The U.S. Supreme court ruled on Friday that members of the public can sue government officials who block them on social media platforms under certain circumstances.
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“When a government official posts about job-related topics on social media, it can be difficult to tell whether the speech is official or private. We hold that such speech is attributable to the State only if the official (1) possessed actual authority to speak on the State’s behalf, and (2) purported to exercise that authority when he spoke on social media,” said Justice Amy Barrett.
The Supreme court unanimously decided to establish standards for judges to determine whether a citizen can sue a public official for blocking him on social media, but declined to issue a verdict on the case which prompted the debate.
The Supreme court heard arguments on the case, Lindke v. Freed, in October, but did not issue their final decision until mid-March.
Kevin Lindke brought a lawsuit against James Freed, the city manager of Port Huron, Michigan, for allegedly violating his First Amendment rights by blocking him on Facebook.
Freed had made posts on his personal account, discussing some elements of his job as City Manager, and eventually blocked Lindke from commenting after he criticized the city’s response to COVID-19.
Lindke argued that, since Freed was the city manager and had used his Facebook account to discuss some official matters, he had a constitutional right to comment on Freed’s posts.
The district court, then the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, initially ruled in favor of Freed, arguing that the Facebook account was personal, and thus Freed was operating within his rights as a private citizen to block Lindke.
Rather than making the final ruling on the case, the Supreme Court developed rules by which the case ought to be judged, and sent it back to a lower court, to be judged within the bounds of those rules.
The rules state that a government official is in violation of First Amendment rights if he blocks someone on social media only if the official had authority to speak on behalf of the state, and if used the social media account to exercise that authority.
A government official is still a private citizen, and is permitted to speak about his work in that capacity, but if, for example, he uses the account to make an official announcement unavailable elsewhere, and blocks someone from viewing the account, he will be in violation of the person’s rights.
I’d like to see this extended to “news”papers like the Bangor Daily News. Ever try getting a comment posted there? If the BDN staff deigns a comment acceptable and doesn’t suspend/ban the author the team of regular comment writers there are quick to attack patriots/conservatives/Christians.
Totally agree Bill, BND is a communist rag. The admin of the comments is anti-white – so glad I found the wire