Trump Twitter Ruling Limits

Posted on 06-05-2018 by Lextalk Staff
Tags: social media , Trump , Twitter , President Trump

Government Speech vs. Personal Use 

As long as President Trump is using his Twitter handle for government speech, he cannot block individuals from following him. So says the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Mute Not Block

In Knight First Amendment Institute v. Trump, decided last week in New York, U.S. District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald held that the “interactive spaces” of President Trump’s Twitter account were a public forum under First Amendment law. Within those spaces, the president may “mute” his critics; that is, he has a right to ignore them. But, he may not block them: Blocking prevents those critical of the president from engaging with others in the interactive public forum created by direct responses to his tweets.  Twitter As Public Forum: The Limits Of The Trump Ruling, Law360, May 23, 2018

Read the district court ruling in the Trump case, the Supreme Court’s first ruling on this topic and current legal analysis below: