Editor’s note: We have some bittersweet news for Florida Politics’ readers: Jason Delgado is leaving the FP family.
Jason has been an invaluable reporter for Florida Politics and a gregarious member of the Capitol Press Corps the last two years. He’s played his strengths, including as an Army veteran, and his coverage of the Florida National Guard — and the State Guard — has been second to none.
Jason might carry around a personal fan like Charlie Crist, and he may have unknowingly hijacked Jim Rosica’s seat in the House Press Gallery, but Jason has set himself apart in Tallahassee as a stand-up guy always prepared to give anybody their “fair shake.”
Some parting words from Florida Politics publisher Peter Schorsch: “Jason Delgado is not only a superb reporter with an extraordinarily bright future, he is a helluva good person who I am fortunate enough to call my friend.”
Expect to see Jason’s byline pop up in USA TODAY in the coming days — or just click through when his work inevitably shows up in Sunburn.
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Tweetstorm
Between Elon Musk buying Twitter, President Joe Biden’s “Ministry of Truth” and Florida lawmakers reneging on their Disney+ carveout, online free speech has held the keys to the national narrative in recent weeks. But another social media storyline has been quietly inching forward.
A federal judge last week heard oral arguments in Florida’s appeal to reinstate a law preventing social media deplatforming and limiting their ability to regulate their platform.
The Computer & Communications Industry Association and NetChoice sued last year to take down the law. They won the first battle. And the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals should declare the winner of the second battle, whether to remove the injunction as the case moves forward, in the coming months.
The legislation’s proponents say the law combats censorship, while opponents, like NetChoice Vice President and General Counsel Carl Szabo, argue the law compels speech, violating the First Amendment.
But as Florida and Silicon Valley have litigated the case, the political battlelines have inverted under their feet again, following Musk’s decision to buy Twitter and take the company private. Szabo told Florida Politics that, in backing Musk and opposing Biden’s Disinformation Governance Board, Republicans went from saying government can regulate content to government can’t regulate content.
“I think in the past two weeks, we’ve seen such incredible whiplash from Democrats and Republicans that my neck hurts when it comes to the rights of private businesses to decide what’s best for their users and their advertisers,” Szabo said.
In Szabo’s opinion, the free market should dictate how a company polices its content, like with Musk buying Twitter and the rise of platforms such as YouTube-alternative Rumble. In another example, former President Donald Trump’s Twitter alternative, Truth Social, climbed to the top of Apple’s app chart last week despite initial rollout problems.
Last week, the state’s lawyers argued that key language in federal law, known as Section 230, doesn’t allow online companies to operate free of oversight. Additionally, they said social media has effectively become the public square.
“We are grateful for the time and attention from the engaged panel of judges and look forward to the Court’s ruling,” Attorney General Ashley Moody’s press secretary, Kylie Mason, said in a statement.
Although questions about social media usage and free speech may have been supplanted this week by the U.S. Supreme Court leak on abortion, expect issues around people’s online rights to continue their slow burn.
On Thursday, Missouri and Louisiana sued the Biden administration, accusing officials of colluding with and coercing companies like Meta and Twitter to combat social media “misinformation.” On Friday, a U.S. judge dismissed Trump’s lawsuit over his Twitter ban. Plus, Texas will also argue its appeal against an injunction on its Big Tech bill on Monday in a case that parallels the Florida lawsuit.
Szabo said it can’t be a coincidence that the Biden administration launched its Disinformation Governance Board during the chittering around Musk buying Twitter.
“Whether it’s the Disinformation Governance Board, whether it is the use of antitrust as a weapon, whether it is states forcing private businesses to host speech, all of it is a violation of the First Amendment,” Szabo said. “All of it is exactly the type of government compelled speech that our founders protected us against and that all of us should oppose regardless of who’s in office.”
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Coming up, the usual assortment of news, intel, and observations from the week that was in Florida’s capital city by Peter Schorsch, Drew Wilson, Renzo Downey, Jason Delgado, Christine Jordan Sexton, Tristan Wood and the staff of Florida Politics.
Take 5
The “Takeaway 5” — the Top 5 stories from the week that was:
SCOTUS leak shifts Midterm focus to abortion — A leaked report suggesting the Supreme Court will soon overturn Roe v. Wade drew strong reactions from Florida leaders this week. Democrats largely derided the move as an attack on women’s rights, and some feared the Legislature could soon move to further restrict abortions. DeSantis said he’d wait for a final decision before contemplating any action. But he argued the same point made by many Republicans: the leak was unprecedented and wrong. “You want to talk about an insurrection, that’s a judicial insurrection, to be taking that out and trying to kneecap a potential majority through extra-constitutional means,” DeSantis said.
AHCA requests spending data on ‘illegal alien’ health — The DeSantis administration is calling on Florida’s hospitals to compile information on how much money they are spending to treat immigrants who have entered the country illegally. The Agency for Health Care Administration this week asked all licensed hospitals to figure all costs and expenditures and “report any uncollected debt calculations related to the health care of illegal aliens.” DeSantis and Moody have sharply criticized the Biden administration’s border policy, and one of the Governor’s lines of attack has been what they call the untold cost of immigrants who are using government resources while living in the country illegally.
Republished with permission [/vc_message]
