The New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA) has joined its plaintiffs in the lawsuit that the state of Missouri and Louisiana filed against the Biden administration alleging that social media platforms are acting as arms of the federal government.
NCLA’s plaintiffs include Dr. Jayanta Bhattacharya, Dr. Martin Kulldorff as well as Dr. Aaron Kheriaty and Jill Hines who have all been censored for expressing views about COVID restrictions that opposed the government’s position.
“The government shouldn't be in the business of deciding what's true and what's not true because last summer you had Biden and Wilensky saying that if you got the vaccine, you wouldn't get COVID and now we know that's not true,” said Jenin Younes, litigation counsel with the NCLA.
Dr. Bhattacharya and Dr. Kulldorff are among the world’s most renowned epidemiologists and had crucial insights to share on the flawed reasoning and science underlying lockdowns, masks and vaccine mandates, according to a press release. Dr. Kheriaty is a professor of medical ethics, while Hines is a consumer and human rights advocate who says she offered thoughtfully, reasoned opposition to government-imposed Covid-19 restrictions.
“Members of the Biden administration, including the president, the surgeon general, and DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas have made public statements saying they will penalize tech companies if they don't ramp up censorship and it was throughout this time that people on social media noticed a drastic increase in censorship,” Younes told the St. Louis Record.
State of Missouri ex rel. Schmitt, et al. v. Joseph R. Biden, Jr., et al., filed in association with the State of Louisiana, accuses YouTube, Meta, and Twitter platforms of being government actors in suppressing disfavored speakers, which violates the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
“The attorneys general have that in the lawsuit that the states want to know what their citizens actually think and if you're censoring speech, they don't know that,” Younes said.
As previously reported in the St. Louis Record, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana Judge Terry Doughty issued a ruling last month that allows Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt’s lawsuit alleging government-fueled social media censorship to proceed.
“Social media is our modern-day public square,” Younes added. “It's where people go to exchange ideas so it's extremely important that a precedent is set saying that the government cannot tell social media companies what to do. The government cannot be deciding whose voices get to be heard, and whose voices are silent. That's a basic First Amendment right.”