Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey and Louisiana Attorney General Jeffrey Landry slammed the Biden administration Sunday for attempting to stop a federal judge’s injunction against government censorship activities.
Bailey and Landry opposed the Biden administration’s efforts to halt a preliminary injunction issued July 4 by Western District of Louisiana Judge Terry A. Doughty that bars federal officials from communicating with social media platforms for the purpose of censoring protected speech. The attorneys general argued in their court filing that the administration is essentially asking to “continue violating the First Amendment.”
“In essence, Defendants argue that the injunction should be stayed because it might interfere with the Government’s ability to continue working with social-media companies to censor Americans’ core political speech on the basis of viewpoint,” they wrote in the court filing. “In other words, the Government seeks a stay of the injunction so that it can continue violating the First Amendment.”
The Biden administration appealed the injunction Wednesday and filed an emergency motion Thursday night asking to pause the injunction pending its appeal. (RELATED: Here’s What A Federal Judge’s Blocking Of Biden Admin Censorship Efforts Signals For The First Amendment Going Forward)
BIDEN: “Do you disagree with the judge’s ruling that this coordination was a form of censorship that specifically targeted Conservative speech?”
JEAN-PIERRE: “We disagree with the decision.” pic.twitter.com/4ui0ql6jiD
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) July 5, 2023
Bailey and Landry state in the filing that the administration’s claim that the injunction is “sweeping in scope and vague in its terms” does not hold up because it “matches the scope of the ongoing First Amendment violations found by the Court.”
“The injunction addresses a great deal of unlawful conduct because Defendants have committed a great deal of unlawful conduct,” they wrote.
In their initial March motion for a preliminary injunction, Landry and Bailey highlighted over 1,400 facts that they said show officials engaged in censorship activities with social media platforms, which were uncovered through internal government documents they gained access to from the lawsuit. Activities included Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) “switchboards” that allowed state and local election officials to flag misinformation and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) officials flagging social-media posts for removal, along with the FBI planting false information intended to convince platforms to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story.
“Although this case is still relatively young, and at this stage the Court is only examining it in terms of Plaintiffs’ likelihood of success on the merits, the evidence produced thus far depicts an almost dystopian scenario,” Doughty wrote July 4. “During the COVID-19 pandemic, a period perhaps best characterized by widespread doubt and uncertainty, the United States Government seems to have assumed a role similar to an Orwellian ‘Ministry of Truth.’”
After the injunction was issued last week, the State Department canceled its meeting with Facebook to go over hacking threats and 2024 election preparations, along with all future monthly meetings “pending further guidance,” according to The Washington Post.
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