Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-277_d18f.pdf
Page Number: 5

Cite as:  603 U. S. ____ (2024) 

5 

Syllabus 

post’s  viewpoint.    That  limitation  profoundly  alters  the  platforms’
choices about the views they convey.

The  Court  has  repeatedly  held  that  type of  regulation  to  interfere 
with protected speech.  Like the editors, cable operators, and parade 
organizers this Court has previously considered, the major social-me-
dia platforms curate their feeds by combining “multifarious voices” to 
create  a  distinctive  expressive  offering.  Hurley,  515  U. S.,  at  569. 
Their  choices  about  which  messages  are  appropriate  give  the  feed  a 
particular expressive quality and “constitute the exercise” of protected
“editorial control.”  Tornillo, 418 U. S., at 258.  And the Texas law tar-
gets those expressive choices by forcing the platforms to present and
promote content on their feeds that they regard as objectionable. 

That  those  platforms  happily  convey  the lion’s  share  of  posts  sub-
mitted to them makes no significant First Amendment difference.  In 
Hurley,  the  Court  held  that  the  parade  organizers’  “lenient”  admis-
sions policy did “not forfeit” their right to reject the few messages they 
found  harmful  or  offensive.    515  U. S.,  at  569.    Similarly  here,  that
Facebook  and  YouTube  convey  a  mass  of  messages  does  not  license 
Texas to prohibit them from deleting posts they disfavor.  Pp. 19–26.

(3) The  interest  Texas  relies  on  cannot  sustain  its  law.    In  the 
usual First Amendment case, the Court must decide whether to apply 
strict or intermediate scrutiny.  But here, Texas’s law does not pass 
even  the  less  stringent  form  of  review.    Under  that  standard,  a  law 
must further a “substantial governmental interest” that is “unrelated
to the suppression of free expression.”  United States v. O’Brien, 391 
U. S. 367, 377.  Many possible interests relating to social media can 
meet that test.  But Texas’s asserted interest relates to the suppression
of free expression, and it is not valid, let alone substantial. 

Texas has never been shy, and always been consistent, about its in-
terest: The objective is to correct the mix of viewpoints that major plat-
forms  present.  But  a  State  may  not  interfere  with  private  actors’ 
speech  to  advance  its  own vision  of ideological  balance.    States  (and
their citizens) are of course right to want an expressive realm in which
the public has access to a wide range of views.  But the way the First
Amendment achieves that goal is by preventing the government from 
“tilt[ing] public debate in a preferred direction,” Sorrell v. IMS Health 
Inc., 564 U. S. 552, 578–579, not by licensing the government to stop 
private actors from speaking as they wish and preferring some views 
over others.  A State cannot prohibit speech to rebalance the speech 
market.  That unadorned interest is not “unrelated to the suppression 
of free expression.”  And Texas may not pursue it consistent with the 
First Amendment.  Pp. 26–29. 

No. 22–277, 34 F. 4th 1196; No. 22–555, 49 F. 4th 439; vacated and re-

manded.