Murthy v. Missouri

P R E L I M I N A R Y P R I N T
Volume 603 U. S. Part 1
Pages 43–108
OFFICIAL REPORTS
OF
T H E S U P R E M E C O U R T
June 26, 2024
REBECCA A. WOMELDORF
reporter of decisions
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N O T I C E : This preliminary print is subject to formal revision before
the bound volume is published. Users are requested to notify the Reporter
of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, D. C. 20543,
pio@supremecourt.gov, of any typographical or other formal errors.

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TERM, 2023
43
Syllabus
MURTHY, SURGEON GENERAL, et al. v. MISSOURI
et
al.
certiorari to the united states court of appeals for
the fth circuit
No. 23–411. Argued March 18, 2024—Decided June 26, 2024
Under their longstanding content-moderation policies, social-media plat-
forms have taken a range of actions to suppress certain categories of
speech, including speech they judge to be false or misleading. In 2020,
with the outbreak of COVID–19, the platforms announced that they
would enforce these policies against users who post false or misleading
content about the pandemic. The platforms also applied misinformation
policies during the 2020 election season. During that period, various
federal offcials regularly spoke with the platforms about COVID–19
and election-related misinformation. For example, White House off-
cials publicly and privately called on the platforms to do more to address
vaccine misinformation. Surgeon General Vivek Mur thy issued a
health advisory that encouraged the platforms to take steps to prevent
COVID–19 misinformation “from taking hold.” The Centers for Dis-
ease Control and Prevention alerted the platforms to COVID–19 misin-
formation trends and fagged example posts. The Federal Bureau of
Investigation and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency
communicated with the platforms about election-related misinformation
in advance of the 2020 Presidential election and the 2022 midterms.
Respondents are two States and fve individual social-media users
who sued dozens of Executive Branch offcials and agencies, alleging
that the Government pressured the platforms to censor their speech in
violation of the First Amendment. Following extensive discovery, the
District Court issued a preliminary injunction. The Fifth Circuit af-
frmed in part and reversed in part. The court held that both the state
plaintiffs and the individual plaintiffs had Article III standing to seek
injunctive relief. On the merits, the court held that the Government
entities and offcials, by “coerc[ing]” or “signifcantly encourag[ing]” the
platforms' moderation decisions, transformed those decisions into state
action. The court then modifed the District Court's injunction to state
that the defendants shall not coerce or signifcantly encourage social-
media companies to suppress protected speech on their platforms.
Held: Neither the individual nor the state plaintiffs have established
Article III standing to seek an injunction against any defendant.
Pp. 56–76.

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THY v. MISSOURI
Syllabus
(a) Article III's “case or controversy” requirement is “fundamental”
to
the “proper role” of the Judiciary. Raines v. Byrd, 521 U. S. 811, 818.
A proper case or controversy exists only when at least one plaintiff
“establish[es] that [she] ha[s] standing to sue,” ibid.—i. e., that she has
suffered, or will suffer, an injury that is “concrete, particularized, and
actual or imminent; fairly traceable to the challenged action; and re-
dressable by a favorable ruling,” Clapper v. Amnesty Int'l USA, 568
U. S. 398, 409. Here, the plaintiffs' theories of standing depend on the
platforms' actions—yet the plaintiffs do not seek to enjoin the platforms
from restricting any posts or accounts. Instead, they seek to enjoin
the Government agencies and offcials from pressuring or encouraging
the platforms to suppress protected speech in the future.
The one-step-removed, anticipatory nature of the plaintiffs' alleged
injuries presents two particular challenges. First, it is a bedrock prin-
ciple that a federal court cannot redress “injury that results from the
independent action of some third party not before the court.” Simon v.
Eastern Ky. Wel fare Rights Organization, 426 U. S. 26, 41–42. Second,
because the plaintiffs request forward-looking relief, they must face “a
real and immediate threat of repeated injury.” O'Shea v. Littleton, 414
U. S. 488, 496. Putting these requirements together, the plaintiffs must
show a substantial risk that, in the near future, at least one platform
will restrict the speech of at least one plaintiff in response to the actions
of at least one Government defendant. Here, at the preliminary injunc-
tion stage, they must show that they are likely to succeed in carrying
that burden. On the record in this case, that is a tall order. Pp. 56–58.
(b) The plaintiffs' primary theory of standing involves their “direct
censorship injuries.” Pp. 58–74.
(1) The Court frst considers whether the plaintiffs have demon-
strated traceability for their past injuries. Because the plaintiffs are
seeking only forward-looking relief, the past injuries are relevant only
for their predictive value. The primary weakness in the record of past
restrictions is the lack of specifc causation fndings with respect to any
discrete instance of content moderation. And while the record refects
that the Government defendants played a role in at least some of the
platforms' moderation choices, the evidence indicates that the platforms
had independent incentives to moderate content and often exercised
their own judgment. The Fifth Circuit, by attributing every platform
decision at least in part to the defendants, glossed over complexities in
the evidence. The Fifth Circuit also erred by treating the defendants,
plaintiffs, and platforms each as a unifed whole. Because “standing is
not dispensed in gross,” TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, 594 U. S. 413, 431,
“plaintiffs must demonstrate standing for each claim that they press”
against each defendant, “and for each form of relief that they seek,” ibid.

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Syllabus
This requires a threshold showing that a particular defendant pressured
a
particular platform to censor a particular topic before that platform
suppressed a particular plaintiff 's speech on that topic. Complicating
the plaintiffs' effort to demonstrate that each platform acted due to Gov-
ernment coercion, rather than its own judgment, is the fact that the
platforms began to suppress the plaintiffs' COVID–19 content before
the defendants' challenged communications started. Pp. 58–62.
(2) The plaintiffs fail, by and large, to link their past social-media
restrictions and the defendants' communications with the platforms.
The state plaintiffs, Louisiana and Missouri, refer only to action taken
by Facebook against a Louisiana state representative's post about chil-
dren and the COVID–19 vaccine. But they never say when Facebook
took action against the offcial's post—a critical fact in establishing a
causal link. Nor have the three plaintiff doctors established a likeli-
hood that their past restrictions are traceable to either the White House
offcials or the CDC. They highlight restrictions imposed by Twitter
and LinkedIn, but point only to Facebook's communications with White
House offcials. Plaintiff Jim Hoft, who runs a news website, experi-
enced election-related restrictions on various platforms. He points to
the FBI's role in the platforms' adoption of hacked-material policies and
claims that Twitter restricted his content pursuant to those policies.
Yet Hoft's declaration reveals that Twitter took action according to its
own rules against posting private, intimate media without consent.
Hoft does not provide evidence that his past injuries are likely traceable
to the FBI or CISA. Plaintiff Jill Hines, a healthcare activist, faced
COVID–19-related restrictions on Facebook. Though she makes the
best showing of all the plaintiffs, most of the lines she draws are tenu-
ous. Plus, Facebook started targeting her content before almost all of
its communications with the White House and the CDC, thus weakening
the inference that her subsequent restrictions are likely traceable to
Government-coerced enforcement of Facebook's policies. Even assum-
ing Hines can eke out a showing of traceability, the past is relevant only
insofar as it predicts the future. Pp. 62–69.
(3) To obtain forward-looking relief, the plaintiffs must establish a
substantial risk of future injury that is traceable to the Government
defendants and likely to be redressed by an injunction against them.
The plaintiffs who have not pointed to any past restrictions likely trace-
able to the Government defendants (i. e., everyone other than Hines)
are ill suited to the task of establishing their standing to seek forward-
looking relief. But even Hines, with her superior showing on past
harm, has not shown enough to demonstrate likely future harm at the
hands of these defendants. On this record, it appears that the frequent,
intense communications that took place in 2021 between the Govern-

46 MUR
THY v. MISSOURI
Syllabus
ment defendants and the platforms had considerably subsided by 2022,
when
Hines fled suit. Thus it is “no more than conjecture” to assume
that Hines will be subject to Government-induced content moderation.
Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U. S. 95, 108.
The plaintiffs' counterarguments are unpersuasive. First, they argue
that they suffer “continuing, present adverse effects” from their past
restrictions, as they must now self-censor on social media. O'Shea, 414
U. S., at 496. But the plaintiffs “cannot manufacture standing merely
by inficting harm on themselves based on their fears of hypothetical
future harm that is not certainly impending.” Clapper, 568 U. S., at
416. Second, the plaintiffs suggest that the platforms continue to sup-
press their speech according to policies initially adopted under Govern-
ment pressure. But the plainti ffs have a redressabi lity problem.
Without evidence of continued pressure from the defendants, the plat-
forms remain free to enforce, or not to enforce, their policies—even
those tainted by initial governmental coercion. And the available evi-
dence indicates that the platforms have continued to enforce their poli-
cies against COVID–19 misinformation even as the Federal Government
has wound down its own pandemic response measures. Enjoining the
Government defendants, therefore, is unlikely to affect the platforms'
content-moderation decisions. Pp. 69–74.
(c) The plaintiffs next assert a “right to listen” theory of standing.
The individual plaintiffs argue that the First Amendment protects their
interest in reading and engaging with the content of other speakers on
social media. This theory is startlingly broad, as it would grant all
social-media users the right to sue over someone else's censorship—at
least so long as they claim an interest in that person's speech. While
the Court has recognized a “First Amendment right to `receive informa-
tion and ideas,' ” the Court has identifed a cognizable injury only where
the listener has a concrete, specifc connection to the speaker. Klein-
dienst v. Mandel, 408 U. S. 753, 762. Attempting to satisfy this require-
ment, the plaintiffs emphasize that hearing unfettered speech on social
media is critical to their work as scientists, pundits, and activists. But
they do not point to any specifc instance of content moderation that
caused them identifable harm. They have therefore failed to establish
an injury that is suffciently “concrete and particularized.” Lujan v.
Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U. S. 555, 560. The state plaintiffs assert a
sovereign interest in hearing from their citizens on social media, but
they have not identifed any specifc speakers or topics that they have
been unable to hear or follow. And States do not have third-party
“standing as parens patriae to bring an action against the Federal
Government” on behalf of their citizens who have faced social-media
restrictions. Haaland v. Brackeen, 599 U. S. 255, 295. Pp. 74–76.
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Syllabus
83 F. 4th 350, reversed and remanded.
Barret
t, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Roberts,
C. J., and Sotomayor, Kagan, Kavanaugh, and Jackson, JJ., joined.
Alito, J., fled a dissenting opinion, in which Thomas and Gorsuch, JJ.,
joined, post, p. 76.
Principal Deputy Solicitor General Fletcher argued the
cause for petitioners. With him on the briefs were Solicitor
General Prelogar, Pr incipal Deputy Assistant Attorney
General Boynton, Sopan Joshi, Daniel Tenny, and Daniel
Winik.
J. Benjamin Aguiñaga, Solicitor General of Louisiana, ar-
gued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief were
Elizabeth B. Murrill, Attorney General, Tracy Short, As-
sistant Attorney General, D. John Sauer, Special Assistant
Attorney General, Andrew Bailey, Attorney General of Mis-
souri, Joshua M. Divine, Solicitor General, Todd A. Scott,
John J. Vecchione, Jenin Younes, and Zhonette Brown.*
*Briefs of amici curiae urging reversal were fled for the State of New
York et al. by Letitia James, Attorney General of New York, Barbara D.
Underwood, Solicitor General, Judith N. Vale, Deputy Solicitor General,
Grace X. Zhou and Anthony R. Raduazo, Assistant Solicitors General,
and by the Attorneys General for their respective jurisdictions as follows:
Kris Mayes of Arizona, Rob Bonta of California, Philip J. Weiser of Colo-
rado, William Tong of Connecticut, Brian L. Schwalb of the District of
Columbia, Kathleen Jennings of Delaware, Anne E. Lopez of Hawaii,
Kwame Raoul of Illinois, Aaron M. Frey of Maine, Anthony G. Brown of
Maryland, Andrea Joy Campbell of Massachusetts, Dana Nessel of Michi-
gan, Keith Ellison of Minnesota, Aaron D. Ford of Nevada, Matthew J.
Platkin of New Jersey, Raúl Torrez of New Mexico, Ellen F. Rosenblum
of Oregon, Michelle A. Henry of Pennsylvania, Peter F. Neronha of Rhode
Island, Charity R. Clark of Vermont, Robert W. Ferguson of Washington,
and Joshua L. Kaul of Wisconsin; for the Secretaries of State of Arizona
et al. by Jason Harrow and Charles Gerstein, Special Assistant Attorneys
General of Colorado, Charity R. Clark, Attorney General of Vermont, and
S. Lauren Hibbert, Special Assistant Attorney General, and Peter S. Auh;
for the Coalition for Independent Technology Research by Seth D. Ber-
lin; for Stanford University by John B. Bellinger III, Elisabeth S. Theo-
dore, R. Stanton Jones, Stephen K. Wirth, and Debra L. Zumwalt; and for
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THY v. MISSOURI
Opinion of the Court
Justice Barrett delivered the opinion of the Court.
Dur
ing the 2020 election season and the COVID–19 pan-
demic, social-media platforms frequently removed, demoted,
or fact checked posts containing allegedly false or mislead-
Sen. Mark Warner by Hassan A. Zavareei, Glenn E. Chappell, Spencer
S. Hughes, and Gemma Seidita. Damon Hewitt, Jon Greenbaum, Ezra
Rosenberg, David Brody, and Pooja Chaudhuri fled a brief for the Law-
yers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law et al. as amici curiae urg-
ing vacatur.
Briefs of amici curiae urging affrmance were fled for the State of
Montana et al. by Austin Knudsen, Attorney General of Montana, Chris-
tian B. Corrigan, Solicitor General, and Peter M. Torstensen, Jr., Deputy
Solicitor General, and by the Attorneys General for their respective States
as follows: Steve Marshall of Alabama, Treg Taylor of Alaska, Ashley
Moody of Florida, Christopher M. Carr of Georgia, Raúl R. Labrador of
Idaho, Brenna Bird of Iowa, Kris Kobach of Kansas, Michael T. Hilgers
of Nebraska, Dave Yost of Ohio, Alan Wilson of South Carolina, Marty J.
Jackley of South Dakota, Jonathan Skrmetti of Tennessee, Sean D. Reyes
of Utah, Jason Miyares of Virginia, and Patrick Morrisey of West Vir-
ginia; for Advancing American Freedom Inc., et al. by J. Marc Wheat; for
America's Future et al. by William J. Olson, Jeremiah L. Morgan, Robert
J. Olson, Patrick M. McSweeney, and John I. Harris III; for the American
Free Enterprise Chamber of Commerce by Michael B. Buschbacher and
William P. Barr; for the Americans for Prosperity Foundation by Cynthia
Fleming Crawford; for America's Frontline Doctors et al. by David A.
Dalia; for Amicus Populi et al. by Mitchell Keiter and William J. Becker,
Jr.; for the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons by Andrew
L. Schlafy; for the Atlantic Legal Foundation by Lawrence S. Ebner; for
The Buckeye Institute by Jay R. Carson, Robert D. Alt, and David C.
Tryon; for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression et al.
by Robert Corn-Revere, Abigail E. Smith, Lee Rowland, and Edward S.
Rudofsky; for the International Center for Law & Economics by Andrew
C. Nichols; for the Kennedy Plaintiffs by Mary Holland and Roger I.
Teich; for the Liberty Counsel by Mathew D. Staver, Anita L. Staver, and
Horatio G. Mihet; for Louder With Crowder, LLC, by Georgios Mavros;
for the Manhattan Institute et al. by Ilya Shapiro; for the National In-
stitute of Family and Life Advocates by John J. Bursch, Samuel J. Salario,
Jr., Travis C. Barham, James A. Campbell, and Jeremy D. Tedesco;
for The Rutherford Institute by John W. Whitehead; for the “Twitter
Files” Journalists: Matt Taibbi et al. by D. Adam Candeub; for Justin
Hart et al. by M. E. Buck Dougherty III; for Rep. Jim Jordan et

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as: 603 U. S. 43 (2024)
49
Opinion of the Court
ing information. At the same time, federal offcials, con-
cer
ned about the spread of “misinformation” on social media,
communicated extensively with the platforms about their
content-moderation efforts.
The plaintiffs, two States and fve social-media users, sued
dozens of Executive Branch offcials and agencies, alleging
that they pressured the platforms to suppress protected
speech in violation of the First Amendment. The Fifth Cir-
cuit agreed, concluding that the offcials' communications
rendered them responsible for the private platforms' mod-
eration decisions. It then affrmed a sweeping preliminary
injunction.
The Fifth Circuit was wrong to do so. To establish stand-
ing, the plaintiffs must demonstrate a substantial risk that,
in the near future, they will suffer an injury that is traceable
al. by Christopher E. Mills, Gene P. Hamilton, and Reed D. Rubinstein;
for Charlie Kirk et al. by Jay Alan Sekulow, Stuart J. Roth, Jordan A.
Sekulow, Craig L. Parshall, Cece Noland-Heil, Laura B. Hernandez, and
Geoffrey R. Surtees; and for Angela Reading by Thomas Brejcha and
B. Tyler Brooks.
Briefs of amici curiae were fled for the American Academy of Pediat-
rics et al. by Jessica Anne Morton and Jeffrey B. Dubner; for the Center
for American Liberty by Harmeet K. Dhillon, Karin Sweigart, and Mark
Meuser; for the Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America
by Steffen N. Johnson, Brian M. Willen, Michael W. McConnell, and Jon-
athan D. Urick; for the Claremont Institute's Center for Constitutional
Jurisprudence by John C. Eastman and Anthony T. Caso; for Election
Offcials by Leah J. Tulin, Daniel Weiner, and Matthew A. Seligman; for
the Electronic Frontier Foundation et al. by David Greene; for Floor64,
Inc., dba the Copia Institute, by Catherine R. Gellis; for Informed Consent
Action Network by Aaron Siri; for the Institute for Free Speech by
Charles Miller and Brett R. Nolan; for the International Municipal Law-
yers Association by Meaghan VerGow, Amanda Karras, and Erich Eiselt;
for the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University by Alex
Abdo; for National Religious Broadcasters by Michael P. Farris; for Net-
Choice et al. by David M. Gossett, Ambika Kumar, Adam S. Sieff, Carl
M. Szabo, Paul D. Taske, Matthew C. Schruers, Stephanie A. Joyce, Alex-
andra J. Sternburg, Anastasia P. Boden, and Thomas A. Berry; and for
the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press by Bruce D. Brown.

50 MUR
THY v. MISSOURI
Opinion of the Court
to a Government defendant and redressable by the injunc-
ti
on they seek. Because no plaintiff has carried that burden,
none has standing to seek a preliminary injunction.
I
A
With their billions of active users, the world's major social-
media companies host a “staggering ” amount of content on
their platforms. Twitter, Inc. v. Taamneh, 598 U. S. 471, 480
(2023). Yet for many of these companies, including Face-
book, Twitter, and YouTube, not everything goes.
1
Under
their longstanding content-moderation policies, the platforms
have taken a range of actions to suppress certain categories
of speech. They place warning labels on some posts, while
deleting others. They also “demote” content so that it is
less visible to other users. And they may suspend or ban
users who frequently post content that violates platform
policies.
For years, the platforms have targeted speech they judge
to be false or misleading. For instance, in 2016, Facebook
began fact checking and demoting posts containing mislead-
ing claims about elections. Since 2018, Facebook has re-
moved health-related misinformation, including false claims
about a measles outbreak in Samoa and the polio vaccine
in Pakistan. Likewise, in 2019, YouTube announced that
it would “demonetize” channels that promote anti-vaccine
messages.
In 2020, with the outbreak of COVID–19, the platforms
announced that they would enforce their policies against
users who post false or misleading content about the pan-
demic. As early as January 2020, Facebook deleted posts it
1
Since the events of this suit, Twitter has merged into X Corp. and is
now known as X. Facebook is now known as Meta Platforms. For the
sake of clarity, we will refer to these platforms as Twitter and Facebook,
as they were known during the vast majority of the events underlying
this suit.
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Opinion of the Court
deemed false regarding “cures,” “treatments,” and the effect
of
“physical distancing.” 60 Record on Appeal 19035 (Rec-
ord). And it demoted posts containing what it described as
“conspiracy theories about the origin of the virus.” Id., at
19036. Twitter and YouTube began applying their policies
in March and May 2020, respectively. Throughout the pan-
demic, the platforms removed or reduced posts questioning
the effcacy and safety of mask wearing and the COVID–19
vaccine, along with posts on related topics.
The platforms also applied their misinformation policies
during the 2020 Presidential election season. Facebook, in
late 2019, unveiled measures to counter foreign interference
campaigns and voter suppression efforts. One month before
the election, multiple platforms suppressed a report about
Hunter Biden's laptop, believing that the story originated
from a Russian hack-and-leak operation. After the election,
the platforms took action against users or posts that ques-
tioned the integrity of the election results.
Over the past few years, various federal offcials regularly
spoke with the platforms about COVID–19 and election-
related misinformation. Offcials at the White House, the
Offce of the Surgeon General, and the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention (CDC) focused on COVID–19 con-
tent, while the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and
the Cybersecur ity and Infrastr ucture Security Agency
(CISA) concentrated on elections.
White House. In early 2021, and continuing primarily
through that year, the director of Digital Strategy and mem-
bers of the COVID–19 response team interacted with the
platforms about their efforts to suppress vaccine misinforma-
tion. They expressed concern that Facebook in particular
was “one of the top drivers of vaccine hesitancy,” due to the
spread of allegedly false or misleading claims on the plat-
form. App. 659–660. Thus, the offcials peppered Facebook
(and to a lesser extent, Twitter and YouTube) with detailed
questions about their policies, pushed them to suppress cer-
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52 MUR
THY v. MISSOURI
Opinion of the Court
tain content, and sometimes recommended policy changes.
Some
of these communications were more aggressive than
others. For example, the director of Digital Strategy, frus-
trated that Facebook had not removed a particular post, com-
plained: “[L]ast time we did this dance, it ended in an
insurrection.” Id., at 698. Another offcial, unhappy with
Facebook's supposed lack of transparency about its vaccine
misinformation problems, wrote: “Internally we have been
considering our options on what to do about it.” Id., at 657.
Publicly, White House communications offcials called on the
platforms to do more to address COVID–19 misinforma-
tion—and, perhaps as motivation, raised the possibility of
reforms aimed at the platforms, including changes to the
antitrust laws and 47 U. S. C. § 230.
Surgeon General. In July 2021, Surgeon General Vivek
Murthy issued a health advisory on misinformation. The
advisory encouraged platforms to “[r]edesign recommenda-
tion algorithms to avoid amplifying misinformation,” “[i]m-
pose clear consequences for accounts that repeatedly violate
platform policies,” and “[p]rovide information from trusted
and credible sources to prevent misconceptions from taking
hold.” 3 Record 662. At a press conference to announce
the advisory, Surgeon General Murthy argued that the plat-
forms should “operate with greater transparency and ac-
countability.” 2 id., at 626. The following year, the Sur-
geon General issued a “Request for Information,” seeking,
among other things, reports on each platform's “COVID–19
misinformation policies.” Impact of Health Misinformation
in the Digital Information Environment in the United States
Throughout the COVID–19 Pandemic Request for Informa-
tion (RFI), 87 Fed. Reg. 12714 (Mar. 7, 2022).
CDC. Like the White House, the CDC frequently com-
municated with the platforms about COVID–19 misinforma-
tion. In early 2020, Facebook reached out to the agency,
seeking authoritative information about the virus that it
could post on the platform. The following year, the CDC's
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communications expanded to other platfor ms, including
T
witter and YouTube. The CDC hosted meetings and sent
reports to the platforms, alerting them to misinformation
trends and fagging example posts. The platforms often
asked the agency for fact checks on specifc claims.
FBI and CISA. These agencies communicated with the
platforms about election-related misinformation. They
hosted meetings with several platforms in advance of the
2020 Presidential election and the 2022 midterms. The FBI
alerted the platforms to posts containing false information
about voting, as well as pernicious foreign infuence cam-
paigns that might spread on their sites. Shortly before the
2020 election, the FBI warned the platforms about the po-
tential for a Russian hack-and-leak operation. Some compa-
nies then updated their moderation policies to prohibit users
from posting hacked materials. Until mid-2022, CISA,
through its “switchboarding ” operations, forwarded third-
party reports of election-related misinformation to the plat-
forms. These communications typically stated that the
agency “w[ould] not take any action, favorable or unfavor-
able, toward social media companies based on decisions about
how or whether to use this information.” 72 Record 23223.
B
Respondents are two States and fve individual social-
media users. They were the plaintiffs below, and for the
sake of narrative clarity, we will refer to them as “plaintiffs”
in this opinion. (Likewise, we will refer to the Government
individuals and agencies as “defendants” rather than peti-
ti oners.) The individua l plaintiffs—three doc tors, the
owner of a news website, and a healthcare activist—allege
that various platforms removed or demoted their COVID–
19 or election-related content between 2020 and 2023. The
States, Missouri and Louisiana, claim that the platforms have
suppressed the speech of state entities and offcials, as well
as their citizens' speech.
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54 MUR
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Opinion of the Court
Though the platforms restricted the plaintiffs' content, the
plai
ntiffs maintain that the Federal Government was behind
it. Acting on that belief, the plaintiffs sued dozens of Execu-
tive Branch offcials and agencies, alleging that they pres-
sured the platforms to censor the plaintiffs' speech in vio-
lati on of the First Amendment. The States filed their
complaint on May 5, 2022. The next month, they moved for
a preliminary injunction, seeking to stop the defendants from
“taking any steps to demand, urge, encourage, pressure, or
otherwise induce” any platform “to censor, suppress, re-
move, de-platform, suspend, shadow-ban, de-boost, restrict
access to content, or take any other adverse action against
any speaker, content, or viewpoint expressed on socia l
media.” 1 id., at 253. The individual plaintiffs joined the
suit on August 2, 2022.
After granting extensive discovery, the District Court
issued a preliminary injunction. Missouri v. Biden, 680
F. Supp. 3d 630, 729 (WD La. 2023). The court held that
offcials at the White House, the Surgeon General's Offce,
the CDC, the FBI, and CISA likely “coerced” or “signif-
cantly encouraged” the platforms “to such extent that the[ir
content-moderation] decision[s] should be deemed to be the
decisions of the Government.” Id., at 694 (internal quota-
tion marks omitted). It enjoined those agencies, along with
scores of named and unnamed offcials and employees, from
taking actions “for the purpose of urging, encouraging, pres-
suring, or inducing in any manner the removal, deletion, sup-
pression, or reduction of content containing protected free
speech posted on social-medial platforms.” Missouri v.
Biden, 2023 WL 5841935, *1–*2 (WD La., July 4, 2023).
2
2
The District Court also enjoined the National Institute of Allergy and
Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and the State Department, along with their
offcials and employees. 680 F. Supp. 3d, at 700–701, 704–705. The Fifth
Circuit removed these entities and individuals from the injunction, how-
ever, so they are not before us. Missouri v. Biden, 83 F. 4th 350, 391
(2023).

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Opinion of the Court
Following a grant of panel rehearing, the Fifth Circuit af-
fr
med in part and reversed in part. Missouri v. Biden, 83
F. 4th 350 (2023). It frst held that the individual plaintiffs
had Article III standing to seek injunctive relief, reasoning
that the social-media companies had suppressed the plain-
tiffs' speech in the past and were likely to do so again in the
future, id., at 367–369, and that both of these injuries were
“traceable to government-coerced enforcement” of the plat-
form's policies and “redressable by an injunction against the
government offcials,” id., at 373. The court also concluded
that the States had standing, both because the platforms had
restricted the posts of individual state offcials and because
the States have the “right to listen” to their citizens on social
media. Id., at 371–372.
On the merits, the Fifth Circuit explained that “a private
party's conduct may be state action if the government co-
erced or signifcantly encouraged it.” Id., at 380 (citing
Blum v. Yaretsky, 457 U. S. 991, 1004 (1982); emphasis de-
leted). To identify coercion, it asked whether “the govern-
ment compelled the [private party's] decision by . . . intimat-
ing that some form of punishment will follow a failure to
comply.” 83 F. 4th, at 380. The court explained that the
Government signifcantly encourages a private party's choice
when it exercises “active, meaningful control, whether by
entanglement in the party's decision-making process or di-
rect involvement in carrying out the decision itself.” Id.,
at 377.
3
Applying those tests, the Fifth Circuit determined that
White House offcials, in conjunction with the Surgeon Gen-
eral's Offce, likely both coerced and signifcantly encouraged
the platforms to moderate content. Id., at 388. The court
concluded that the same was true for the FBI. Ibid. It
held that the CDC and CISA signifcantly encouraged (but
3
Because we do not reach the merits, we express no view as to whether
the Fifth Circuit correctly articulated the standard for when the Govern-
ment transforms private conduct into state action.
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did not coerce) the platforms' moderation decisions. Id., at
389,
391.
The Fifth Circuit agreed with the District Court that the
equities favored the plaintiffs. Id., at 392–394. It then
modifed the District Court's injunction to state that the de-
fendants, and their employees and agents, shall not “ `coerce
or signifcantly encourage social-media companies to remove,
delete, suppress, or reduce, including through altering their
algorithms, posted social-media content containing protected
free speech.' ” Id., at 397. The court did not limit the in-
junction to the platforms that the plaintiffs use or the topics
that the plaintiffs wish to discuss, explaining that the harms
stemming from the defendants' conduct “impac[t] every
social-media user.” Id., at 398.
The federal agencies and offcials applied to this Court for
emergency relief. We stayed the injunction, treated the ap-
plication as a petition for a writ of certiorari, and granted
the petition. 601 U. S. ––– (2023).
II
We begin—and end—with standing. At this stage, nei-
ther the individual nor the state plaintiffs have established
standing to seek an injunction against any defendant. We
therefore lack jurisdiction to reach the merits of the dispute.
A
Article III of the Constitution limits the jurisdiction of
federal courts to “Cases” and “Controversies.” The “case or
controversy” requirement is “ `fundamental to the judiciary's
proper role in our system of government.' ” Raines v. Byrd,
521 U. S. 811, 818 (1997) (quoting Simon v. Eastern Ky. Wel-
fare Rights Organization, 426 U. S. 26, 37 (1976)). Federal
courts can only review statutes and executive actions when
necessary “to redress or prevent actual or imminently
threatened injury to persons caused by . . . offcial violation
of law.” Summers v. Earth Island Institute, 555 U. S. 488,
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492 (2009). As this Court has explained, “[i]f a dispute is
not
a proper case or controversy, the courts have no business
deciding it, or expounding the law in the course of doing so.”
DaimlerChrysler Corp. v. Cuno, 547 U. S. 332, 341 (2006).
A proper case or controversy exists only when at least
one plaintiff “establish[es] that [she] ha[s] standing to sue.”
Raines, 521 U. S., at 818; Department of Commerce v. New
York, 588 U. S. 752, 766 (2019). She must show that she has
suffered, or will suffer, an injury that is “concrete, particu-
larized, and actual or imminent; fairly traceable to the chal-
lenged action; and redressable by a favorable ruling.” Clap-
per v. Amnesty Int'l USA, 568 U. S. 398, 409 (2013) (internal
quotation marks omitted). These requirements help ensure
that the plaintiff has “such a personal stake in the outcome
of the controversy as to warrant [her] invocation of federal-
court jurisdiction.” Summers, 555 U. S., at 493 (internal
quotation marks omitted).
The plaintiffs claim standing based on the “direct censor-
ship” of their own speech as well as their “right to listen” to
others who faced social-media censorship. Brief for Re-
spondents 19, 22. Notably, both theories depend on the
platform's actions—yet the plaintiffs do not seek to enjoin
the platforms from restricting any posts or accounts. They
seek to enjoin Government agencies and offcials from pres-
suring or encouraging the platforms to suppress protected
speech in the future.
The one-step-removed, anticipatory nature of their alleged
injuries presents the plaintiffs with two particular chal-
lenges. First, it is a bedrock principle that a federal court
cannot redress “injury that results from the independent ac-
tion of some third party not before the court.” Simon, 426
U. S., at 41–42. In keeping with this principle, we have
“been reluctant to endorse standing theories that require
guesswork as to how independent decisionmakers will exer-
cise their judgment.” Clapper, 568 U. S., at 413. Rather
than guesswork, the plaintiffs must show that the third-
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party platforms “will likely react in predictable ways” to the
defendants'
conduct. Department of Commerce, 588 U. S.,
at 768. Second, because the plaintiffs request forward-
looking relief, they must face “a real and immediate threat
of repeated injury.” O'Shea v. Littleton, 414 U. S. 488, 496
(1974); see also Susan B. Anthony List v. Driehaus, 573 U. S.
149, 158 (2014) (“An allegation of future injury may suffce if
the threatened injury is certainly impending, or there is a
substantial risk that the harm will occur” (internal quotation
marks omitted)). Putting these requirements together, the
plaintiffs must show a substantial risk that, in the near fu-
ture, at least one platform will restrict the speech of at least
one plaintiff in response to the actions of at least one Govern-
ment defendant. On this record, that is a tall order.
Before we evaluate the plaintiffs' different theories, a few
preliminaries: The plaintiff “bears the burden of establishing
standing as of the time [s]he brought th[e] lawsuit and main-
taining it thereafter.” Carney v. Adams, 592 U. S. 53, 59
(2020). She must support each element of standing “with
the manner and degree of evidence required at the succes-
sive stages of the litigation.” Lujan v. Defenders of Wild-
life, 504 U. S. 555, 561 (1992). At the preliminary injunction
stage, then, the plaintiff must make a “clear showing ” that
she is “likely” to establish each element of standing. See
Winter v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 555 U. S.
7, 22 (2008) (emphasis deleted). Where, as here, the parties
have taken discovery, the plaintiff cannot rest on “mere alle-
gations,” but must instead point to factual evidence. See
Lujan, 504 U. S., at 561 (internal quotation marks omitted).
B
1
The plaintiffs' primary theory of standing involves their
“direct censorship injuries.” They claim that the restric-
tions they have experienced in the past on various platforms
are traceable to the defendants and that the platforms will
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continue to censor their speech at the behest of the defend-
ants.
So we frst consider whether the plaintiffs have dem-
onstrated traceability for their past injuries.
Here, a note of caution: If the plaintiffs were seeking com-
pensatory relief, the traceability of their past injuries would
be the whole ball game. But because the plaintiffs are seek-
ing only forward-looking relief, the past injuries are relevant
only for their predictive value. See O'Shea, 414 U. S., at
495–496 (“Past exposure to illegal conduct” can serve as evi-
dence of threatened future injury but “does not in itself show
a present case or controversy regarding injunctive relief ”).
If a plaintiff demonstrates that a particular Government de-
fendant was behind her past social-media restriction, it will
be easier for her to prove that she faces a continued risk of
future restriction that is likely to be traceable to that same
defendant. Conversely, if a plaintiff cannot trace her past
injury to one of the defendants, it will be much harder for
her to make that showing. See Clapper, 568 U. S., at 411.
In the latter situation, the plaintiff would essentially have
to build her case from scratch, showing why she has some
newfound reason to fear that one of the named defendants
will coerce her chosen platform to restrict future speech on
a topic about which she plans to post—in this case, either
COVID–19 or the upcoming election. Keep in mind, there-
fore, that the past is relevant only insofar as it is a launching
pad for a showing of imminent future injury.
The primary weakness in the record of past restrictions is
the lack of specifc causation fndings with respect to any
discrete instance of content moderation. The District Court
made none. Nor did the Fifth Circuit, which approached
standing at a high level of generality. The platforms, it rea-
soned, “have engaged in censorship of certain viewpoints on
key issues,” while “the government has engaged in a years-
long pressure campaign” to ensure that the platforms sup-
press those viewpoints. 83 F. 4th, at 370. The platforms'
“censorship decisions”—including those affecting the plain-

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tiffs—were thus “likely attributable at least in part to the
platfor
ms' reluctance to risk” the consequences of refusing
to “adhere to the government's directives.” Ibid.
We reject this overly broad assertion. As already dis-
cussed, the platforms moderated similar content long before
any of the Government defendants engaged in the challenged
conduct. In fact, the platforms, acting independently, had
strengthened their pre-existing content-moderation policies
before the Government defendants got involved. For in-
stance, Facebook announced an expansion of its COVID–19
misinformation policies in early February 2021, before White
House officials began communicating with the platform.
And the platforms continued to exercise their independent
judgment even after communications with the defendants
began. For example, on several occasions, various plat-
forms explained that White House offcials had fagged con-
tent that did not violate company policy. Moreover, the
platforms did not speak only with the defendants about con-
tent moderation; they also regularly consulted with outside
experts.
This evidence indicates that the platforms had independ-
ent incentives to moderate content and often exercised their
own judgment. To be sure, the record refects that the Gov-
ernment defendants played a role in at least some of the
platforms' moderation choices. But the Fifth Circuit, by
attributing every platform decision at least in part to the
defendants, glossed over complexities in the evidence.
4
4
The Fifth Circuit relied on the District Court's factual fndings, many
of which unfortunately appear to be clearly erroneous. The District
Court found that the defendants and the platforms had an “effcient report-
and-censor relationship.” Missouri v. Biden, 680 F. Supp. 3d 630, 715
(WD La. 2023). But much of its evidence is inapposite. For instance,
the court says that Twitter set up a “streamlined process for censorship
requests” after the White House “bombarded” it with such requests.
Ibid., n. 662 (internal quotation marks omitted). The record it cites says
nothing about “censorship requests.” See App. 639–642. Rather, in re-
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The Fifth Circuit also erred by treating the defendants,
plai
ntiffs, and platforms each as a unifed whole. Our deci-
sions make clear that “standing is not dispensed in gross.”
TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, 594 U. S. 413, 431 (2021).
That is, “plaintiffs must demonstrate standing for each claim
that they press” against each defendant, “and for each form
of relief that they seek.” Ibid. Here, for every defendant,
there must be at least one plaintiff with standing to seek
an injunction. This requires a certain threshold showing:
namely, that a particular defendant pressured a particular
platform to censor a particular topic before that platform
suppressed a particular plaintiff's speech on that topic.
Heeding these conditions is critically important in a
sprawling suit like this one. The plaintiffs faced speech re-
strictions on different platforms, about different topics, at
different times. Different groups of defendants communi-
cated with different platforms, about different topics, at dif-
ferent times. And even where the plaintiff, platform, time,
content, and defendant line up, the links must be evaluated
in light of the platform's independent incentives to moderate
content. As discussed, the platforms began to suppress the
plaintiffs' COVID–19 content before the defendants' chal-
ation account of President Biden's granddaughter, Twitter told the offcial
about a portal that he could use to fag similar issues. Ibid. This has
nothing to do with COVID–19 misinformation. The court also found that
“[a] drastic increase in censorship . . . directly coincided with Defendants'
public calls for censorship and private demands for censorship.” 680
F. Supp. 3d, at 715. As to the “calls for censorship,” the court's proof
included statements from Members of Congress, who are not parties to
this suit. Ibid., and n. 658. Some of the evidence of the “increase in
censorship” reveals that Facebook worked with the CDC to update its list
of removable false claims, but these examples do not suggest that the
agency “demand[ed]” that it do so. Ibid. Finally, the court, echoing the
plaintiffs' proposed statement of facts, erroneously stated that Facebook
agreed to censor content that did not violate its policies. Id., at 714,
n. 655. Instead, on several occasions, Facebook explained that certain
content did not qualify for removal under its policies but did qualify for
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lenged communications started, which complicates the plain-
ti
ffs' effort to demonstrate that each platform acted due to
“government-coerced enforcement” of its policies, 83 F. 4th,
at 370 (emphasis deleted), rather than in its own judgment
as an “ `independent acto[r],' ” Lujan, 504 U. S., at 562. With
these factors in mind, we proceed to untangle the mass of
the plaintiffs' injuries and Government communications.
2
The plaintiffs rely on allegations of past Government cen-
sorship as evidence that future censorship is likely. But
they fail, by and large, to link their past social-media restric-
tions to the defendants' communications with the platforms.
Thus, the events of the past do little to help any of the plain-
tiffs establish standing to seek an injunction to prevent fu-
ture harms.
Louisiana and Missouri. The state plaintiffs devote
minimal attention to restriction of their own social-media
content, much less to a causal link between any such restric-
tion and the actions of any Government defendant. They
refer only to Facebook's “fagg[ing] . . . and de-boost[ing]” of
a Louisiana state representative's post about children and
the COVID–19 vaccine. Brief for Respondents 20; App.
635–636. We need not decide whether an injury to a state
representative counts as an injury to the State, because evi-
dence of causation is lacking.
5
The States assert only that
in November 2021, Facebook, “as a result of [its] work [with
the CDC],” updated its policies “to remove additional false
claims about the COVID–19 vaccine for children.” 37 Rec-
ord 11457. But they never say when Facebook took action
against the offcial's post—and a causal link is possible only
if the removal occurred after Facebook's communication with
5
The Fifth Circuit held that States “sustain a direct injury when the
social-media accounts of state offcials are censored due to federal coer-
cion.” 83 F. 4th, at 372. Because the State failed to show that its offcial
was censored, we need not express a view on this theory.
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the CDC. There is therefore no evidence to support the
St
ates' allegation that Facebook restricted the state repre-
sentative pursuant to the CDC-infuenced policy.
Jayanta Bhattacharya, Martin Kulldorff, and Aaron
Kheriaty. These plaintiffs are doctors who questioned the
wisdom of then-prevailing COVID–19 policies, including
lockdowns and mask and vaccine mandates. Each faced his
frst social-media restriction in 2020, before the White House
and the CDC entered discussions with the relevant plat-
forms. Plaintiffs highlight restrictions imposed by Twitter
and LinkedIn, starting in 2021, on Dr. Kulldorff's posts about
natural immunity. They also point out that Twitter re-
stricted the visibility of Dr. Kheriaty's posts about vaccine
safety and effcacy, as well as the ethics surrounding vaccine
mandates. Attempting to show causation, the plaintiffs em-
phasize that in January 2022, Facebook reported to White
House offcials that it had recently demoted one post advocat-
ing for natural immunity over vaccine immunity. But nei-
ther the timing nor the platforms line up (nor, in Dr. Kheria-
ty's case, does the content), so the plaintiffs cannot show that
these restrictions were traceable to the White House off-
cials. In fact, there is no record evidence that White House
offcials ever communicated at all with LinkedIn.
Drs. Bhattacharya and Kulldorff claim that, after disagree-
ing with the CDC and other federal health offcials, they
faced a “relentless covert campaign of social-media censor-
ship.” App. 585 (emphasis deleted). They refer to the plat-
forms' suppression of the Great Barrington Declaration,
their coauthored report calling for an end to lockdowns.
But their declarations do not suggest that anyone at the
CDC was involved; rather, they point to offcials at the Na-
tional Institutes of Health and the NIAID. Those entities
are not before us. With nothing else to show, Drs. Bhatta-
charya, Kulldorff, and Kheriaty have not established a likeli-
hood that their past restrictions are traceable to either the
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Jim Hoft. Both Hoft and his news website, “The Gate-
way
Pundit,” experienced election and COVID–19-related
restrictions on various platforms. Hoft tries to demonstrate
his standing to sue only the FBI and CISA, which means
that only the suppression of his election-related posts is rele-
vant. (As already discussed, the record contains no evi-
dence that either the FBI or CISA engaged with the plat-
forms about the pandemic.) First, Hoft points to the FBI's
role in the platforms' adoption of hacked-material policies.
And he claims that Twitter, in December 2020, censored con-
tent about the Hunter Biden laptop story under such a policy.
The post was titled: “Where's Hunter? How is Hunter Cele-
brating the New Year? New Photos of Hunter Biden Push-
ing Drugs on Women Emerge.” Hoft's own declaration re-
veals that Twitter acted according to its “rules against
posting or sharing privately produced/distributed intimate
media of someone without their express consent.” Id., at
608. Hoft provides no evidence that Twitter adopted a pol-
icy against posting private, intimate content in response to
the FBI's warnings about hack-and-leak operations. Plus, it
was Hoft's brother, Joe Hoft, who posted this tweet; Twitter
therefore suspended Joe Hoft's account. It is unclear why
Jim Hoft would have standing to sue for his brother's injury.
Hoft claims that his content appears on a CISA document
tracking posts that various entities had fagged for the plat-
forms as misinformation. The spreadsheet shows that a pri-
vate entity, the Election Integrity Partnership—not CISA—
alerted Twitter to an unidentifed article from the Gateway
Pundit. And the spreadsheet does not reveal whether Twit-
ter removed or otherwise suppressed that post. This evi-
dence does not support the conclusion that Hoft's past inju-
ries are likely traceable to the FBI or CISA.
Jill Hines. Of all the plaintiffs, Hines makes the best
showing of a connection between her social-media restric-
tions and communications between the relevant platform
(Facebook) and specifc defendants (CDC and the White
House). That said, most of the lines she draws are tenuous,
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particularly given her burden of proof at the preliminary in-
junc
tion stage—recall that she must show that her restric-
tions are likely traceable to the White House and the CDC.
A healthcare activist, Hines codirects “Health Freedom
Louisiana,” a group that advocated against COVID–19 mask
and vaccine mandates. In October 2020—before the start
of communications with the White House and the bulk of
communications with the CDC—Facebook began to reduce
the reach of Hines' and Health Freedom's pages. Hines
tries to connect Facebook's subsequent actions against her
to both the White House offcials and the CDC.
First, Facebook “deplatformed” (i. e., deleted) one of Health
Freedom's groups in July 2021. The last post in the group
asked members to contact state legislators about health free-
dom legislation. Three months earlier, a White House off-
cial sent Facebook several “suggestions” that were “circulat-
ing around the building and informing thinking,” including
that the platform should “end group recommendations for
groups with a history of COVID–19 or vaccine misinforma-
tion.” 54 Record 16870–16871. A week later, Facebook re-
plied that it had “already removed all health groups from
our recommendation feature.” App. 716. It is hard to
know what to make of this. Facebook reported that it had
already acted, which tends to imply that Facebook made its
decision independently of the White House. Moreover,
Facebook and the White House communicated about remov-
ing groups from recommendation features, not deleting them
altogether—further weakening the inference that Facebook
was implementing White House policy rather than its own.
6
6
Hines tries to link this restriction to the Surgeon General's Offce as
well, suggesting that the White House and Surgeon General together pres-
sured Facebook. But the record reveals that a White House offcial sent
the relevant email, and Facebook responded only to White House offcials.
The Surgeon General's Offce was seemingly uninvolved. Thus, Hines
cannot demonstrate that her past restriction is traceable to the Surgeon
General's Offce. The plaintiffs do not attempt to draw any other connec-
tions between their restrictions and the Surgeon General's Offce.
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Next, in April 2023, Facebook gave Hines a warning after
she
reposted content from Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Two
years earlier, White House offcials had pushed Facebook to
remove the accounts of the “disinformation dozen,” 12 people
(including Kennedy) supposedly responsible for a majority of
COVID–19-related misinformation. Hines tries to link the
warning she received to this earlier White House pressure.
Again, though, the link is weak. There is no evidence that
the White House asked Facebook to censor every user who
reposts a member of the disinformation dozen, nor did Face-
book change its policies to do so. Facebook's 2023 warning
to Hines bears only a tangential relationship to the White
House's 2021 directive to Facebook.
Hines traces her remaining restrictions to the CDC. Be-
ginning in October 2020, Facebook fact checked Hines' posts
about pregnant women taking the COVID–19 vaccine, along
with posts including data from the Vaccine Adverse Event
Reporting System (VAERS). And in March 2021, the CDC
fagged several misinformation trends for Facebook, includ-
ing claims related to pregnancy and VAERS data. Because
Hines does not provide dates for the fact checks, we cannot
know whether the CDC could be responsible.
In May 2022, Facebook restricted Hines' account for post-
ing an article discussing increased rates of myocarditis in
teenagers following vaccination. A little over a year earlier,
the CDC warned Facebook against claims of “unsubstanti-
ated links to new [vaccine] side effects,” including “ `irri-
tab[ility],' ” “ `auto-immune issues, infertility,' ” and “ `neu-
rolog ica l damage i ncludi ng lowered IQ. ' ” 54 Record
17042–17043 (emphasis deleted). There is no evidence that
the CDC ever listed myocarditis as an unsubstantiated side
effect—but because it is an alleged side effect, it at least
falls under the same umbrella as the CDC's communication.
Health Freedom's February 2023 violation, by contrast, was
for posting that vaccine manufacturers would not compen-
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sate those with vaccine-related injuries—a topic that bears
l
ittle resemblance to the content that the CDC fagged.
In April 2023, Hines received violations for posts about
children and the vaccine. In November 2021, Facebook
worked with the CDC to update its policies to remove addi-
tional false claims including that “ `the COVID vaccine is not
safe for kids.' ” 37 id., at 11457. It is not clear that either
of Hines' posts violated the CDC-infuenced policy against
false claims related to children and the vaccine. One simply
referred to the World Health Organization's COVID–19 vac-
cine recommendations for children, and the other discussed
the role of children within the “predatory” pharmaceutical
industry. App. 789–790. Given the loose match between
the policy and the posts, it is hard to call it “likely” that
Facebook was enforcing the CDC's preferences rather than
its own.
7
7
The dissent does not dispute the Court's assessment of these asserted
links. Instead, the dissent draws links that Hines herself has not set
forth, often based on injuries that Hines never claimed. Compare post,
at 93–95, with Brief for Respondents 19–20; App. 628–632. For instance,
the dissent says that in May 2021, Facebook began demoting content from
accounts that repeatedly shared misinformation, purportedly due to White
House pressure. Post, at 85–86, 94. Because Facebook frequently fact
checked Hines' posts, the dissent simply assumes (without citing Hines'
declarations) that her content was subsequently hidden from her friends'
feeds. Post, at 94. Likewise, pointing to an August 2021 policy change,
the dissent concludes that the mid-July 2021 deplatforming of one of Hines'
groups rendered her other pages “non-recommendable.” Ibid. Hines,
however, never claimed as much—and the plaintiffs bear the burden to
establish standing by setting forth “specifc facts.” Lujan v. Defenders
of Wildlife, 504 U. S. 555, 561 (1992) (internal quotation marks omitted).
It is especially important to hold the plaintiffs to their burden in a case
like this one, where the record spans over 26,000 pages and the lower
courts did not make any specifc causation fndings. As the Seventh Cir-
cuit has memorably put it, “[ j]udges are not like pigs, hunting for truffes
buried [in the record].” Gross v. Cicero, 619 F. 3d 697, 702 (2010) (internal
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With one or two potentially viable links, Hines makes the
best
showing of all the plaintiffs. Still, Facebook was tar-
geting her pages before almost all of its communications with
the White House and the CDC, which weakens the inference
that her subsequent restrictions are likely traceable to “gov-
ernment-coerced enforcement” of Facebook's policies, 83
F. 4th, at 370 (emphasis deleted), rather than to Facebook's
independent judg ment.
8
Even assuming, however, that
8
By acknowledging the real possibility that Facebook acted independ-
ently in suppressing Hines' content, we are not applying a “new and
heightened standard,” as the dissent claims. Post, at 95. The whole pur-
pose of the traceability requirement is to ensure that “in fact, the asserted
injury was the consequence of the defendants' actions,” rather than of “the
independent action” of a third party. Simon v. Eastern Ky. Wel fare
Rights Organization, 426 U. S. 26, 42, 45 (1976). Nor is our analysis in-
consistent with Department of Commerce v. New York, 588 U. S. 752
(2019). See post, at 95. There, the plaintiffs, including several States,
challenged the Secretary of Commerce's decision to reinstate a citizenship
question on the census. 588 U. S., at 761, 764. They argued that this
question would make noncitizens less likely to respond to the census, lead-
ing to an inaccurate population count and the concomitant loss of congres-
sional seats and federal funding. Id., at 766–767. The plaintiffs' injuries
thus depended on the actions of third parties. Id., at 767–768. The Dis-
trict Court found that noncitizens had historically responded at lower
rates than citizens to previous versions of the census (and other surveys)
that included a citizenship question and that noncitizens were dispropor-
tionately likely to stop responding to those questionnaires once they
reached the citizenship question. New York v. United States Dept. of
Commerce, 351 F. Supp. 3d 502, 578–579 (SDNY 2019). Crediting those
fndings, this Court concluded that the plaintiffs “met their burden of
showing that third parties will likely react in predictable ways to the
citizenship question.” Department of Commerce, 588 U. S., at 768. The
dissent suggests that it “would have been diffcult for [the plaintiffs] to
determine which noncitizen households failed to respond to the census
because of a citizenship question and which had other reasons.” Post,
at 95. But the evidence made clear that the citizenship question drove
noncitizens' lower response rates; the District Court made no fndings
about noncitizens' response rates to the census generally. Here, by con-
trast, the evidence is murky. Facebook targeted Hines' posts (and others
like hers) before the White House entered the picture, meaning that Face-

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Opinion of the Court
Hines has eked out a showing of traceability for her past
i
njuries, the past is relevant only insofar as it predicts the
future. And this weak record gives her little momentum
going forward.
3
To obtain forward-looking relief, the plaintiffs must estab-
lish a substantial risk of future injury that is traceable to
the Government defendants and likely to be redressed by
an injunction against them. To carry that burden, the plain-
tiffs must proffer evidence that the defendants' “allegedly
wrong fu l behav i or w[ou ld] l ikely occur or conti nue. ”
Friends of the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Environmental Serv-
ices (TOC), Inc., 528 U. S. 167, 190 (2000). At the prelimi-
nary injunction stage, the plaintiffs must show that they are
likely to succeed in carrying that burden. See Winter, 555
U. S., at 22. But without proof of an ongoing pressure cam-
paign, it is entirely speculative that the platforms' future
moderation decisions will be attributable, even in part, to
the defendants.
The plaintiffs treat the defendants as a monolith, claiming
broadly that “ `the governmen[t]' ” continues to communicate
with the platforms about “ `content-moderation issues. ' ”
Brief for Respondents 29 (quoting 83 F. 4th, at 369). But
we must confrm that each Government defendant continues
to engage in the challenged conduct, which is “coercion” and
“significant encouragement, ” not mere “communication. ”
Plus, the plaintiffs have only explicitly identifed an interest
in speaking about COVID–19 or elections—so the defend-
ants' discussions about content-moderation issues must focus
on those topics.
book had independent incentives to restrict Hines' content. It is there-
fore diffcult to say that the White House was responsible (even in part)
for all of Hines' later restrictions—especially absent clear links between
White House content-moderation requests to Facebook and Facebook's ac-
tions toward Hines. Cf. post, at 96.
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Opinion of the Court
We begin with the plaintiffs who have not pointed to any
past
restrictions likely traceable to the Government defend-
ants. This failure to establish traceability for past harms—
which can serve as evidence of expected future harm—
“substantially undermines [the plaintiffs'] standing theory.”
Clapper, 568 U. S., at 411. These plaintiffs (i. e., everyone
other than Hines) are thus particularly ill suited to the task
of establishing their standing to seek forward-looking relief.
Take Hoft, the only plaintiff who has expressed interest
in speaking about elections (and thus the only plaintiff with
potential standing to sue the FBI and CISA). The FBI's
challenged conduct was ongoing at the time of the complaint,
as the agency worked with the platforms during the 2022
midterm election season. Still, Hoft must rely on a “specu-
lative chain of possibilities” to establish a likelihood of future
harm traceable to the FBI. Id., at 414. Hoft's future posts
(presumably about the 2024 Presidential election) must con-
tain content that falls within a misinformation trend that the
FBI has identifed or will identify in the future. The FBI
must pressure the platforms to remove content within that
category. The platform must then suppress Hoft's post, and
it must do so at least partly in response to the FBI, rather
than in keeping with its own content-moderation policy.
Hoft cannot satisfy his burden with such conjecture. CISA,
meanwhile, stopped switchboarding in mid-2022, and the
Government has represented that it will not resume opera-
tions for the 2024 election. Especially in light of his poor
showing of traceability in the past, Hoft has failed to demon-
strate likely future injury at the hands of the FBI or CISA—
so the injunction against those entities cannot survive.
The doctors and the state plaintiffs, who focus on COVID–
19 content, have a similarly uphill battle vis-à-vis the White
House, the Surgeon General's Offce, and the CDC. Hines,
with her superior showing on past harm, is in a slightly bet-
ter position to demonstrate likely future harm at the hands
of these defendants. Still, she has not shown enough.

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Starting with the White House and Surgeon General's Of-
fce
, the vast majority of their public and private engagement
with the platforms occurred in 2021, when the pandemic was
still in full swing. By August 2022, when Hines joined the
case, the offcials' communications about COVID–19 mis-
information had slowed to a trickle. Publicly, the White
House Press Secretary made two statements in February
and April 2022. First, she said that the platforms should
continue “call[ing] out misinformation and disinformation.”
3 Record 758. Two months later, she spoke generally about
§ 230 and antitrust reform, but did not mention content mod-
eration or COVID–19 misinformation. In March 2022, the
Surgeon General issued a voluntary “Request for Informa-
tion” from the platforms about their misinformation policies.
9
Privately, Facebook sent monthly “Covid Insights” reports
to offcials in the White House and the Surgeon General's
Offce, at least until July 2022. These reports contained
information about the top 100 vaccine-related posts in
the United States, including whether Facebook took action
against any of them. In June, Facebook asked if it should
continue sending these reports, as it had stopped seeing
“problematic vaccine related” content in the top posts. 50
id., at 15645–15646. The offcial replied that, though he
would “normally say we are good to discontinue,” the reports
would be helpful “as we start to ramp up . . . vaccines” for
children under fve. Id., at 15645. The record contains no
other evidence of private contact with respect to COVID–
19 misinformation.
On this record, it appears that the frequent, intense com-
munications that took place in 2021 had considerably sub-
sided by 2022. (Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the changed
state of the pandemic.) It is thus very diffcult for Hines to
9
According to a declaration submitted by the Surgeon General's Chief
of Staff, no one in that offce met with the platforms to discuss their sub-
missions “or otherwise had substantive communications with social media
companies about the RFI.” 61 Record 19,480.
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Opinion of the Court
show that she faces future harm that is traceable to offcials
i
n the White House and the Surgeon General's Offce. Re-
call the Fifth Circuit's reasoning regarding traceability for
past harms: In the face of a governmental “pressure cam-
paign,” the “platforms' censorship decisions were likely at-
tributable at least in part to [their] reluctance to risk the
adverse legal or regulatory consequences that could result
from a refusal to adhere to the government's directives.” 83
F. 4th, at 370. But in the months leading up to this suit,
these offcials issued no directives and threatened no conse-
quences. They only asked for information about the most
popular vaccine-related posts. Hines does not allege that
her content has fallen, or is likely to fall, in that category.
In these circumstances, Hines cannot rely on “the predict-
able effect of Government action on the decisions of third
parties”; rather, she can only “speculat[e] about the decisions
of third parties.” Department of Commerce, 588 U. S., at
768. It is “no more than conjecture” to assume that Hines
will be subject to White House-induced content moderation.
Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U. S. 95, 108 (1983). Hines (along
with the other plaintiffs) has therefore failed to establish a
likelihood of future injury traceable to the White House or
the Surgeon General's Offce. Likewise, the risk of future
harm traceable to the CDC is minimal. The CDC stopped
meeting with the platforms in March 2022. Thereafter, the
platforms sporadically asked the CDC to verify or debunk
several claims about vaccines. But the agency has not re-
ceived any such message since the summer of 2022.
10
10
The dissent claims that the future injury prong is satisfed because
Facebook continued to censor Hines at the time of her complaint and
thereafter. Post, at 92. But the dissent gives short shrift to the key
point: By the time Hines fled suit in August 2022, the White House was
no longer engaged in any sort of “pressure campaign” toward Facebook.
(Note that the dissent, in its 10-page recounting of the record, devotes
only one paragraph to the events of 2022. Post, at 89.) Thus, when
Hines sued, it was unlikely that Facebook's actions were fairly traceable
to the White House at the time—or would be going forward.
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Opinion of the Court
The plaintiffs' counterarguments do not persuade. First,
they
argue that they suffer “continuing, present adverse ef-
fects” from their past restrictions, as they must now self-
censor on social media. O'Shea, 414 U. S., at 496. But the
plaintiffs “cannot manufacture standing merely by inficting
harm on themselves based on their fears of hypothetical fu-
ture harm that is not certainly impending.” Clapper, 568
U. S., at 416. And as we explained, the plaintiffs have not
shown that they are likely to face a risk of future censorship
traceable to the defendants. Indeed, even before the de-
fendants entered the scene, the plaintiffs “had a similar in-
centive to engage in” self-censorship, given the platforms'
independent content moderation. Id., at 417. So it is “dif-
fcult to see how” the plaintiffs' self-censorship “can be traced
to” the defendants. Ibid.
Second, the plaintiffs and the dissent suggest that the plat-
forms continue to suppress their speech according to policies
initially adopted under Government pressure. Post, at 96.
That may be true. But the plaintiffs have a redressability
problem. “To determine whether an injury is redressable,”
we “consider the relationship between `the judicial relief re-
quested' and the `injury' suffered.” California v. Texas, 593
U. S. 659, 671 (2021). The plaintiffs assert several injuries—
their past social-media restrictions, current self-censorship,
and likely social-media restrictions in the future. The re-
quested judicial relief, meanwhile, is an injunction stopping
certain Government agencies and employees from coercing
or encouraging the platforms to suppress speech. A court
could prevent these Government defendants from interfer-
ing with the platforms' independent application of their poli-
cies. But without evidence of continued pressure from the
defendants, it appears that the platforms remain free to en-
force, or not to enforce, those policies—even those tainted
by initial governmental coercion. The platforms are “not
parties to the suit, and there is no reason they should be
obliged to honor an incidental legal determination the suit
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Opinion of the Court
produced.” Lujan, 504 U. S., at 569 (plurality opinion); see
a
lso Haaland v. Brackeen, 599 U. S. 255, 293–294 (2023).
Indeed, the available evidence indicates that the platforms
have enforced their policies against COVID–19 misinforma-
tion even as the Federal Government has wound down its
own pandemic response measures. For instance, Hines re-
ports that Facebook imposed several restrictions on her
vaccine-related posts in the spring of 2023. Around the
same time, in April 2023, President Biden signed a joint reso-
lution that ended the national COVID–19 emergency. See
Pub. L. 118–3, 137 Stat. 6. The next month, the White
House disbanded its COVID–19 Response Team, which was
responsible for many of the challenged communications in
this case. Enjoining the Government defendants, therefore,
is unl ikely to affec t the platfor ms' content-moderati on
decisions.
11
C
We conclude briefy with the plaintiffs' “right to listen”
theory. The individual plaintiffs claim an interest in reading
and engaging with the content of other speakers on social
11
As with traceability, the dissent is wrong to claim that we are applying
a “new and elevated standard for redressability.” Post, at 97. Far from
holding plaintiffs to a “certainty” standard, ibid., we simply conclude that
an injunction against the Government defendants is unlikely to stop the
platforms from suppressing the plaintiffs' speech. And while traceability
and redressability are “ `often “fip sides of the same coin,” ' ” ibid. (quoting
FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, 602 U. S. 367, 380 (2024); em-
phasis added), that is not always the case. Facebook might continue to
remove Hines' posts under a policy that it adopted at the White House's
behest (thus satisfying traceability). But if the White House offcials
have already abandoned their pressure campaign, enjoining them is un-
likely to prompt Facebook to stop enforcing the policy (thus failing re-
dressability). Finally, by invoking Massachusetts v. EPA, it is the dissent
that applies a new and loosened standard for redressability. Post, at 97.
In that case, we explained that state plaintiffs are “entitled to special solic-
itude” when it comes to standing, and we conducted our analysis accord-
ingly. 549 U. S. 497, 520 (2007). That “special solicitude” does not apply
to Jill Hines, an individual.
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75
Opinion of the Court
media. The First Amendment, they argue, protects that in-
terest.
Thus, the plaintiffs assert injuries based on the re-
str icti ons that countless other socia l-media users have
experienced.
This theory is startlingly broad, as it would grant all
social-media users the right to sue over someone else's cen-
sorship—at least so long as they claim an interest in that
person's speech. This Court has “never accepted such a
boundless theory of standing.” Already, LLC v. Nike, Inc.,
568 U. S. 85, 99 (2013). While we have recognized a “First
Amendment right to `receive information and ideas,' ” we
have identifed a cognizable injury only where the listener
has a concrete, specifc connection to the speaker. Klein-
dienst v. Mandel, 408 U. S. 753, 762 (1972). For instance, in
Mandel, we agreed that a group of professors had a First
Amendment interest in challenging the visa denial of a per-
son they had invited to speak at a conference. Id., at 762–
765. And in Virginia Bd. of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens
Consumer Council, Inc., we concluded that prescription-
drug consumers had an interest in challenging the prohibi-
tion on advertising the price of those drugs. 425 U. S. 748,
756–757 (1976).
Attempting to satisfy this requirement, the plaintiffs em-
phasize that hearing unfettered speech on social media is
critical to their work as scientists, pundits, and activists.
But they do not point to any specifc instance of content mod-
eration that caused them identifable harm. They have
therefore failed to establish an injury that is suffciently
“concrete and particularized.” Lujan, 504 U. S., at 560.
The state plaintiffs, claiming their own version of the
“right to listen” theory, assert a sovereign interest in hear-
ing from their citizens on social media. See 83 F. 4th, at
372–373. But this theory suffers from the same faws as the
individual plaintiffs' theory. The States have not identifed
any specifc speakers or topics that they have been unable to
hear or follow.
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The States cite this supposed sovereign injury as a basis
for
asserting third-party standing on behalf of “the citizens
they would listen to.” Brief for Respondents 30. But
“[t]his argument is a thinly veiled attempt to circumvent the
limits on parens patriae standing.” Brackeen, 599 U. S., at
295, n. 11. Namely, States do not have “ `standing as parens
patriae to bring an action against the Federal Govern-
ment.' ” Id., at 295.
The States, like the individual plaintiffs, have failed to es-
tablish a likelihood of standing.
***
The plaintiffs, without any concrete link between their
injuries and the defendants' conduct, ask us to conduct a
review of the years-long communications between dozens
of federal offcials, across different agencies, with different
social-media platforms, about different topics. This Court's
standing doctrine prevents us from “exercis[ing such] gen-
eral legal oversight” of the other branches of Government.
TransUnion, 594 U. S., at 423–424. We therefore reverse
the judgment of the Fifth Circuit and remand the case for
further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Justice Alito, with whom Justice Thomas and Justice
Gorsuch join, dissenting.
This case involves what the District Court termed “a far-
reaching and widespread censorship campaign” conducted by
high-ranking federal offcials against Americans who ex-
pressed certain disfavored views about COVID–19 on social
media. Missouri v. Biden, 680 F. Supp. 3d 630, 729 (WD La.
2023). Victims of the campaign perceived by the lower
courts brought this action to ensure that the Government
did not continue to coerce social media platforms to suppress
speech. Among these victims were two States, whose pub-
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77
Alito, J., dissenting
lic health offcials were hampered in their ability to share
their
expertise with state residents; distinguished professors
of medicine at Stanford and Harvard; a professor of psychia-
try at the University of California, Irvine School of Medicine;
the owner and operator of a news website; and Jill Hines,
the director of a consumer and human rights advocacy orga-
nization. All these victims simply wanted to speak out on a
question of the utmost public importance.
To protect their right to do so, the District Court issued a
preliminary injunction, App. 278–285, and the Court of Ap-
peals found ample evidence to support injunctive relief. See
Missouri v. Biden, 83 F. 4th 350 (CA5 2023).
If the lower courts' assessment of the voluminous record
is correct, this is one of the most important free speech cases
to reach this Court in years. Freedom of speech serves
many valuable purposes, but its most important role is
protection of speech that is essential to democratic self-
government, see Snyder v. Phelps, 562 U. S. 443, 451–452
(2011), and speech that advances humanity's store of knowl-
edge, thought, and expression in felds such as science, medi-
cine, history, the social sciences, philosophy, and the arts, see
United States v. Alvarez, 567 U. S. 709, 751 (2012) (Alito,
J., dissenting).
The speech at issue falls squarely into those categories.
It concerns the COVID–19 virus, which has killed more than
a mi l l i on Amer icans.
1
Our country's response to the
COVID–19 pandemic was and remains a matter of enormous
medical, social, political, geopolitical, and economic impor-
tance, and our dedication to a free marketplace of ideas de-
mands that dissenting views on such matters be allowed. I
assume that a fair portion of what social media users had to
say about COVID–19 and the pandemic was of little lasting
value. Some was undoubtedly untrue or misleading, and
1
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Deaths by Week and
State, https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/COVID19/ index.htm (last ac-
cessed June 21, 2024).
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some may have been downright dangerous. But we now
know
that valuable speech was also suppressed.
2
That is
what inevitably happens when entry to the marketplace of
ideas is restricted.
Of course, purely private entities like newspapers are not
subject to the First Amendment, and as a result, they may
publish or decline to publish whatever they wish. But gov-
ernment offcials may not coerce private entities to suppress
speech, see National Rife Association of America v. Vullo,
602 U. S. 175 (2024), and that is what happened in this case.
The record before us is vast. It contains evidence of com-
munications between many different government actors and
2
This includes information about the origin of the COVID–19 virus.
When the pandemic began, Facebook began demoting posts supporting
the theory that the virus leaked from a laboratory. See Interim Staff
Report of the House Judiciary Committee, The Censorship-Industrial
Complex: How Top Biden White House Offcials Coerced Big Tech To Cen-
sor Americans, True Information, and Critics of the Biden Administration,
p. 398 (May 1, 2024) (Committee Report), https://judiciary.house.gov/sites/
evo-subsites/republicans-judiciary.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/
Censorship-Industrial-Complex-WH-Report_Appendix.pdf. “In Febru-
ary 2021, in response to . . . tense conversations with the new Administra-
tion,” Facebook changed its policy to instead remove posts about the lab
leak theory wholesale. Ibid.; accord, id., at 463 (Facebook executive ex-
plained that the platform removed these posts “[b]ecause we were under
pressure from the administration and others to do more and it was part
of the `more' package”). But since then, both the Federal Bureau of In-
vestigation and the Department of Energy have found that the theory is
probably correct. See, e. g., A. Kaur & D. Diamond, FBI Director Says
Covid–19 “Most Likely” Originated From Lab Incident, Washington Post
(Feb. 28, 2023), https://www.wash i ng tonpost.com/nati on/2023/02/28/
f bi-director-christopher-wray-wuhan-lab; J. Herb & N. Bertrand, US En-
ergy Department Assesses Covid–19 Likely Resulted From Lab Leak,
Furthering US Intel Divide Over Virus Origin, CNN (Feb. 27, 2023),
https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/26/politics/cov id-lab-leak-wuhan-ch ina-
intelligence/ index.html. Facebook reversed its policy, and Mark Zucker-
berg expressed regret that the platform had ever removed the posts: “This
seems like a good reminder that when we compromise our standards due
to pressure from an administration in either direction, we'll often regret
it later.” Committee Report 398.
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Alito, J., dissenting
a variety of internet platforms, as well as evidence regarding
the
effects of those interactions on the seven different plain-
tiffs. For present purposes, however, I will focus on (a) just
a few federal offcials (namely, those who worked either in
the White House or the Surgeon General's offce), (b) only
one of the most infuential social media platforms, Facebook,
and (c) just one plaintiff, Jill Hines, because if any of the
plaintiffs has standing, we are obligated to reach the merits
of this case. See Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and In-
stitutional Rights, Inc., 547 U. S. 47, 52, n. 2 (2006).
With the inquiry focused in this way, here is what the rec-
ord plainly shows. For months in 2021 and 2022, a coterie
of offcials at the highest levels of the Federal Government
continuously harried and implicitly threatened Facebook
with potentially crippling consequences if it did not comply
with their wishes about the suppression of certain COVID–
19-related speech. Not surprisingly, Facebook repeatedly
yielded. As a result Hines was indisputably injured, and
due to the offcials' continuing efforts, she was threatened
with more of the same when she brought suit. These past
and threatened future injuries were caused by and traceable
to censorship that the offcials coerced, and the injunctive
relief she sought was an available and suitable remedy. This
evidence was more than suffcient to establish Hines's stand-
ing to sue, see Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U. S. 555,
561–562 (1992), and consequently, we are obligated to tackle
the free speech issue that the case presents. The Court,
however, shirks that duty and thus permits the successful
campaign of coercion in this case to stand as an attractive
model for future offcials who want to control what the people
say, hear, and think.
That is regrettable. What the offcials did in this case was
more subtle than the ham-handed censorship found to be un-
constitutional in Vullo, but it was no less coercive. And be-
cause of the perpetrators' high positions, it was even more
dangerous. It was blatantly unconstitutional, and the coun-
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try may come to regret the Court's failure to say so. Off-
cia
ls who read today's decision together with Vullo will get
the message. If a coercive campaign is carried out with
enough sophistication, it may get by. That is not a message
this Court should send.
In the next section of this opinion, I will recount in some
detail what was done by the offcials in this case, but in con-
sidering the coercive impact of their conduct, two prominent
facts must be kept in mind.
First, social media have become a leading source of news
for many Americans,
3
and with the decline of other media,
their importance may grow.
Second, internet platforms, although rich and powerful,
are at the same time far more vulnerable to Government
pressure than other news sources. If a President dislikes a
particular newspaper, he (fortunately) lacks the ability to put
the paper out of business. But for Facebook and many other
social media platforms, the situation is fundamentally differ-
ent. They are critically dependent on the protection pro-
vided by § 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996,
47 U. S. C. § 230, which shields them from civil liability for
content they spread. They are vulnerable to antitrust ac-
tions; indeed, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has de-
scribed a potential antitrust lawsuit as an “existential”
threat to his company.
4
And because their substantial over-
seas operations may be subjected to tough regulation in the
European Union and other foreign jurisdictions, they rely
3
See, e. g., J. Liedke & L. Wang, News Platform Fact Sheet, Pew Re-
search Center (Nov. 15, 2023), https://www.pewresearch.org/journalism/
fact-sheet/news-platform-fact-sheet; A. Watson, Most Popular Platforms
for Daily News Consumption in the United States as of August 2022,
by Age Group, Statista (Jan. 4, 2024), https://www.statista.com/statistics/
717651/most-popular-news-platforms.
4
C. Newton, Read the Full Transcript of Mark Zuckerberg 's Leaked
Internal Facebook Meetings, The Verge (Oc t. 1, 2019), https://www.
theverge.com/2019/10/1/20892354/mark-zuckerberg-full-transcript-leaked-
facebook-meetings.
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Alito, J., dissenting
on the Federal Government's diplomatic efforts to protect
their
interests.
For these and other reasons,
5
internet platforms have a
powerful incentive to please important federal offcials, and
the record in this case shows that high-ranking offcials skill-
fully exploited Facebook's vulnerability. When Facebook
did not heed their requests as quickly or as fully as the off-
cials wanted, the platform was publicly accused of “killing
people” and subtly threatened with retaliation.
Not surpr isi ng ly these effor ts bore fr uit. Facebook
adopted new rules that better conformed to the offcials'
wishes, and many users who expressed disapproved views
about the pandemic or COVID–19 vaccines were “deplat-
formed” or otherwise injured.
I
A
I begin by recounting the White House-led campaign to
coerce Facebook. The story starts in early 2021, when
White House offcials began communicating with Facebook
about the spread of misinformation about COVID–19 on its
platform. Their emails started as questions, e. g., “Can you
also give us a sense of misinformation that might be falling
outside of your removal polices?” 10 Record 3397. But
when the White House did not get the results it wanted, its
questions quickly turned to virtual demands. And some-
times, those statements were paired with explicit references
to potential consequences.
We may begin this account with an exchange that occurred
in March 2021, when the Washington Post reported that
Facebook was conducting a study that examined whether
5
For pending or potential legislation affecting internet platforms, see
Congressional Research Service, C. Cho, L. Zhu, & K. Busch, Defning and
Regulating Online Platforms (Aug. 25, 2023), https://crsreports.congress.
gov/product/pdf/R/R47662/11.
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posts on the platform questioning COVID–19's severity or
the
vaccines' effcacy dissuaded some Americans from being
vaccinated.
6
The study noted that Facebook's rules permit-
ted some of this content to circulate. Rob Flaherty, the
White House Director of Digital Strategy, promptly emailed
Facebook about the report. The subject line of his email
contained this accusation: “You are hiding the ball.” 30 id.,
at 9366. Flaherty noted that the White House was “gravely
concerned that [Facebook] is one of the top drivers of vaccine
hesitancy,” and he demanded to know how Facebook was try-
ing to solve the problem. Id., at 9365. In his words, “we
want to know that you're trying, we want to know how we
can help, and we want to know that you're not playing a shell
game with us when we ask you what is going on.” Ibid.
Andy Slavitt, the White House Senior Advisor for the
COVID–19 Response, chimed in with similar complaints.
“[R]elative to othe[r]” platforms, he said, “interactions with
Facebook are not straightforward” even though the misinfor-
mation problems there, in his view, were “worse.” Id., at
9364. According to Slavitt, the White House did not believe
that Facebook was “trying to solve the problem,” so he in-
formed Facebook that “[i]nternally we have been considering
our options on what to do about it.” Ibid.
Facebook responded apologetically to this and other mis-
sives. It acknowledged that “[w]e obviously have work to
do to gain your trust.” Id., at 9365. And after a follow-up
conversation, the platform promised Flaherty and Slavitt
that it would adopt additional policies to “reduc[e] virality
of vaccine hesitancy content.” Id., at 9369. In particular,
Facebook promised to “remove [any] Groups, Pages, and Ac-
counts” that “disproportionately promot[e] . . . sensational-
ized content” about the risks of vaccines, even though it ac-
6
E. Dwoskin, Massive Facebook Study on Users' Doubt in Vaccines
Finds a Small Group Appears To Play a Big Role in Pushing the Skepti-
cism, Washington Post (Mar. 14, 2021), https://www.washingtonpost.com/
technology/2021/03/14/facebook-vaccine-hesitancy-qanon.
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knowledged that user stories about their experiences and
those
of family members or friends were “ofte[n] true.”
Ibid. Facebook also promised to share additional data with
the White House, ibid., but Flaherty was not fully satisfed.
He said that the additional data Facebook offered was not
“going to get us the info we're looking for,” but “it shows to
me that you at least understand the ask.” Id., at 9368.
In April, Flaherty again demanded information on the “ac-
tions and changes” Facebook was taking “to ensure you're
not making our country's vaccine hesitancy problem worse.”
Id., at 9371. To emphasize his urgency, Flaherty likened
COVID–19 misinformation to misinformation that led to
the January 6 attack on the Capitol. Ibid. Facebook, he
charged, had helped to “increase skepticism” of the 2020 elec-
tion, and he claimed that “an insurrection . . . was plotted, in
large part, on your platform.” Ibid. He added: “I want
some assurances, based in data, that you are not doing the
same thing again here.” Ibid. Facebook was surprised by
these remarks because it “thought we were doing a better
job” communicating with the White House, but it promised
to “more clearly respon[d]” in the future. Ibid.
The next week, Facebook offcers spoke with Slavitt and
Flaherty about reports of a rare blood clot caused by the
Johnson & Johnson vaccine. Id., at 9385. The conversation
quickly shifted when the White House noticed that one of
the most-viewed vaccine-related posts from the past week
was a Tucker Carlson video questioning the effcacy of the
Johnson & Johnson vaccine. Id., at 9376, 9388. Facebook
informed the White House that the video did not “qualify
for removal under our policies” and thus would be demoted
instead, ibid., but that answer did not please Flaherty.
“How was this not violative?” he queried, and “[w]hat exactly
is the rule for removal vs demoting?” Id., at 9387. Then,
for the second time in a week, he invoked the January 6
attack: “Not for nothing but last time we did this dance, it
ended in an insurrection.” Id., at 9388. When Facebook
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did not respond promptly, he made his demand more explicit:
“
These questions weren't rhetorical.” Id., at 9387.
If repeated accusations that Facebook aided an insur-
rection did not suffciently convey the White House's dis-
pleasure, Flaherty and Slavitt made sure to do so by phone.
7
In one call, both offcials chided Facebook for not being
“straightforward” and not “play[ing] ball.” Committee Re-
port 141–142. Flaherty also informed Facebook that he was
reporting on the COVID–19 misinformation problem to the
President. Id., at 136.
After a second call, a high-ranking Facebook executive
perceived that Slavitt was “outraged—not too strong a word
to describe his reaction”—that the platform had not removed
a fast-spreading meme suggesting that the vaccines might
cause harm. Id., at 295. The executive had “countered
that removing content like that would represent a signifcant
incursion into traditional boundaries of free expression in the
US,” but Slavitt was unmoved, in part because he presumed
that other platforms “would never accept something like
this.” Ibid.
A few weeks later, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki
was asked at a press conference about Facebook's decision to
keep former President Donald Trump off the platform. See
Press Briefng by Press Secretary Jen Psaki and Secretary
of Agriculture Tom Vilsack (May 5, 2021) (hereinafter May 5
Press Briefng).
8
Psaki defected that question but took the
opportunity to call on platforms like Facebook to “ `stop am-
plifying untrustworthy content . . . , especially related to
COVID–19, vaccinations, and elections.' ” 78 Record 25170.
7
Notes recounting these calls were released by the House Judiciary
Committee after the District Court entered the preliminary injunction
and were published in a Committee Report. See Committee Report; Fed.
Rule Evid. 201.
8
https://www.whitehouse. gov/ briefing-room/press-briefings/2021/05/05/
press-briefing-by-press-secretary-jen-psaki-and-secretary-of-agriculture-
tom-vilsack-may-5-2021.
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In the same breath, Psaki reminded the platforms that Presi-
dent
Biden “ `supports . . . a robust anti-trust program.' ”
Id., at 25171 (emphasis deleted); May 5 Press Briefng.
Around th is same ti me, Flaher ty and Slav itt were
in terrogating Facebook on the mechanics of its content-
moderation rules for COVID–19 misinformation. 30 Rec-
ord 9391, 9397. Flaherty also forwarded to Facebook a
“COVID–19 Vaccine Misinformation Brief ” that had been
drafted by outside researchers and was “informing thinking ”
in the White House on what Facebook's policies should be.
52 id., at 16186. This document recommended that Face-
book strengthen its efforts against misinformation in several
ways. It recommended the adoption of “progressively se-
vere penalties” for accounts that repeatedly posted misinfor-
mation, and it proposed that Facebook make it harder for
users to fnd “anti-vaccine or vaccine-hesitant propaganda”
from other users. Ibid. Facebook declined to adopt some
of these suggestions immediately, but it did “se[t] up more
dedicated monitoring for [COVID] vaccine content” and
adopted a policy of “stronger demotions [for] a broader set
of content.” 30 id., at 9396.
The White House responded with more questions. Ac-
knowledging that he sounded “like a broken record,” Flah-
erty interrogated Facebook about “how much content is
being demoted, and how effective [Facebook was] at mitigat-
ing reach, and how quickly.” Id., at 9395. Later, Flaherty
chastised Facebook for failing to prevent some vaccine-
hesitant content from showing up through the platform's
search function. Id., at 9400. “ `[R]emoving bad informa-
tion from search' is one of the easy, low-bar things you guys
do to make people like me think you're taking action,” he
said. Id., at 9399. “If you're not getting that right, it raises
even more questions about the higher bar stuff.” Ibid. A
few weeks after this latest round of haranguing, Facebook
expanded penalties for individual Facebook accounts that re-
peatedly shared content that fact-checkers deemed misinfor-
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mation; henceforth, all of those individuals' posts would show
up
less frequently in their friends' news feeds. See 9 id., at
2697; Facebook, Taking Action Against People Who Repeat-
edly Share Misinformation (May 26, 2021).
9
Perhaps the most intense period of White House pressure
began a short time later. On July 15, Surgeon General
Vivek Mur thy released an advisory titled “Confronting
Health Misinformation.” 78 Record 25171, 25173. Dr. Mur-
thy suggested, among other things, algorithmic changes to
demote misinformation and additional consequences for mis-
information “ `super-spreaders.' ” U. S. Public Health Serv-
ice, Confronting Health Misinformation: The U. S. Surgeon
General's Advisory on Building a Healthy Information Envi-
ronment 12 (2021).
10
Dr. Murthy also joined Psaki at a press
conference, where he asked the platforms to take “much,
much more . . . aggressive action” to combat COVID–19 mis-
information “because it's costing people their lives.” Press
Briefng by Press Secretary Jen Psaki and Surgeon General
Dr. Vivek H. Murthy (July 15, 2021).
11
At the same press conference, Psaki singled out Facebook
as a primary driver of misinformation and asked the plat-
form to make several changes. Facebook “should provide,
publicly and transparently, data on the reach of COVID–19
[and] COVID vaccine misinformation.” Ibid. It “needs to
move more quickly to remove harmful, violative posts.”
Ibid. And it should change its algorithm to promote “qual-
ity information sources.” Ibid. These recommendations
echoed Slavitt's and Flaherty's private demands from the
preceding months—as Psaki herself acknowledged. The
9
https://about.f b.com/news/2021/05/taking-action-against-people-who-
repeatedly-share-misinformation.
10
h t t p s : / / w w w. h h s . g o v / s i t e s / d e f a u l t / f i l e s / s u r g e o n - g e n e r a l -
misinformation-advisory.pdf.
11
https://www.whitehouse.gov/ briefing-room/press-briefings/2021/07/15/
press-briefing-by-press-secretary-jen-psaki-and-surgeon-general-dr-
vivek-h-murthy-july-15-2021.
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Alito, J., dissenting
White House “engage[s] with [Facebook] regularly,” she said,
and
Facebook “certainly understand[s] what our asks are.”
Ibid. Apparently, the White House had not gotten every-
thing it wanted from those private conversations, so it was
turning up the heat in public.
Facebook responded by telling the press that it had part-
nered with the White House to counter misinformation and
that it had “removed accounts that repeatedly break these
rules” and “more than 18 million pieces of COVID misinfor-
mation.” 78 Record 25174. But at another press briefng
the next day, Psaki said these efforts were “[c]learly not”
suffcient and expressed confdence that Facebook would
“make decisions about additional steps they can take.” See
id., at 25175; Press Briefng by Press Secretary Jen Psaki
(July 16, 2021).
12
That same day, President Biden told reporters that social
media platforms were “ `killing people' ” by allowing COVID-
related misinformation to circulate. 78 Record 25174, 25212.
At oral argument, the Government suggested that the Presi-
dent later disclaimed any desire to hold the platforms ac-
countable for misinformation, Tr. of Oral Arg. 34–35, but that
is not so. The President's so-called clarifcation, like many
other statements by Government offcials, called on “ `Face-
book' ” to “ `do something about the misinformation' ” on its
platform. B. Klein, M. Vazquez, & K. Collins, Biden Backs
Away From His Claim That Facebook Is `Killing People' by
Allowing COVID Misinformation, CNN (July 19, 2021).
13
And far from disclaiming potential regulatory action, the
White House confrmed that it had not “ `taken any options
off the table.' ” Ibid. In fact, the day after the President's
supposed clarifcation, the White House Communications Di-
rector commended the President for “speak[ing] very ag-
12
https://www.whitehouse. gov/ briefng-room/press-briefngs/2021/07/16/
press-briefng-by-press-secretary-jen-psaki-july-16-2021.
13
https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/19/politics/ joe-biden-facebook/ index.
html.
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gressively” and affrmed that platforms “certainly . . . should
be
held accountable” for publishing misinformation. 61 Rec-
ord 19400–19401. Indeed, she said that the White House
was “reviewing ” whether § 230 should be amended to open
the platforms to suit. Id., at 19400.
Facebook responded quickly. The same day the President
made his “killing people” remark, the platform reached out
to Dr. Murthy to determine “the scope of what the White
House expects from us on misinformation going forward.”
9 id., at 2690. The next day, Facebook asked offcials about
how to “get back to a good place” with the White House. 30
id., at 9403. And soon after, Facebook sent an email saying
that it “hear[d]” the offcials' “call for us to do more,” and
promptly assured the White House that it would comply. 9
id., at 2706. In spite of the White House's infammatory
rhetoric, Facebook at all times went out of its way to strike
a conciliatory tone. Only two days after the President's re-
mark—and before his supposed clarifcation—Facebook as-
sured Dr. Murthy that, though “it's not great to be accused
of killing people,” Facebook would “fnd a way to deescalate
and work together collaboratively.” Id., at 2713.
Concrete changes followed in short order. In early Au-
gust, the Surgeon General's Offce reached out to Facebook
for “an update of any new/additional steps you are taking
with respect to health misinformation in light of ” the July
15 advisory. Id., at 2703. In response, Facebook informed
the Surgeon General that it would soon “expan[d] [its]
COVID policies to further reduce the spread of potentially
harmful content.” Id., at 2701.
White House-Facebook conversations about misinforma-
tion did not end there. In September, the Wall Street Jour-
nal wrote about the spread of misinformation on Facebook,
and Facebook preemptively reached out to the White House
to clarify. 8 id., at 2681. Flaherty asked (again) for infor-
mation on “how big the problem is, what solutions you're
implementing, and how effective they've been.” Ibid.
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Then in October, the Washington Post published yet an-
other
story suggesting that Facebook knew more than it let
on about the spread of misinformation. Flaherty emailed
the link to Facebook with the subject line: “not even sure
what to say at this point.” Id., at 2676. And the Surgeon
General's Offce indicated both publicly and privately that it
was disappointed in Facebook. See @Surgeon_General, X
(Oct. 29, 2021) (accusing Facebook of “lacking . . . transpar-
ency and accountability”);
14
9 Record 2708. Facebook of-
fered to speak with both the White House and the Surgeon
General's Offce to assuage concerns. 8 id., at 2676.
Interactions related to COVID–19 misinformation contin-
ued until at least June 2022. Id., at 2663. At that point,
Facebook proposed discontinuing its reports on misinforma-
tion, but assured the White House that it would be “happy
to continue, or to pick up at a later date, . . . if we hear from
you that this continues to be of value.” Ibid. Flaherty
asked Facebook to continue reporting on misinformation be-
cause the Government was preparing to roll out COVID–19
vaccines for children under fve years old and, “[o]bviously,”
that rollout “ha[d] a potential to be just as charged” as other
vaccine-related controversies. Ibid. Flaherty added that
he “[w]ould love to get a sense of what you all are planning
here,” and Facebook agreed to provide information for as
long as necessary. Ibid.
What these events show is that top federal offcials contin-
uously and persistently hectored Facebook to crack down on
what the offcials saw as unhelpful social media posts, includ-
ing not only posts that they thought were false or misleading
but also stories that they did not claim to be literally false
but nevertheless wanted obscured. See, e. g., 30 id., at 9361,
9365, 9369, 9385–9388. And Facebook's reactions to these
efforts were not what one would expect from an independ-
ent news source or a journalistic entity dedicated to holding
14
https://twitter.com/Surgeon_General/status/1454181191494606854.
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the Government accountable for its actions. Instead, Face-
book
's responses resembled that of a subservient entity de-
termined to stay in the good graces of a powerful task-
master. Facebook told White House offcials that it would
“work . . . to gain your trust.” Id., at 9365. When criti-
ci zed, Facebook represent atives wh i mpered that they
“thought we were doing a better job” but promised to do
more going forward. Id., at 9371. They pleaded to know
how they could “get back to a good place” with the White
House. Id., at 9403. And when denounced as “killing peo-
ple,” Facebook responded by expressing a desire to “work
together collaboratively” with its accuser. 9 id., at 2713; 78
id., at 25174. The picture is clear.
B
While all this was going on, Jill Hines and others were
subjected to censorship. Hines serves as the co-director of
Health Freedom Louisiana, an organization that advocated
against vaccine and mask mandates during the pandemic.
Over the course of the pandemic—and while the White
House was pressuring Facebook—the platform repeatedly
censored Hines's speech.
For instance, in the summer and fall of 2021, Facebook
removed two groups that Hines had formed to discuss the
vaccine. 4 id., at 1313–1315. In January 2022, Facebook re-
stricted posts from Hines's personal page “for 30 days . . .
for sharing the image of a display board used in a legislative
hearing that had Pfzer's preclinical trial data on it.” Id.,
at 1313. In late May, Facebook restricted Hines for 90
days for sharing an article about “increased emergency calls
for teens with myocarditis following [COVID] vaccination.”
Id., at 1313–1314. Hines's public pages, Reopen Louisiana
and Health Freedom Louisiana, were subjected to similar
treatment. Facebook's disciplinary actions meant that both
public pages suffered a drop in viewership; as Hines put it,
“Each time you build viewership up [on a page], it is knocked
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back down with each violation.” Id., at 1314. And from
F
ebruary to April 2023, Facebook issued warnings and viola-
tions for several vaccine-related posts shared on Hines's per-
sonal and public pages, including a post by Robert F. Ken-
nedy, Jr., and an article entitled “ `Some Americans Shouldn't
Get Another COVID-19 Vaccine Shot, FDA Says.' ” 78 id.,
at 25503–25506. The result was that “[n]o one else was per-
mitted to view or engage with the[se] post[s].” Id., at 25503.
II
Hines and the other plaintiffs in this case brought this suit
and asked for an injunction to stop the censorship campaign
just described. To maintain that suit, they needed to show
that they (1) were imminently threatened with an injury in
fact (2) that is traceable to the defendants and (3) that could
be redressed by the court. Lujan, 504 U. S., at 560–561;
O'Shea v. Littleton, 414 U. S. 488, 496 (1974). Hines satisfed
all these requirements.
A
Injury in fact. Because Hines sought and obtained a pre-
liminary injunction, it was not enough for her to show that
she had been injured in the past. Instead, she had to iden-
tify a “real and immediate threat of repeated injury” that
existed at the time she sued—that is, on August 2, 2022.
O'Shea, 414 U. S., at 496; see also Friends of the Earth, Inc.
v. Laidlaw Environmental Services (TOC), Inc., 528 U. S.
167, 191 (2000); Mollan v. Torrance, 9 Wheat. 537, 539 (1824).
The Government concedes that Hines suffered past injury,
but it claims that she did not make the showing needed
to obtain prospective relief. See Brief for Petitioners 17.
Both the District Court and the Court of Appeals rejected
this argument and found that Hines had shown that she was
likely to be censored in the future. 680 F. Supp. 3d, at 713;
83 F. 4th, at 368–369. We have previously examined such
findings under the “clear ly erroneous” test. See D uke
Power Co. v. Carolina Environmental Study Group, Inc.,
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438 U. S. 59, 77 (1978). But no matter what test is applied,
the
record clearly shows that Hines was still being censored
when she sued—and that the censorship continued thereaf-
ter. See supra, at 90–91. That was suffcient to establish
the ty pe of i n jury needed to obt ai n i n junc tive rel ief.
O'Shea, 414 U. S., at 496; see also County of Riverside v.
McLaughlin, 500 U. S. 44, 51 (1991).
B
Traceability. To sue the White House offcials, Hines had
to identify a “causal connection” between the actions of those
offcials and her censorship. Bennett v. Spear, 520 U. S. 154,
167 (1997). Hines did not need to prove that it was only
because of those offcials' conduct that she was censored.
Rather, as we held in Department of Commerce v. New York,
588 U. S. 752 (2019), it was enough for her to show that one
predictable effect of the offcials' action was that Facebook
would modify its censorship policies in a way that affected
her. Id., at 768.
Hines easily met that test, and her traceability theory is
at least as strong as the State of New York's in the Depart-
ment of Commerce case. There, the State claimed that it
would be hurt by a census question about citizenship. The
State predicted that the question would dissuade some non-
citizen households from complying with their legal duty to
complete the form, and it asserted that this in turn could
cause the State to lose a seat in the House of Representa-
tives, as well as federal funds that are distributed on the
basis of population. Id., at 766–767. Although this theory
depended on illegal conduct by third parties and an attenu-
ated chain of causation, the Court found that the State had
established traceability. It was enough, the Court held, that
the failure of some aliens to respond to the census was “likely
attributable” to the Government's introduction of a citizen-
ship question. Id., at 768.
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This is not a demanding standard, and Hines made the
requisite
showing—with room to spare. Recall that offcials
from the White House and Surgeon General's Offce repeat-
edly hectored and implicitly threatened Facebook to sup-
press speech expressing the viewpoint that Hines espoused.
See supra, at 81–90. Censorship of Hines was the “predict-
able effect” of these efforts. Department of Commerce, 588
U. S., at 768. Or, to put the point in different terms, Face-
book would “likely react in predictable ways” to this unre-
lenting pressure. Ibid.
This alone was suffcient to show traceability, but here there
is even more direct proof. On numerous occasions, the White
House offcials successfully pushed Facebook to tighten its
censorship policies, see supra, at 82–83, 85–86, 88, and those
policies had implications for Hines.
15
First, in March 2021,
the White House pressured Facebook into implementing
a policy of removing accounts that “dispropor ti onately
promot[e] . . . sensati ona l ized content” about vacci nes.
15
The Court discounts this evidence because Hines did not draw the
same links in her briefng. See ante, at 67, n. 7. But we have an “inde-
pendent obligation” to assess standing, Summers v. Earth Island Insti-
tute, 555 U. S. 488, 499 (2009), and a “virtually unfagging obligation” to
exercise our jurisdiction if standing exists, Colorado River Water Conser-
vation Dist. v. United States, 424 U. S. 800, 817 (1976). “[A] case like this
one, where the record spans over 26,000 pages” and the plaintiffs have
provided numerous facts, deserves some scrutiny before we simply brush
standing aside. Ante, at 67, n. 7.
As it happens, Hines has said enough to establish standing. First, she
says that, at the behest of the White House, Facebook announced new
measures to combat misinformation about COVID–19 and the vaccines.
Second, she says that her Facebook pages fell under those policies. Third,
she says that she suffered the penalties imposed by Facebook, such as
demotion of her posts and pages. See 4 Record 1315; 78 id., at 25503.
She may not explicitly say that the policy changes caused the penalties
she experienced. But what theory makes more sense—that a user falling
within Facebook's amended policies was censored under those policies or
that something else caused her injury?
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Supra, at 82–83. Later that year, Facebook removed two of
Hi
nes's groups, which posted about vaccines. Supra, at 90.
And when Hines sued in August 2022, she reported that her
personal page was “currently restricted” for sharing vaccine-
related content and, thus, that she was “under constant
threat of being completely deplatformed.” 4 Record 1314.
Second, in May, Facebook told Slavitt that it would “se[t]
up more dedicated monitoring ” of vaccine content and apply
demotions to “a broader set of content.” Supra, at 85.
Then, a few weeks later, Facebook also increased demotions
of posts by individual Facebook accounts that repeatedly
shared misinformation. Supra, at 85–86. Hines says that
she was repeatedly fact-checked for posting about the vac-
cines, see supra, at 90–91; 4 Record 1314, so these policy
changes apparently increased the risk that posts from her
personal account would have been hidden from her friends'
Facebook feeds.
Third, in response to the July 2021 comments from the
White House and the Surgeon General, Facebook made more
changes. Supra, at 88. And from the details Hines pro-
vides about her posting history, this policy change would
have affected her. For one thing, Facebook “rendered `non-
recommendable' ” any page linked to another account that
had been “removed” for spreading misinformation about
COVID–19. 9 Record 2701. Hines says that two of her
groups were removed for alleged COVID misinformation
around this time. Supra, at 90; 4 Record 1315. So under
the new policy, her other pages would apparently be non-
recommendable. Perhaps for this reason, though Hines at-
tempted to convince members of her deplatformed group to
migrate to a substitute group, only about a quarter of its
membership made the move before the substitute group too
was removed. Ibid.
For another, Facebook “increas[ed] the strength of [its] de-
motions for COVID and vaccine-related content that third
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text.' ” 9 id., at 2701. And Facebook “ma[de] it easier to
have
Pages/Groups/Accounts demoted for sharing COVID
and vaccine-related misinformation by . . . counting content
removals” under Facebook's COVID–19 policies “towards
their demotion threshold.” Ibid. Under this new policy,
Facebook would now consider Hines's “numerous” commu-
nity standards violations, 4 id., at 1314, when determining
whether to make her posts less accessible to other users.
So, for instance, when Hines received several citations in
early 2023, this amendment would have governed Facebook's
decision to “downgrad[e] the visibility of [her] posts in Face-
book's News Feed (thereby limiting its reach to other
users).” 78 id., at 25503. The record here amply shows
traceability.
The Court reaches the opposite conclusion by applying a
new and heightened standard. The Court notes that Face-
book began censoring COVID–19-related misinformation be-
fore offcials from the White House and the Surgeon Gener-
al's Offce got involved. Ante, at 68; see also Brief for
Petitioners 18. And in the Court's view, that fact makes
it diffcult to untangle Government-caused censorship from
censorship that Facebook might have undertaken anyway.
See ante, at 68. That may be so, but in the Department of
Commerce census case, it also would have been diffcult for
New York to determine which noncitizen households failed
to respond to the census because of a citizenship question
and which had other reasons. Nevertheless, the Court did
not require New York to perform that essentially impossible
operation because it was clear that a citizenship question
would dissuade at least some noncitizen households from re-
sponding. As we explained, “Article III `requires no more
than de facto causality,' ” so a showing that a citizenship
question affected some aliens suffced. Department of Com-
merce, 588 U. S., at 768.
Here, it is reasonable to infer (indeed, the inference leaps
out from the record) that the efforts of the federal offcials

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affected at least some of Facebook's decisions to censor
Hi
nes. All of Facebook's demotion, content-removal, and
deplatforming decisions are governed by its policies.
16
So
when the White House pressured Facebook to amend some of
the policies related to speech in which Hines engaged, those
amendments necessarily impacted some of Facebook's cen-
sorship decisions. Nothing more is needed. What the
Court seems to want are a series of ironclad links—from a
particular coercive communication to a particular change in
Facebook's rules or practice and then to a particular adverse
action against Hines. No such chain was required in the
Department of Commerce case, and neither should one be
demanded here.
In addition to this heightened linkage requirement, the
Court argues that Hines lacks standing because the threat
of future injury dissipated at some point during summer 2022
when the offcials' pressure campaign tapered off. Ante, at
72, n. 10. But this argument errs in two critical respects.
First, the effects of the changes the offcials coerced per-
sisted. Those changes controlled censorship decisions be-
fore and after Hines sued.
Second, the White House threats did not come with expira-
tion dates, and it would be silly to assume that the threats
lost their force merely because White House offcials opted
not to renew them on a regular basis. Indeed, the record
suggests that Facebook did not feel free to chart its own
course when Hines sued; rather, the platform had promised
to continue reporting to the White House and remain respon-
sive to its concerns for as long as the offcials requested.
Supra, at 89.
In short, when Hines sued in August 2022, there was still
a link between the White House and the injuries she was
presently suffering and could reasonably expect to suffer in
the future. That is enough for traceability.
16
See Meta, Policies, https://transparency.meta.com/policies ( last ac-
cessed June 19, 2024).

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97
Alito, J., dissenting
C
Redressab
ility. Finally, Hines was required to show that
the threat of future injury she faced when the complaint was
fled “likely would be redressed” by injunctive relief. FDA
v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, 602 U. S. 367, 380
(2024). This required proof that a preliminary injunction
would reduce Hines's “risk of [future] harm . . . to some ex-
tent.” Massachusetts v. EPA, 549 U. S. 497, 526 (2007) (em-
phasis added). And as we recently explained, “[t]he second
and third standing requirements—causation and redressabil-
ity—are often `fip sides of the same coin.' ” Alliance for
Hippocratic Medicine, 602 U. S., at 380. Therefore, “[i]f a
defendant's action causes an injury, enjoining the action or
awarding damages for the action will typically redress that
injury.” Id., at 381.
Hines easily satisfed that requirement. For the reasons
just explained, there is ample proof that Hines's past injuries
were a “predictable effect” of the Government's censorship
campaign, and the preliminary injunction was likely to pre-
vent the continuation of the harm to at least “some extent.”
Massachusetts v. EPA, 549 U. S., at 526.
The Court disagrees because Facebook “remain[s] free to
enforce . . . even those [policies] tainted by initial governmen-
tal coercion.” Ante, at 73. But as with traceability, the
Court applies a new and elevated standard for redressability,
which has never required plaintiffs to be “certain” that a
court order would prevent future harm. Larson v. Valente,
456 U. S. 228, 243–244, n. 15 (1982). In Massachusetts v.
EPA, for example, no one could say that the relief sought—
reconsideration by the EPA of its decision not to regulate
the emission of greenhouse gases—would actually remedy
the Commonwealth's alleged injuries, such as the loss of land
due to rising sea levels. The Court's decision did not pre-
vent the EPA from adhering to its prior decision, 549 U. S.,
at 534–535, and there was no way to know with any degree
of certainty that any greenhouse gas regulations that the
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EPA might eventually issue would prevent the oceans from
r
ising. Yet the Court found that the redressability require-
ment was met.
Similarly, in Department of Commerce, no one could say
with any certainty that our decision barring a citizenship
question from the 2020 census questionnaire would prevent
New York from losing a seat in the House of Representa-
tives, 588 U. S., at 767, and in fact that result occurred de-
spite our decision. S. Goldmacher, New York Loses House
Seat After Coming Up 89 People Short on Census, N. Y.
Times, Apr. 26, 2021.
17
As we recently proclaimed in FDA v. Alliance for Hippo-
cratic Medicine, Article III standing is an important compo-
nent of our Constitution's structural design. See 602 U. S.,
at 378–380. That doctrine is cheapened when the rules are
not evenhandedly applied.
***
Hines showed that, when she sued, Facebook was censor-
ing her COVID-related posts and groups. And because the
White House prompted Facebook to amend its censorship
policies, Hines's censorship was, at least in part, caused by
the White House and could be redressed by an injunction
against the continuation of that conduct. For these reasons,
Hines met all the requirements for Article III standing.
III
I proceed now to the merits of Hines's First Amendment
claim.
18
Government efforts to “dictat[e] the subjects about
17
https://www.nyti mes.com/2021 /04 /26/nyreg ion/new-york-census-
congress.html.
18
To obtain a preliminary injunction, Hines was required to establish
that she is likely to succeed on the merits, that she would otherwise suffer
irreparable harm, and that the equities cut in her favor. Winter v. Natu-
ral Resources Defense Council, Inc., 555 U. S. 7, 20 (2008). In a First
Amendment case, the equities are bound up in the merits. See Elrod
v. Burns, 427 U. S. 347, 373 (1976) (plurality opinion) (“The loss of First
Amendment freedoms, for even minimal periods of time, unquestionably
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99
Alito, J., dissenting
which persons may speak,” First Nat. Bank of Boston v. Bel-
l
otti, 435 U. S. 765, 784–785 (1978), or to suppress protected
speech are “ `presumptively unconstitutional,' ” Rosenberger
v. Rector and Visitors of Univ. of Va., 515 U. S. 819, 830
(1995). And that is so regardless of whether the Govern-
ment carries out the censorship itself or uses a third party
“ `to accomplish what . . . is constitutionally forbidden.' ”
Norwood v. Harrison, 413 U. S. 455, 465 (1973).
As the Court held more than 60 years ago in Bantam
Books, Inc. v. Sullivan, 372 U. S. 58 (1963), the Government
may not coerce or intimidate a third-party intermediary into
suppressing someone else's speech. Id., at 67. Earlier this
Term, we reaffrmed that important principle in National
Rife Association v. Vullo, 602 U. S., at 187–191. As we said
there, “a government offcial cannot do indirectly what she
is barred from doing directly,” id., at 190, and while an off-
cial may forcefully attempt to persuade, “[w]hat she cannot
do . . . is use the power of the State to punish or suppress
disfavored expression,” id., at 188.
In Vullo, the alleged conduct was blunt. The head of the
state commission with regulatory authority over insurance
companies allegedly told executives at Lloyd's directly and
in no uncertain terms that she would be “ `less interested' ”
in punishing the company's regulatory infractions if it ceased
doing business with the National Rife Association. Id., at
183. The federal offcials' conduct here was more subtle and
sophisticated. The message was delivered piecemeal by
various offcials over a period of time in the form of aggres-
sive questions, complaints, insistent requests, demands, and
thinly veiled threats of potentially fatal reprisals. But the
message was unmistakable, and it was duly received.
The principle recognized in Bantam Books and Vullo re-
quires a court to distinguish between permissible persuasion
and unconstitutional coercion, and in Vullo, we looked to
constitutes irreparable injury”). So I focus on Hines's likelihood of
success.
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Alito, J., dissenting
three leading factors that are helpful in making that determi-
nati
on: (1) the authority of the government offcials who are
alleged to have engaged in coercion, (2) the nature of state-
ments made by those offcials, and (3) the reactions of the
third party alleged to have been coerced. 602 U. S., at 189–
190, and n. 4, 191–194. In this case, all three factors point
to coercion.
A
I begin with the authority of the relevant offcials—high-
ranking White House offcials and the Surgeon General.
High-ranking White House offcials presumably speak for
and may have the ability to infuence the President, and
as discussed earlier, a Presidential administration has the
power to infict potentially fatal damage to social media plat-
forms like Facebook. See supra, at 80–81. Facebook ap-
preciates what the White House could do, and President
Biden has spoken openly about that power—as he has every
right to do. For instance, he has declared that the “policy
of [his] Administration [is] to enforce the antitrust laws to
meet the challenges posed by . . . the rise of the dominant
Internet platforms,” and he has directed the Attorney Gen-
eral and other agency heads to “enforce the antitrust laws
. . . vigorously.” Promoting Competition in the American
Economy, Executive Order No. 14036, 3 CFR 609 (2021).
19
He has also foated the idea of amending or repealing § 230
of the Communications Decency Act. See, e. g., B. Klein,
White House Reviewing Section 230 Amid Efforts To Push
Social Media Giants To Crack Down on Misinformation, CNN
(July 20, 2021);
20
R. Kern, White House Renews Call To `Re-
move' Section 230 Liability Shield, Politico (Sept. 8, 2022).
21
19
https://www.whitehouse. gov/ briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/
07/09/executive-order-on-promoting-competition-in-the-american-economy.
20
https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/20/politics/white-house-section-230-face-
book/ index.html.
21
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/08/white-house-renews-call-to-
remove-section-230-liability-shield-00055771.
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101
Alito, J., dissenting
Previous administrations have also wielded signifcant
p
ower over Facebook. In a data-pr ivacy case brought
jointly by the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade
Commission, Facebook was required “to pay an unprece-
dented $5 billion civil penalty,” which is “among the largest
civil penalties ever obtained by the federal government.”
Press Release, Dept. of Justice, Facebook Agrees To Pay $5
Billion and Implement Robust New Protections of User In-
formation in Settlement of Data-Privacy Claims (July 24,
2019).
22
A matter that may well have been prominent in Face-
book's thinking during the period in question in this case
was a dispute between the United States and the European
Union over international data transfers. In 2020, the Court
of Justice of the European Union invalidated the mechanism
for transferring data between the European Union and
United States because it did not suffciently protect EU citi-
zens from Federal Government surveillance. Data Protec-
tion Comm'r v. Facebook Ireland Limited, Case C–311/18
(2020). The EU-U. S. confict over data privacy hindered
Facebook's international operations, but Facebook could not
“resolve [the confict] on its own.” N. Clegg & J. Newstead,
Our Response to the Decision on Facebook's EU-US Data
Transfers, Meta (May 22, 2023).
23
Rather, the platform re-
lied on the White House to negotiate an agreement that
would preserve its ability to maintain its trans-Atlantic oper-
ations. K. Mackrael, EU Approves Data-Transfer Deal
With U. S., Averting Potential Halt in Flows, Wall Street
Journal, July 10, 2023.
24
22
https://www.justice. gov/opa /pr/facebook-agrees-pay-5-billion-and-
implement-robust-new-protections-user-information.
23
https://about.f b.com/news/2023/05/our-response-to-the-decision-on-
facebooks-eu-us-data-transfers.
24
https://www.wsj.com/articles/eu-approves-data-transfer-deal-with-u-s-
averting-potential-halt-in-fows-7a149c9.
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It is therefore beyond any serious dispute that the top-
rank
ing White House offcials and the Surgeon General pos-
sessed the authority to exert enormous coercive pressure.
B
1
Second, I turn to the offcials' communications with Face-
book, which possess all the hallmarks of coercion that we
identifed in Bantam Books and Vullo. Many of the White
House's emails were “phrased virtually as orders,” Bantam
Books, 372 U. S., at 68, and the offcials' frequent follow-ups
ensured that they were understood as such, id., at 63. To
take a few examples, after Flaherty read an article about
content causing vaccine hesitancy, he demanded “to know
that [Facebook was] trying ” to combat the issue and “to
know that you're not playing a shell game with us when we
ask you what is going on.” 30 Record 9365; see supra, at
82. The next month, he requested “assurances, based in
data,” that Facebook was not “making our country's vaccine
hesitancy problem worse.” 30 Record 9371; see supra, at 83.
A week after that, he questioned Facebook about its policies
“for removal vs demoting,” and when the platform did not
promptly respond, he added: “These questions weren't rhe-
torical.” 30 Record 9387; see supra, at 84. When Facebook
provided the White House with some data it asked for, Flah-
erty thanked Facebook for demonstrating “that you at least
understand the ask.” 30 Record 9368; see supra, at 83.
Various comments during the July pressure campaign like-
wise reveal that the White House and the Surgeon General's
Offce expected compliance. At the press conference an-
nouncing the Surgeon General's recommendations related to
misinformation, Psaki noted that the White House “engage[s]
with [Facebook] regularly,” and Facebook “certainly under-
stand[s] what our asks are.” Supra, at 86–87. The next
day, she expressed confdence that Facebook would “make
decisions about additional steps they can take.” 78 Record
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103
Alito, J., dissenting
25175; see supra, at 87. And eventually, the Surgeon Gener-
a
l's Offce prompted Facebook for “an update of any new/
additional steps you are taking with respect to health misin-
formation in light of ” the July 15 advisory. 9 Record 2703;
see supra, at 88.
These demands were coupled with “thinly veiled threats”
of legal consequences. Bantam Books, 372 U. S., at 68.
Three instances stand out. Early on, when the White House
frst expressed skepticism that Facebook was effectively
combating misinformation, Slavitt informed the platform
that the White House was “considering our options on what
to do about it.” 30 Record 9364; see supra, at 82. In other
words, if Facebook did not “solve” its “misinformation” prob-
lem, the White House might unsheathe its potent authority.
30 Record 9364.
The threat was made more explicit in May, when Psaki
paired a request for platforms to “ `stop amplifying untrust-
worthy content' ” with a reminder that President Biden
“ `supports . . . a robust anti-trust program.' ” 78 id., at
25170–25171 (emphasis deleted); May 5 Press Briefng; see
also supra, at 85. The Government casts this reference to
legal consequences as a defense of individual Americans
against censorship by the platforms. See Reply Brief 9.
But Psaki's full answer undermines that interpretation.
Immediately after noting President Biden's support for anti-
trust enforcement, Psaki added, “So his view is that there's
more that needs to be done to ensure that this type of . . .
life-threatening information is not going out to the American
public.” May 5 Press Briefng. The natural interpretation
is that the White House might retaliate if the platforms al-
lowed free speech, not if they suppressed it.
Finally, in July, the White House asserted that the plat-
forms “should be held accountable” for publishing misinfor-
mation. 61 Record 19400; see supra, at 86–88. The totality
of this record—constant haranguing, dozens of demands for-
compliance, and references to potentia l consequences—
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Alito, J., dissenting
evince “a scheme of state censorship.” Bantam Books, 372
U
. S., at 72.
2
The Government tries to spin these interactions as fairly
benign. In its telling, Flaherty, Slavitt, and other offcials
merely “asked the platforms for information” and then “pub-
licly and privately criticized the platforms for what the off-
cials perceived as a . . . failure to live up to the platforms'
commitments. ” Brief for Petitioners 31. References to
consequences, the Government claims, were “feeting and
general” and “cannot plausibly be characterized as coercive
threats.” Id., at 32.
This characterization is not true to what happened. Sla-
vitt and Flaherty did not simply ask Facebook for informa-
tion. They browbeat the platform for months and made it
clear that if it did not do more to combat what they saw as
misinformation, it might be called to account for its short-
comings. And as for the supposedly “feeting ” nature of the
numerous references to potential consequences, death
threats can be very effective even if they are not delivered
every day.
The Government also defends the offcials' actions on the
ground that “[t]he President and his senior aides are entitled
to speak out on such matters of pressing public concern.”
Reply Brief 11. According to the Government, the offcials
were simply using the President's “bully pulpit” to “in-
form, persuade, and protect the public.” Brief for Petition-
ers 5, 24.
This argument introduces a new understanding of the
term “bully pulpit,” which was coined by President Theodore
Roosevelt to denote a President's excellent (i. e., “bully”
25
)
position (i. e., his “pulpit”) to persuade the public.
26
But
25
Webster 's International Dictionary of the English Language 191
(1902).
26
See D. Goodwin, The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William How-
ard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism, pp. xi–xii (2013) (Goodwin).
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as: 603 U. S. 43 (2024)
105
Alito, J., dissenting
Flaherty, Slavitt, and other offcials who emailed and tele-
phoned
Facebook were not speaking to the public from a
fgurative pulpit. On the contrary, they were engaged in a
covert scheme of censorship that came to light only after the
plaintiffs demanded their emails in discovery and a congres-
sional Committee obtained them by subpoena. See Commit-
tee Report 1–2. If these communications represented the
exercise of the bully pulpit, then everything that top federal
offcials say behind closed doors to any private citizen must
also represent the exercise of the President's bully pulpit.
That stretches the concept beyond the breaking point.
In any event, the Government is hard-pressed to fnd any
prior example of the use of the bully pulpit to threaten cen-
sorship of private speech. The Government cites four in-
stances in which past Presidents commented publicly about
the performance of the media. President Reagan lauded the
media for “tough reporting ” on drugs. Reagan Presiden-
tial Library & Museum, Remarks to Media Executives at a
White House Briefng on Drug Abuse (Mar. 7, 1988).
27
But
he never threatened to do anything to media outlets that
were soft on the issue of drugs. President Theodore Roose-
velt “lambasted `muck-raking ' journalists” as “ `one of the
most potent forces for evil' ” and encouraged journalists to
speak truth, rather than slander. Brief for Petitioners 24
(quoting The American Presidency Project, Remarks at the
Laying of the Cornerstone of the Offce Building of the
House of Representatives (Apr. 14, 1906)).
28
But his com-
ment did not threaten any action against the muckrakers,
see Goodwin 480–487, and it is unclear what he could have
done to them. President George W. Bush denounced por-
nography as “debilitating ” for “communities, marriages, fam-
ilies, and children.” Presidential Proclamation No. 7725, 3
27
https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/arch ives/speech/remarks-media-
executives-white-house-briefng-drug-abuse.
28
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-the-laying-the-
cornerstone-the-offce-building-the-house-representatives-the-man.
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Alito, J., dissenting
CFR 129 (2003 Comp.). But he never threatened to take
ac
tion against pornography that was not “obscene” within
the meaning of our precedents.
The Government's last example is a 1915 speech in which
President Wilson deplored false reporting that the Japanese
were using Turtle Bay, California, as a naval base. The
American Presidency Project, Address at the Associated
Press Luncheon in New York City (Apr. 20, 1915).
29
Speak-
ing to a gathering of reporters, President Wilson proclaimed:
“We ought not to permit that sort of thing to use up the
electrical energy of the [telegraph] wires, because its energy
is malign, its energy is not of the truth, its energy is of mis-
chief.” Ibid. Wilson's comment is best understood as met-
aphorical and hortatory, not as a legal threat. And in any
event, it is hard to see how he could have brought about
censorship of telegraph companies because the Mann-Elkins
Act, enacted in 1910, deemed them to be common carriers,
and that meant that they were obligated to transmit all mes-
sages regardless of content. See 36 Stat. 544–545; T. Wu, A
Brief History of American Telecommunications Regulation,
in 5 Oxford International Encyclopedia of Legal History 95
(2007). Thus, none of these examples justifes the conduct
at issue here.
C
Finally, Facebook's responses to the offcials' persistent in-
quiries, criticisms, and threats show that the platform per-
ceived the statements as something more than mere recom-
mendations. Time and time again, Facebook responded to
an angry White House with a promise to do better in the
future. In March, Facebook attempted to assuage the
White House by acknowledging “[w]e obviously have work to
do to gain your trust.” 30 Record 9365. In April, Facebook
29
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/address-the-associated-
press-luncheon-new-york-city.

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107
Alito, J., dissenting
promised to “more clearly respon[d] to [White House] ques-
ti
ons.” Id., at 9371. In May, Facebook “committed to ad-
dressing the defensive work around misinformation that
you've called on us to address.” 9 id., at 2698. In July,
Facebook reached out to the Surgeon General after “the
President's remarks about us” and emphasized its efforts “to
better understand the scope of what the White House ex-
pects from us on misinformation going forward.” Id., at
2690. And of course, as we have seen, Facebook repeatedly
changed its policies to better address the White House's con-
cerns. See supra, at 82–83, 85–86, 88.
The Government's primary response is that Facebook oc-
casionally declined to take its suggestions. Reply Brief 11;
see, e. g., supra, at 85. The implication is that Facebook
must have chosen to undertake all of its anti-misinformation
efforts entirely of its own accord.
That is bad logic, and in any event, the record shows other-
wise. It is true that Facebook voluntarily undertook some
anti-misinformation efforts and that it declined to make some
requested policy changes. But the interactions recounted
above unmistakably show that the White House was insis-
tent that Facebook should do more than it was doing on its
own, see, e. g., supra, at 86–87, and Facebook repeatedly
yielded—even if it did not always give the White House
everything it wanted.
Internal Facebook emails paint a clear picture of subservi-
ence. The platform quickly realized that its “handling of
[COVID] misinformation” was “importan[t]” to the White
House, so it looked for ways “to be viewed as a trusted,
transparent partner” and “avoid . . . public spat[s].” Com-
mittee Report 181, 184, 188. After the White House blamed
Facebook for aiding an insurrection, the platform realized
that it was at a “crossroads . . . with the White House.” Id.,
at 294. “Given what is at stake here,” one Facebook em-
ployee proposed reevaluating the company's “internal meth-
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ods” to see what “further steps we may/may not be able to
t
ake.” Id., at 295. This reevaluation led to one of Face-
book's policy changes. See supra, at 83–86.
Facebook again took stock of its relationship with the
White House after the President's accusation that it was
“killing people.” Internally, Facebook saw little merit in
many of the White House's critiques. One employee labeled
the White House's understanding of misinformation “com-
pletely unclear” and speculated that “it's convenient for them
to blame us” “when the vaccination campaign isn't going as
hoped.” Committee Report 473. Nonetheless, Facebook
fgured that its “current course” of “in effect explaining our-
selves more fully, but not shifting on where we draw the
lines,” is “a recipe for protracted and increasing acrimony
with the [White House].” Id., at 573. “Given the bigger
fsh we have to fry with the Administration,” such as the
EU-U. S. dispute over “data fows,” that did not “seem [like]
a great place” for Facebook-White House relations “to be.”
Ibid. So the platform was motivated to “explore some moves
that we can make to show that we are trying to be respon-
sive.” Ibid. That brainstorming resulted in the August
2021 rule changes. See supra, at 88, 94–95.
In sum, the offcials wielded potent authority. Their com-
munications with Facebook were virtual demands. And
Facebook's quavering responses to those demands show that
it felt a strong need to yield.
For these reasons, I would hold that Hines is likely to pre-
vail on her claim that the White House coerced Facebook
into censoring her speech.
***
For months, high-ranking Government offcials placed un-
relenting pressure on Facebook to suppress Americans' free
speech. Because the Court unjustifably refuses to address
this serious threat to the First Amendment, I respectfully
dissent.
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Reporter’s Note
The attached opinion has been revised to refect the usual publication
and citation style of the United States Reports. The revised pagination
makes available the offcial United States Reports citation in advance of
publication. The syllabus has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions
for the convenience of the reader and constitutes no part of the opinion of
the Court. A list of counsel who argued or fled briefs in this case, and
who were members of the bar of this Court at the time this case was
argued, has been inserted following the syllabus. Other revisions may
include adjustments to formatting, captions, citation form, and any errant
punctuation. The following additional edits were made:
p. 44, line 2 from bottom: “that” is inserted after “claim”
p. 44, last line: “that” is inserted after “relief ”
p. 63, line 5: “Kheriarty” is changed to “Kheriaty”
p. 63, line 13: “Kheriarty” is changed to “Kheriaty”
p. 63, line 19: “Kheriarty” is changed to “Kheriaty”
p. 63, line 3 from bottom: “Kheriarty” is changed to “Kheriaty”
p. 89, line 6: “publically” is changed to “publicly”
p. 89, line 14 from bottom: “the” is changed to “a”
p. 98, line 5: “censorship” is changed to “citizenship”
p. 102, Part B–I, frst line: “of ” is deleted
p. 106, line 12: “of ” is inserted before “mischief ”
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