A Big Day for Freedom of Speech

Missouri v. Biden, a landmark lawsuit over the Biden administration’s efforts to pressure social media companies to silence conservative critics, has ended with a consent decree that will prevent the federal government from throttling dissent through proxies. You can read it here. The heart of it:

The Parties also agree that government, politicians, media, academics, or anyone else applying labels such as “misinformation,” “disinformation,” or “malinformation” to speech does not render it constitutionally unprotected…

The Surgeon General, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) (“Enjoined Defendants”), and their employees and agents, shall take no actions, formal or informal, directly or indirectly—except as authorized by the Constitution, statute, judicial order, or regulation—to threaten Social-Media Companies with some form of punishment (i.e., an adverse legal, regulatory, or economic government sanction) unless they remove, delete, suppress, or reduce, including through altering their algorithms, posted social-media content containing protected free speech. Nor shall Enjoined Defendants unilaterally direct or veto social media content moderation decisions of Social Media Companies.

Much more tomorrow. Many twists and turns on the long road to this good outcome.

“Let that sink in.”