Murthy v. Missouri ‘One of the Most Important Cases In a Century’: La. AG

Louisiana heads to the U.S. Supreme Court “to defend our First Amendment rights against government censorship,” said a media alert Wednesday from the office of Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill (R), trumpeting oral argument Monday in Murthy v. Missouri (docket 23-411) (see 2401290058). Louisiana and Missouri are the two state respondents challenging the government’s petition to vacate the injunction that would block officials from the White House and four federal agencies from coercing social media platforms to moderate their content. The Supreme Court has stayed the injunction pending its resolution of the case (see 2310230003). When George Orwell published Nineteen Eighty-Four in 1949 as a warning against tyranny, “he never intended it to be used as a how-to guide by the federal government,” said the Murrill media alert. Yet Murthy v. Missouri has uncovered more than 20,000 pages of documents “highlighting an extensive censorship campaign stemming directly” from President Joe Biden and his federal government, it said: “As a result, this has become one of the most important cases in a century related to the First Amendment.” The state respondents “will present a powerful argument” to the Supreme Court, “which we believe will validate the original ruling by a district judge that Biden’s censorship enterprise is a massive violation of the First Amendment,” it said. “We hope to get a strong, powerful message” from the Supreme Court that the First Amendment “still matters and that the federal government cannot engage in a broad ranging enterprise to stifle protected speech,” it said.