And... The GOP Controlled State "Laws" -- Purporting To Return To "Must Carry" Rules, At Private Social Media Outlets -- Are... Effectively Dead.

Just as we've long said, here. Technically, these cases, too were returned to the trial courts -- for more rulings. But the import is clear. There is no "must carry" law, when private clubs act to exclude liars or crooks from their ranks.

With the laws enjoined, it is hard to see any state (Florida, Texas, Mizzou or Mississippi) being able to make the required showing that it was effectively a federal government acting, through the private social media clubs. Justice Roberts opined last week in a companion case that the linkage, in fact. . . didn't exist. That is effectively a death knell for these laws. But here's a bit, largely to close it all out:

. . .And what does that “based on viewpoint” requirement entail? Doubtless some of the platforms’ content moderation practices are based on characteristics of speech other than viewpoint (e.g., on subject matter). But if Texas’s law is enforced, the platforms could not -- as they in fact do now -- disfavor posts because they:

▲ support Nazi ideology

▲ advocate for terrorism

▲ espouse racism, Islamophobia, or anti-Semitism

▲ glorify rape or other gender-based violence;

▲ encourage teenage suicide and self-injury

▲ discourage the use of vaccines

▲ advise phony treatments for diseases

▲ advance false claims of election fraud



The point of it is not that the speech environment created by Texas’s law is worse than the ones to which the major platforms aspire on their main feeds. The point is just that Texas’s law profoundly alters the platforms’ choices about the views they will, and will not, convey.

And we have time and again held that type of regulation to interfere with protected speech. . . .

Now you know. Be certain to vote -- and please volunteer to aid the candidates of your choosing. It will be more important than ever, come November -- to be sure that people who support the rule of law. . . elect people who do likewise. Out.

नमस्ते