Lindke v. Freed, 601 U.S. 187 (2024), and O'Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier, 601 U.S. 205 (2024), were a pair of United States Supreme Court cases regarding the First Amendment. Both cases were filed by individuals who were blocked from a public official's personal social media account where the official sometimes spoke about official government business. The blocked individuals asserted that their blocks constituted state action subject to the First Amendment and civil rights litigation.[1] In a unanimous decision in Lindke, the court held that speech made by a public official on a private social media account is not government speech – such that the official could not block users or delete comments related to that speech – unless the official had authority to speak on the government's behalf and purported to do so in the posts at issue.[2] In a per curiam opinion, the court remanded O'Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier back to the Ninth Circuit for further consideration in light of the decision in Lindke.
| Lindke v. Freed | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Argued October 31, 2023 Decided March 15, 2024 | |
| Full case name | Kevin Lindke v. James R. Freed |
| Docket no. | 22-661 |
| Citations | 601 U.S. 187 (more) |
| Argument | Oral argument |
| Decision | Opinion |
| Holding | |
| A public official who prevents someone from commenting on the official's social-media page engages in state action under §1983 only if the official both (1) possessed actual authority to speak on the State's behalf on a particular matter, and (2) purported to exercise that authority when speaking in the relevant social-media posts. | |
| Court membership | |
| |
| Case opinion | |
| Majority | Barrett, joined by unanimous |
| O'Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier | |
|---|---|
| |
| Argued November 1, 2023 Decided March 15, 2024 | |
| Full case name | Michelle O'Connor-Ratcliff, et al. v. Christopher Garnier, et ux. |
| Docket no. | 22-324 |
| Citations | 601 U.S. 205 (more) |
| Argument | Oral argument |
| Decision | Opinion |
| Case history | |
| Prior | Garnier v. O'Connor-Ratcliff, 513 F. Supp. 3d 1229 (S.D. Cal. 2021); Garnier v. O'Connor-Ratcliff, Zane, 41 F.4th 1158 (9th Cir. 2022) |
| Holding | |
| The judgment of the Ninth Circuit is vacated and the case is remanded for further consideration in light of Lindke v. Freed. | |
| Court membership | |
| |
| Case opinion | |
| Per curiam | |
Background
editIn 2014, petitioners Michelle O'Connor-Ratcliff and T.J. Zane successfully ran for election to the Board of Trustees of the Poway Unified School District (PUSD), located in Poway, California. In addition to personal accounts, petitioners also created public accounts on Facebook and Twitter to promote their campaigns. After they were elected, petitioners continued to use these accounts to post content related to PUSD business and activities of the Board. This included information about achievements of students and faculty, reminders about Board meetings, and matters of public safety and security at PUSD.[3]
Respondents Christopher and Kimberly Garnier are parents with children attending PUSD schools. For years, the Garniers had been active members of the PUSD community and had often been critical of the Board. They voiced their concerns at public meetings of the Board of Trustees, in emails, and in person at meetings with individual trustees. As they became unsatisfied with the results of these communications, the Garniers began – in 2015 – to comment on Trustees' social media posts. Respondents' comments never included profanity or threatening language, and were nearly always related to PUSD matters. However, the length and repetitive nature of the comments became frustrating to O'Connor-Ratcliff and Zane. For example, Christopher Garnier had once left near-identical comments on 42 separate posts on O'Connor-Ratcliff's Facebook page. He had also left 226 identical replies over the span of 10 minutes to each tweet O'Connor-Ratcliff had ever posted on her public Twitter account.
At first, petitioners began to hide or delete individual comments from their Facebook pages. As this grew onerous, O'Connor-Ratcliff and Zane blocked the Garniers from their social media accounts. Sometime after, petitioners also implemented "word filters" on their Facebook accounts, effectively precluding members of the public from leaving verbal reactions, but not from liking the post or otherwise reacting in a nonverbal way. Since they were blocked, the Garniers were unable to interact with the posts in nonverbal ways.
After they were blocked, the Garniers sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 seeking injunctive and declaratory relief, alleging a violation of the First Amendment. The United States District Court for the Southern District of California ruled in favor of the Garniers, granting declaratory and injunctive relief. The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed.
Supreme Court
editA previous case, Knight First Amendment Institute v. Trump, related to Donald Trump's use of his personal Twitter account to block users while he served as president, had been decided by the Second Circuit in that Trump's account was considered a public forum and could not block users. The case was appealed to the Supreme Court at the end of 2020, but with Trump leaving office in January 2021, the Supreme Court ruled that the case was rendered moot.[4]
O'Connor-Ratcliff and Zane petitioned the Supreme Court to hear their case on October 4, 2022. On April 24, 2023, the Court granted certiorari.
References
edit- ^ Calvert, Clay (May 4, 2023). "The Supreme Court's next target: social media". The Hill. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
- ^ Sherman, Mark (March 15, 2024). "SCOTUS Rules Public Officials Can Sometimes Be Sued For Blocking Critics On Social Media". Associated Press. Retrieved March 15, 2024 – via Huffington Post.
- ^ "Garnier v. O'Connor-Ratcliffe". July 27, 2022. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
- ^ Fritze, John (October 30, 2023). "Can a city official 'cancel' a constituent? How a fight over an emoji wound up at the Supreme Court". USA Today. Retrieved October 30, 2023.
External links
edit- Text of O'Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier, 601 U.S. 187 (2024) is available from: Justia Oyez (oral argument audio) Supreme Court (slip opinion) Supreme Court (preliminary print)