SCOTUS rules that public officials may block people on social media in certain circumstances, tossing aside challenges against Michigan and California officials
but only sometimes, SCOTUS rules Lauren Feiner / The Verge : Supreme Court defines when it's illegal for public officials to block social media critics Chris Teale / Route Fifty : Supreme Court clarifies when public officials can block citizens on social media Adam Liptak / New York Times : Supreme Court Sets Rules for Blocking Citizens From Officials' Accounts Eugene Volokh / Reason : S. Ct. Announces Test for When a Government Official's Social Media Posts Are “State Action” Michael Macagnone / Roll Call : Supreme Court decides when public officials can block critics online CityNews Toronto : Supreme Court rules public officials can sometimes be sued for blocking critics on social media Lawrence Hurley / NBC News : Supreme Court outlines when officials can be sued for blocking people on social media Threads: Benjamin Goggin / @benjamin_goggin_ : “The Supreme Court ruled on Friday that members of the public in some circumstances can sue public officials for blocking them on social media platforms” https://www.nbcnews.com/... Forums: r/DeFranco : Supreme Court rules that public officials can block social media followers in some circumstances | CNN Politics r/politics : Supreme Court rules that public officials can block social media followers in some circumstances
Context & Ripple Effects
The decision resolves questions the Court took up in 2023 over whether officials’ account-level moderation can trigger First Amendment constraints, following its agreement to hear the two blocking cases.
It also supplies an answer after oral arguments exposed no clear consensus on how to distinguish an official’s government action from personal online activity. The ruling matters because that boundary determines whether blocked users have a constitutional claim.
First-order effects
- Michigan and California officials—and other public officials using social accounts—now have a Court-defined state-action test to assess whether blocking a user can be challenged.
- People blocked from an official’s account face a threshold question: whether the account activity was undertaken with actual or apparent governmental authority, rather than as private conduct.
Second-order effects
- Public bodies and officials will have to distinguish official communications channels from personal accounts more deliberately, because account presentation and use can shape litigation exposure.
- Lower courts will apply the new test to disputes over online access, making the factual record around an account’s authority and purpose central to future cases.
Third-order effects
- The decision reinforces that constitutional speech protections on privately operated platforms depend on identifying government action, not merely on the public importance of an online account.
- As government communication continues to occur through social platforms, litigation is likely to focus less on platforms’ moderation choices and more on when officials’ digital conduct is attributable to the state.
The trend: This is part of a broader effort to map First Amendment state-action rules onto public officials’ and governments’ use of privately run social media services.