Damn SCOTUS

[Kathianne]

This does not bode well:

https://hotair.com/headlines/2023/10/20/new-scotus-to-take-up-biden-appeal-on-censorship-injunction-and-stays-it-n586539


New: SCOTUS to Take Up Biden Appeal on Censorship Injunction -- and Stays ItPOLITICO 6:40 PM on October 20, 2023
In an order Friday afternoon, the justices agreed to hear the Biden administration’s challenge to a lower court order blocking it from urging social media companies to remove certain content that the White House claimed was misinformation around Covid-19 vaccines, Hunter Biden’s laptop and the contested 2020 election results.


In taking the case, the justices also blocked the lower court’s injunction, which had been set to kick in within minutes and would have barred many types of contact between federal officials and the social media giants. The high court’s action means that administration officials can keep contacting social media companies for now while the Supreme Court weighs the case.


Three conservative justices — Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch — dissented from the decision to block the injunction, joining in a five-page opinion by Alito that called the court’s action “highly disturbing” and said it threatened to curtail the discussion of unpopular political views online.


[Read the order and dissent at this link. Needless to say, this does not bode well for the plaintiffs in Missouri v Biden, and the fact that only three justices object to the stay on the injunction leads me to be very pessimistic on the outcome of the full review by the court. It looks like the other six are focusing more on the harms to government in an order restraining them from censorship than the harms of the clear violations of the First Amendment on Americans. — Ed]

Politico link:

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/10/20/supreme-court-biden-social-media-covid-00122842

[Kathianne]

More:

https://hotair.com/jazz-shaw/2023/10/21/scotus-pauses-shutdown-of-biden-censorship-regime-n586574


SCOTUS Pauses Shutdown of Biden Censorship RegimeJAZZ SHAW 1:01 PM on October 21, 2023

SCOTUS Pauses Shutdown of Biden Censorship Regime
AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin
Back in July, in the case of Missouri v. Biden, a court in Louisiana found in favor of the plaintiffs and ordered the Biden administration and several other federal agencies to cease having contact with social media platforms and coercing them to remove posts containing contrarian views about coronavirus vaccines and other matters related to the COVID pandemic. The Fifth Circuit later refined that order and decreased the number of agencies and individuals that would face those restrictions. But on Friday, by a 6-3 majority, the court issued a temporary block to the ruling and agreed to hear the case in full. This drew the ire of the three conservative justices who voted in the minority, including Samuel Alito, who said that he feared the ruling would give a “green light” to the federal government’s ability to suppress speech that was critical of the administration. (Daily Caller)


Justice Samuel Alito said Friday that the Supreme Court majority’s decision to pause a lower court injunction blocking the Biden administration from coercing social media companies to censor speech may be perceived as giving a “green light” to the government’s use of “heavy handed tactics” to suppress speech.


The Supreme Court agreed Friday to hear a landmark free speech case, Missouri v. Biden, that challenges the Biden administration’s communications with social media companies to censor speech. But, until the case can be heard, it also granted the Biden administration’s request to pause the lower court’s order, a decision Alito slammed in a dissent joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch as “unreasoned,” and said “allows the defendants to persist in committing the type of First Amendment violations that the lower courts identified.”


Alito was joined by Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch in opposing the decision. John Roberts has traditionally been weak on free speech issues, particularly when conservative voices are being silenced. But the surrender of Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett clearly demonstrates the extent to which progressive concerns over a “radically conservative Supreme Court” have been overblown. It’s true that this ruling doesn’t mean that the full court will eventually abolish the rulings of the lower courts, but it sends a very negative signal.


From the beginning, however, I have felt that the original lawsuit, while quite well-intentioned, was mostly pointless anyway. The administration has been engaging in this sort of de facto censorship for a while now and the fact that they are fighting it so vigorously in court indicates that they have no intention of stopping it. The willingness of a majority on the court to even entertain the idea also bodes ill for the plaintiffs.


Also, even if such an order were allowed to stand, enforcement would be virtually impossible anyway. Washington is very much defined by the cocktail party circuit and “unofficial orders” can carry as much weight as published ones. The social media companies are almost entirely dominated by leftists who endorse the administration’s policies and seek to curry favor with them. (With the possible exception of Twitter under Elon Musk.) It’s not as if they’re being forced to do something that they didn’t already approve of.


The government is full of “people who know people.” It would take almost no effort for the White House to dispatch someone to an event where they know the right “influencers” will be present. That messenger would simply have to say, ‘Have you seen some of these posts going around saying such-and-such? They’re really awful.’ The listener would then be able to quickly get on the phone to the headquarters of Facebook, Instagram, or wherever and relay the information. They could then begin the search and destroy mission to root out and eliminate the applicable posts and the accounts of those who dared to express those opinions without any White House official ever attending a meeting with the social media giants.


This is unfortunately the reality that we’re dealing with. And the outcome of Missouri v Biden is unlikely to change it.

[Gunny]

There's no way the Supreme Court gets this right ruling in favor of Government. The government should not be allowed to lie to the people, nor decide for the people what is and is not true, especially based on political aims.