Twitter Was ‘Censorship Proxy’ for Government, Says Trump’s Reply Brief

The “secret company documents” that Elon Musk began releasing six weeks after buying Twitter in October “confirm everything” that former President Donald Trump and his co-plaintiffs alleged about the social media platform’s censorship conspiracy but that the district court deemed not plausible, Trump and his co-plaintiffs said in a reply brief Friday (docket 22-15961). It was filed in their 9th Circuit appeal of the District Court for the Northern District of California’s dismissal of their First Amendment complaint against Twitter and its former CEO Jack Dorsey.

Trump alleges his rights were violated when Twitter permanently banned him for engaging in constitutionally protected speech. Trump’s six co-plaintiffs allege Twitter also censored and banned them “for their expression of views contrary to the government’s preferred positions.” The 9th Circuit is considering scheduling oral argument in the appeal for August in San Francisco (see 2305050031).

Trump and his co-plaintiffs allege Twitter “entered into a covert collaboration with the government to censor disfavored viewpoints and silence speakers who departed from the party narrative,” said their reply brief. Twitter was “motivated by fear” of losing its Communications Decency Act Section 230 immunity and was under pressure from federal officials and law enforcement, it said.

The plaintiffs, including the former president, allege a veritable army of “federal Myrmidons” coerced and cajoled social media platforms “to censor disfavored viewpoints,” said the reply brief. The censorship demands came from the highest levels of the Biden White House, it said. Twitter staffers "cracked the whip to ensure compliance,” it said. Defendants Twitter and its former CEO “erected a barricade of denial,” it said.

When “powerful federal officials” threaten to repeal Section 230, the FBI “sets up a private communication channel to forward censorship requests,” said the reply brief. Through that channel, the FBI grants Twitter executives top secret clearances, and pays Twitter “millions to process government demands,” it said. When Twitter deletes targeted accounts within days of receiving government hit lists, “the most reasonable inference is that Twitter served as a censorship proxy for the government,” it said.

The stakes in this case are high, said the reply brief. If this “extreme scenario” doesn’t constitute state action, federal officials and social media platforms “can collaborate to suppress any speech that challenges government orthodoxy, so long as they invoke the fig leaf of ‘content moderation' by nominally private actors,” it said. Denying the plaintiffs the ability to conduct discovery “into the clandestine and unlawful government-Twitter partnership would work a grave miscarriage of justice,” it said: “The judgment should be reversed.”