Federal appeals court rules that our federal government violated the First Amendment during the pandemic

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Update October 3, 2023

@AGAndrewBailey BREAKING: We’ve just obtained an injunction against CISA, an agency within the Department of Homeland Security, that blocks them from violating the First Amendment rights of millions of Americans. The order also applies to the White House, Surgeon General, CDC, and FBI. Here is the 76-page decision.

September 8, 2023- by Steven Greer (pro se litigator extraordinaire)

• 5th Cir decision on Missouri v Biden on government collusion with social media to censor opposing voices–
• “The district court’s judgment is AFFIRMED with respect to the White House, the Surgeon General, the CDC, and the FBI, and REVERSED as to all other officials. The preliminary injunction is VACATED except for prohibition number six, which is MODIFIED as set forth herein.–
• “The Plaintiffs allege that federal officials ran afoul of the First Amendment by coercing and significantly encouraging social media platforms to censor disfavored speech, including by threats of adverse government action like antitrust enforcement and legal reforms. WE AGREE”
• As explained in Part IV above, the district court erred in finding that the NIAID Officials, CISA Officials, and State Department Officials likely violated Plaintiffs’ First Amendment rights. So, we exclude those parties from the injunction.–
• We therefore VACATE prohibitions one, two, three, four, five, seven, eight, nine, and ten of the injunction.–
• That leaves provision six, which bars the officials from “threatening, pressuring, or coercing social-media companies in any manner to remove, delete, suppress, or reduce posted content of postings containing protected free speech.
• But, those terms could also capture otherwise legal speech. So, the injunction’s language must be further tailored to exclusively target illegal conduct and provide the officials with additional guidance or instruction on what behavior is prohibited.”
• Another HUGE precedent set here – the past chilling of their speech has caused individuals to SELF CENSOR. That is considered ongoing harm. This is a massive and very important section.
• I want everyone to think about the above for a moment. They were forcing inorganic amplification so people would be fooled into thinking the vaccine was “safe and effective” when one of them was REMOVED because it wasn’t. The sheer evil behind the obvious is unbelievable.
• I want to stop for a second (again) and go over how monumental this actually is. This is the first time ever that a normal “user” or American has submitted evidence of social media censorship and had their concerns ADDRESSED at all by a COURT OF LAW.
• Here is something ANYONE who is considering any sort of lawsuit needs to consider. The court here aptly notes that plaintiffs aren’t suing the platforms over their TOS, they are suing to stop the GOVERNMENT from interfering with platforms. Also – the government admitted in oral argument that they are STILL in contact with these platforms today.
• This is GRAND. The government argued that because the users had been REINSTATED, all is well. The court rightly says no. The fact that they WERE REINSTATED is what causes the threat of ongoing harm. If they didn’t have an account, they wouldn’t have to worry about censorship— they wouldn’t be able to post. Masterful.
• And I want to again stress, this was LIMITED discovery. The judge in the district court had made it a point in an order to let the government know that this was a mere scintilla of what would be required for production moving forward. So position this for yourselves – all of this is coming from an EXTREMELY limited production of evidence, which will now broaden to include more officials, more agency heads, more PRIVATE companies, like Facebook, Google, and X, that will be subpoenaed and deposed for evidence at trial.
• And next, a very important part of the 1st Amendment that often goes undiscussed. THE RIGHT TO LISTEN. Constituent plaintiffs were harmed by the censorship of their elected representatives, and the elected representatives and states are harmed WHEN THEY CAN NOT HEAR their constituents.
• The headline here is that a circuit court ruled that our federal government was violating the 1st Am. during the pandemic, preventing life-saving information from getting out. This killed millions of people.
• Here is the full decision