The Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) and NetChoice said Friday they have applied for an emergency stay with Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, demanding that Texas HB 20 be prevented from coming into force until it passes. -low courts. . Alito can either unilaterally decide on the request or take it to the full Supreme Court.
The Texas law, which was blocked last year but reinstated by the Fifth District Court of Appeals on Wednesday, makes it illegal for any social media platform with 50 million or more users per month in the U.S. to “block, ban, remove, deplatform, demonetize, de “As a result, this also creates great uncertainty about how social media companies such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube will operate in the country.”
“Texas HB 20 deprives private online businesses of their speaking rights, prohibits them from making constitutionally protected editorial decisions, and forces them to publish and promote unwanted content,” said Chris Marchez, a NetChoice adviser, in a statement shared with CNN Business. “We hope that the Supreme Court will quickly overturn this [appeals court’s decision]and we remain confident that the law will eventually be rejected as unconstitutional. “
Among them, NetChoice and CCIA are some of the largest companies in the technology industry, with Google (GOOGL), Facebook (FB), Twitter (TWTR) and TikTok among their members.
This week’s ruling and the expected repulsion by technology lobby groups potentially lay the groundwork for what could be a clash of Supreme Court rights over the First Amendment rights and possibly a dramatic interpretation of those rights that affects not only the technology industry but all Americans. and decades of established precedent.
– CNN’s Brian Fung contributed to this report.
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