Supreme Court Unanimously Rules That Public Officials Can Be Sued for Blocking Critics on Social Media

Doug Mainwaring : Mar 18, 2024
LifeSiteNews.com

Friday's ruling is only the first of several this term that deal with the relationship between government and social media.

[LifeSiteNews.com] The United States Supreme Court ruled unanimously on Friday that government officials who post about work-related topics on their personal social media accounts can be held liable for violating the First Amendment rights of constituents by blocking their access or deleting their critical comments. (Screengrab image)

In a 15-page opinion, Justice Amy Coney Barrett noted that the personal social media accounts of public officials often present an "ambiguous" status because they mix official announcements with personal content.

The court ruled in two cases where people were blocked after leaving critical comments on social media accounts of public officials.

The first case involved two elected members of a California school board— the Poway Unified School District Board of Trustees—who blocked concerned parents from their Facebook and Twitter accounts after leaving critical comments.

The court upheld the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that said the board members had violated the parents' free speech rights. 

The second case before the court concerned James Freed, Port Huron, Michigan's city manager who had blocked constituent Kevin Lindke from commenting on his Facebook page after deleting his remarks about the city's COVID-19 pandemic policies.

Lindke believed that Freed had violated the First Amendment by doing so and sued Freed.

Freed maintained that he launched his Facebook page long before becoming a public official, arguing that most of the content on his account concerned family-related matters... Subscribe for free to Breaking Christian News here

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