Republican governor forced to stop blocking Facebook users who criticize him

Maryland Governor Larry Hogan allegedly had a habit of blocking Facebook users and deleting comments when people criticized him, but a lawsuit has forced him to adopt a more open social media policy.

Four Maryland residents sued the Republican governor in a US District Court in August 2017, with help from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Maryland. The ACLU announced yesterday that a settlement has been finalized, requiring Hogan to implement a new social media policy within two weeks. The state is also required to pay $65,000 to the plaintiffs.

“The ACLU lawsuit is one in a wave of high-profile cases across the country against elected officials charged with trying to silence constituents on social media—including one case brought against President Donald Trump for blocking constituents on Twitter,” the ACLU of Maryland said.

The ACLU alleged that Hogan was violating constituents’ First Amendment rights to free speech. “Plaintiffs found that they could be, and were, arbitrarily censored by the Governor just for posting comments on the Facebook Page with which the Governor or his staff apparently disagreed,” the court complaint said. The governor and his staff “regularly delete comments and block users because of political disagreement with the messages posted,” the complaint also said.

For example, plaintiff Meredith Phillips posted a comment on Hogan’s Facebook page in January 2017 that “asked whether Governor Hogan planned to ‘speak out on the Muslim ban,'” referring to immigration restrictions imposed by President Trump, the lawsuit said.

Phillips’ comment was allegedly deleted; she posted the same comment again, adding that she “crossed party lines to vote for [Hogan],” and that she hoped the governor would “stand up for all Marylanders and not just those that agree with you.” That comment was deleted, and “she was blocked from posting further comments,” the lawsuit said.

Although there were just four plaintiffs, the ACLU said that “hundreds [of people] reported being wrongfully banned or blocked.”

How the new policy works

The new social media policy will apply to Hogan’s accounts on Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and YouTube. The settlement “mandates that the Governor will not discriminate based on viewpoint, and will permit all commentary on his Facebook page on any past topic he has covered,” the ACLU said. The lawsuit alleged that Hogan and his staff deleted comments and blocked users if their comments were “‘similar’ to a poster’s prior comments, or if they parallel those made by other posters.”

The settlement also “mandates the creation of a second Facebook page dedicated to providing a public forum where constituents can raise a host of issues for the governor’s attention, and creates an appeals process for constituents who feel their comments have been improperly deleted, or that they have been wrongfully blocked,” the ACLU said.

The governor’s office can still block comments that link to or contain malware, ads, profanity, nudity, threats of violence, copyrighted materials, and confidential or private information, among other things. But any content removed must be retained for one year, giving users time to challenge the removal.

Hogan did not admit to any wrongdoing in the settlement. “We are pleased that the ACLU has decided to drop this frivolous and politically motivated lawsuit and reach a settlement with the state,” a Hogan spokesperson told the Baltimore Sun. “Ultimately, it was much better for Maryland taxpayers to resolve this than to continue wasting everyone’s time and resources in court.”

The similar lawsuit against President Trump, filed by the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University and seven people blocked by Trump after criticizing the president, is still unresolved. The Trump administration has argued that the First Amendment doesn’t prevent Trump from blocking people on Twitter.

In oral arguments last month, a federal judge reportedly suggested that the sides could settle if Trump agrees to mute instead of block Twitter accounts he dislikes. But there has been no settlement, and a ruling has not yet been issued.

https://arstechnica.com/?p=1287425