President Donald Trump is appealing an appellate court ruling that he can’t block users from his @realDonalTrump Twitter account…saying the application of the First Amendment in the case was “fundamentally misconceived.” Whoa…must have been his lawyers on that one…too many multi-syllabic words there!
President Donald Trump is challenging a federal appeals court decision that ruled he violated the U.S. Constitution by blocking people whose views he disliked from his Twitter account.
In court papers filed late on Friday by the U.S. Justice Department, Trump sought a rehearing by the full 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York, calling the 3-0 decision “fundamentally misconceived.”
In the appellate court ruling, Circuit Judge Barrington Parker wrote, “the First Amendment does not permit a public official who utilizes a social media account for all manner of official purposes to exclude persons from an otherwise-open online dialogue because they expressed views with which the official disagrees.”
The Justice Department court filing Friday warned that if the appeals court ruling was upheld, “public officials who address matters relating to their public office on personal accounts will run the risk that every action taken on that account will be state action subject to constitutional scrutiny.”
Parker, however, had said Trump’s account bears “all the trappings of an official, state-run account” and is “one of the White House’s main vehicles for conducting official business.”
There is no reason that this court ruling shouldn’t be upheld from further challenges. But again…I suggest that Congress take up a bill to define and refine the uses of official business on social media accounts.