SCOTUS To Consider Whether Public Officials Can Block Criticism On Social Media

Exciting news! The U.S. Supreme Court is taking on a hotly debated issue: can public officials block criticism on social media? Two cases with very different outcomes are being examined. In one case, a California federal judge ruled in favor of a couple who sued members of the Poway School board for blocking their critical posts on social media. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the ruling last July. In the second case, a federal judge ruled in favor of a City Manager who blocked a resident from his public Facebook page. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals also agreed with the ruling.

But wait, there’s more! The Poway School board members changed their Facebook pages to reflect their board positions after being elected. However, they claimed that the couple’s posts disrupted readers from seeing their own posts. The California District Judge wrote in 2019 that it was reasonable to infer that the officials blocked the couple because of the content of their comments, not because they disrupted other posts.

This issue has been brought up before, with a federal judge ruling in 2018 that former President Trump’s decision to block Twitter users critical of him violated the First Amendment. The decision was upheld in 2019, with the judge stating that officials using social media accounts for government purposes cannot exclude people from an “otherwise open online dialogue” because they find their comments objectionable.

In the end, the court reminds us that the best response to disfavored speech on matters of public concern is more speech, not less. Let’s hope this debate leads to a positive outcome for free speech on social media!

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