Supreme Court declines to rule on Texas and Florida laws, but upholds social media platforms' right to moderate content.
The US top court has refused to decide whether Republican-backed laws limiting social media platforms' ability to moderate content violate free speech, sending the issue back to lower courts.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday ordered the 5th and 11th Circuit Courts of Appeals to review the Texas and Florida laws again, arguing that the courts had not adequately addressed the statutes' compatibility with the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
While the high court did not rule on the constitutionality of the laws, the unanimous decision upheld the right of platforms like Facebook, TikTok and YouTube to curate content on their platforms.
Writing for the court, Justice Elena Kagan said social media companies should enjoy editorial discretion comparable to that of newspapers and that the First Amendment “is not suspended when social media is involved.”
“The principle does not change because the curated compilation has moved from the physical to the virtual world,” Kagan wrote in an opinion signed by five of the nine justices.
Florida and Texas have passed laws limiting platforms' discretion to moderate content, amid claims from conservatives that Big Tech routinely favors liberal perspectives and censors right-wing viewpoints.
Republican Governors Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott signed the laws months after Facebook and X banned former President Donald Trump over his posts about the storming of the U.S. Capitol by his supporters on Jan. 6, 2021.
President Joe Biden's administration opposed the state laws and backed a legal challenge brought by the tech industry's largest lobbying groups.
Following legal challenges, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the Florida statute, while the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Texas law.
The high court's decision leaves the Texas and Florida laws intact but on hold following injunctions imposed in lower courts.
Technology industry trade groups welcomed Monday's decision.
Chris Marchese, director of the NetChoice Litigation Center, said the high court had affirmed “the Constitution’s unparalleled protections for free speech, including on the world’s most important communications tool, the Internet.”
Matthew Schruers, president and CEO of the Computer and Communications Industry Association, said he was encouraged that the court had “made clear that states need not try to skew the marketplace of ideas in a favored direction, though our work is not done.”
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said he would continue to fight for his state’s law, calling censorship by tech companies “one of the greatest threats to free public discourse and election integrity.”
“No American should be silenced by Big Tech oligarchs,” Paxton said on X.
