enforcers Tuesday to collaboratively address privacy and social media issues, speaking at a National Association of Attorneys General meeting. North Carolina AG Josh Stein (D) asked an algorithms panel later for suggestions on what states can do amid a rise of AI chatbots like ChatGPT.
Sixteen U.S. school districts joined the mounting wave of lawsuits against social media platforms Wednesday, as budget-strapped schools seek to hold tech companies responsible for rising costs associated with surging student mental health issues. San Diego-based Frantz Law filed 15 cases for school districts in California, Idaho, Oklahoma, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Utah, charging Facebook and Instagram parent Meta, Google, Snapchat and TikTok with violations of public nuisance laws, negligence and racketeering. A similar complaint was filed in Kentucky.
Apple seeks the dismissal of the class action that names 11 defendants and alleges the Biden administration colluded with social media to suppress right-leaning speech and content, said its motion Tuesday (docket 2:22-cv-09438) in U.S. District Court for Central California in Los Angeles. Nowhere in the plaintiffs’ 405-paragraph “airing of grievances is there even a kernel of a claim” against Apple, said the motion. The complaint “reveals a complete misunderstanding (or outright contortion) of the First Amendment and this nation’s bedrock anti-discrimination laws,” it said. There are no factual allegations that Apple “censored so much as a single word” of anyone’s speech, it said. Nor does the complaint “allege any instance of Apple unlawfully discriminating against anyone, let alone a protected class of speakers, voters, or consumers,” it said. There also are no allegations “causally connecting any alleged wrongful conduct by Apple to any cognizable injury” suffered by any plaintiff, it said. Because the plaintiffs fail to demonstrate Article III standing, “every cause of action against Apple should be dismissed with prejudice,” it said. The complaint comes nowhere close “to alleging facts sufficient to transform Apple from a private company into a federal government actor,” which forecloses the plaintiffs’ First Amendment claim, it said. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act bars each of the plaintiffs’ claims because the complaint “admittedly seeks to hold Apple liable for its supposed publication decisions concerning third-party content,” it said.
Defendants in the social media censorship lawsuit Missouri v. Biden sought to “correct the record” on plaintiffs’ request for consolidation with the Missouri et al. v. Biden case against President Joe Biden and some 60 individuals and government agencies pending in the same court, said a Tuesday response (docket 3:22-cv-01213) in U.S. District Court of Western Louisiana in Monroe.
If the U.S. Supreme Court opens online platforms to liability for algorithms through a narrow interpretation of Section 230, it could mean a less consumer-friendly internet and entrench dominant platforms further, tech experts said Tuesday.