Pedestrians walk in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on February 29, 2024 in Washington, DC.
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WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Friday that members of the public in some circumstances can sue public officials for blocking them on social media platforms, deciding a pair of cases against the backdrop of the United States’ controversial and colorful use of Twitter. former President Donald Trump.
The court ruled unanimously that officials can be considered “state actors” when they use social media and can therefore face litigation if they block or silence a member of the public.
In the two cases before the justices, they ruled that disputes involving a school board member in Southern California and a city manager in Michigan should be sent back to lower courts for application of the new legal test.
In a ruling written by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, the court acknowledged that “it can be difficult to tell whether speech is official or private” because of the way social media accounts are used.
The court held that speech can be viewed as a state action when the official in question “possessed actual authority to speak on behalf of the State” and “purported to exercise that authority.”
While both officials have a low profile, the ruling will apply to all public officials who use social media to interact with the public.
During oral arguments in October, Trump’s use of Twitter – before it was renamed X – was frequently mentioned as the justices considered its practical implications.
The cases have raised the question of whether public officials’ posts and other social media activities constitute part of their government duties. In so ruling, the Court held that preventing someone from following an official constitutes a government action that could give rise to a constitutional challenge.
Trump himself was sued when he was president, with courts ruling against him, noting that he often used his Twitter account to make official announcements. But that lawsuit was dismissed as moot once he left office in January 2021. By then, Twitter had disabled Trump’s account, although the company’s new owner, Elon Musk, reversed course as part of a major overhaul that included changing the look of the site. first name. In other disputes, however, courts have reached other conclusions.
The California case arose after two Poway Unified School District board members, Michelle O’Connor-Ratcliff and TJ Zane, blocked parents Christopher and Kimberly Garnier from commenting on their Facebook page in 2017. O’ Connor-Ratcliff also blocked Christopher Garnier from responding to his Twitter posts. Zane has since left office.
The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the couple in 2022, upholding a similar decision by a federal judge in the Southern District of California. The appeals court concluded that the elected officials were acting in their official capacities.
The controversy in Michigan began in March 2020, when Port Huron City Manager James Freed, an appointed official whose Facebook page described him as a “public figure,” posted information there about the city’s efforts to address the COVID-19 pandemic. COVID-19. After resident Kevin Lindke posted comments criticizing the city’s response, Freed blocked him.
Freed argued that the no longer active Facebook page was a personal page that he used to share photos of his family and comment on his daily activities. The U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, upholding a lower court’s decision, agreed in a June 2022 decision, ruling that Freed was not acting in an official capacity and therefore his activity on Facebook did not constitute an state action.
Freed’s page was somewhat different from the ones at issue in the school board case because it included much more personal content, making it much less clear whether it was an official page.
The Court is grappling with a range of social media-related free speech issues in its current term, which runs until June.