SCOTUS sends social media moderation cases back to lower courts

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday ruled 6-3 that two courts of appeals did not correctly analyze laws in Texas and Florida regulating how social media companies moderate content. The state laws remained blocked with the ruling. The court found that the Fifth and Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals had not correctly or fully considered whether the laws abridged certain companies’ free speech. Justice Elena Kagan authored the majority opinion. Justices Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Clarence Thomas dissented.

What are the details of this case? Texas and Florida both passed laws limiting the ways social media platforms could prevent certain users' viewpoints from reaching other users. Florida’s law prevents social media companies from restricting political candidates’ speech on their platforms. The Texas law prevents social media companies from limiting anyone’s speech based on their viewpoint.

Social media trade association NetChoice LLC sued both states over those laws. It alleged that both laws, in virtually every case in which they could be applied, would violate the First Amendment’s prohibition on government bodies limiting free speech. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution only promises that the government will not restrict an individual’s right to free speech, the court ruled. It does not prevent private companies from doing so.

Did the Court issue any other opinions today? The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 on Monday that the Corner Post truck stop could sue the Federal Reserve over its rules regarding debit card transaction fees the store owners had to pay. The Watford City, N.D. truck stop sued the government under the Administrative Procedure Act, which governs how the executive branch institutes new rules and regulations. The government had argued Corner Post couldn’t sue the agency because the six-year statute of limitations on the law had already expired. The Supreme Court ruled that the clock for the law’s statute of limitations does not begin ticking until a plaintiff suffers an injury under that law. Once the plaintiff begins suffering an injury, then that plaintiff has six years to file a lawsuit, the court ruled. Justice Amy Coney Barrett authored the majority opinion. Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor dissented.

Dig deeper: Listen to Mary Reichard and Nick Eicher’s report on The World and Everything in It podcast about the controversy surrounding these laws.