A judge dismissed a lawsuit former President Trump brought last year against Twitter and its then-CEO Jack Dorsey. The social media giant had sought to dismiss the suit, which Trump filed after Twitter banned him from its platform, for “failure to plausibly state a claim.”
Trump, the American Conservative Union and five other people claimed Twitter violated their right to free speech under the First Amendment after it “censored” their accounts. U.S. District Judge for Northern California James Donato rejected their argument because Twitter is a private company, and the free speech clause in the Constitution applies only to the government. The judge found no evidence that Twitter acted on behalf of government officials, as plaintiffs also alleged…
In response to the first act, the judge ruled that because Twitter’s terms of service state that “California law will govern all disputes that arise between Twitter and its users,” the plaintiffs could not accuse the company of violating a Florida law. For the second, the judge ruled that only one of the plaintiffs lived in Florida and had an active Twitter account at the time the state’s act went into effect. Therefore, the majority of the plaintiffs cannot argue they were protected under the Stop Social Media Censorship Act.
Finally, the plaintiffs asked the judge to rule Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects social media companies from liability for content posted on their platforms, unconstitutional. Donato dismissed this request “for lack of standing.”…