Supreme Court Leaves Door Open for Government to Censor Speech Through Collusion With Social Media Companies

WASHINGTON, DC — In a blow to First Amendment freedoms, the U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hold Facebook/Meta accountable for colluding with the government to silence constitutionally protected speech.

Without a clear ruling holding Meta accountable as a state actor, The Rutherford Institute warns that social media companies are likely to once again serve as proxies for government censorship—especially during times of crisis or political pressure.

In urging the Supreme Court to hear the appeal in Children’s Health Defense v. Meta, Rutherford Institute attorneys argued that Meta functioned as a government actor by working in concert with federal officials to suppress viewpoints critical of the government’s COVID-19 policies, including posts by Children’s Health Defense (CHD). Meta attempted to sidestep the issue by claiming the case was moot due to the end of the pandemic and the change in presidential administration. Yet earlier this year, Meta paid $25 million to settle a similar First Amendment lawsuit brought by Donald Trump in 2021—an amount critics have denounced as a political payoff to avoid scrutiny.

“We are rapidly approaching a point where the government no longer needs to directly censor speech. Instead, it outsources its dirty work to corporate gatekeepers like Facebook and YouTube,” said constitutional attorney John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute and author of Battlefield America: The War on the American People. “The Supreme Court’s refusal to intervene sets a dangerous precedent, allowing the government and social media companies to collude behind closed doors while skirting constitutional limits. If we don’t push back now, these companies will be emboldened to silence speech again the next time the government decides certain viewpoints are too dangerous, inconvenient, or politically incorrect.”

Children’s Health Defense has been an outspoken critic of the health dangers posed by vaccine mandates and wireless technologies. Its mission has brought it into conflict with the pharmaceutical industry, the United States government, and big-tech internet companies. Crucial to CHD’s mission of educating the public is its use of social media. However, CHD alleges that since 2019, Facebook has sought to discredit it by targeting its speech, labeling posts “false,” restricting donations, interfering with its outreach, and eventually deplatforming the group. In 2020, CHD filed a lawsuit alleging that Facebook acted under government direction to suppress dissent as part of its crackdown on so-called “vaccine misinformation.”

Although lower courts dismissed the case, a Ninth Circuit dissent warned that a “line has plainly been crossed” if Meta and the government “worked cooperatively together to suppress the concededly truthful speech of Americans.” Those concerns were reinforced in April 2025 when Sarah Wynn-Williams, Facebook’s former Director of Global Public Policy, testified before Congress that Meta worked “hand in glove” with the Chinese Communist Party to build censorship tools—at one point deleting, at Beijing’s request, the account of a prominent Chinese dissident living on American soil and then lying to Congress about it. In the wake of the Supreme Court’s refusal to hear CHD’s appeal, CHD remains de-platformed and, as Rutherford Institute attorneys warn, nothing is deterring social media companies from acting as government censors.

Affiliate attorney Christopher F. Moriarty helped advance the arguments in the brief.

The Rutherford Institute, a nonprofit civil liberties organization, defends individuals whose constitutional rights have been threatened or violated and educates the public on a wide spectrum of issues affecting their freedoms.

Case History

April 29, 2021 • Rutherford Institute Asks District Court To Prohibit Facebook From Censoring, De-Platforming COVID-19 Vaccine Critics

November 08, 2021 • Challenging Technocensorship, Rutherford Institute Appeals to Federal Court to Prohibit Facebook From Censoring COVID-19 Vaccine Critics

August 23, 2024 • Ninth Circuit Refuses to Hold Facebook Accountable for Working With the Government to Censor, Suppress Disfavored Ideas and Speech

February 13, 2025 • Did Facebook Conspire With the Government to Censor Speech in Violation of the First Amendment? Case Could Redefine Social Media Censorship

Children’s Health Defense v. Meta

• Supreme Court Amicus Brief
• Ninth Circuit: Opinion
• Amicus brief before the Ninth Circuit 
• Amicus brief before the U.S. District Court

Article posted with permission from John Whitehead

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