There are new developments in the lawsuit filed against President Donald Trump by Columbia University’s Knight First Amendment Institute for banning some Twitter users from seeing his account.
The Knight First Amendment Institute is suing Trump for “unconstitutional” use of the “block” feature on Twitter, which restricts certain individual users from interacting with or seeing tweets posted by the @realDonaldTrump handle.
Whoo-hoo! Trump blocked me!! : ) pic.twitter.com/gfh1Be5G5h
— Mike Elgan (@MikeElgan) June 15, 2017
US District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald of New York “asked Trump’s lawyer Michael Baer whether letting Trump bar users from @realDonaldTrump would violate their First Amendment free speech rights,” reports CNBC.
@RealDonaldTrump was Donald Trump’s original Twitter account before he became president. He also uses @POTUS for the purpose of posting exclusively presidential information; the White House uses @WhiteHouse to post information regarding official White House matters.
Looking forward to 3:30 P.M. meeting today at the White House. We have to protect & build our Steel and Aluminum Industries while at the same time showing great flexibility and cooperation toward those that are real friends and treat us fairly on both trade and the military.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 8, 2018
@RealDonaldTrump is used in a more private manner than @POTUS, though it does have a larger following than @POTUS and @WhiteHouse. Trump uses @realDonaldTrump to post candid, present concerns, whereas the other accounts are used to make more kosher comments and announcements.
Lowest rated Oscars in HISTORY. Problem is, we don’t have Stars anymore – except your President (just kidding, of course)!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 6, 2018
Twitter’s support page says that users who are blocked by another user on Twitter cannot see tweets posted by the latter. In that case, someone blocked by @realDonaldTrump cannot see anything that he tweets on that account. The president cannot, however, block people from following the @POTUS account.
According to an AP report Thursday, Judge Buchwald “is recommending that President Donald Trump mute rather than block some Twitter followers to resolve a First Amendment lawsuit.”