Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21a720_6536.pdf
Page Number: 3.0

Cite as:  596 U. S. ____ (2022) 

3 

ALITO, J., dissenting 

The  law  before  us  is  novel,  as  are  applicants’  business
models.  Applicants claim that §7 of HB20 interferes with
their  exercise  of  “editorial  discretion,”  and  they  maintain 
that  this  interference  violates  their  right  “not  to  dissemi-
nate speech generated by others.”  Application 19.  Under 
some circumstances, we have recognized the right of organ-
izations to refuse to host the speech of others.  See Hurley 
v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Group of Bos-
ton,  Inc.,  515  U. S.  557  (1995)  (parade  organizer);  Miami 
Herald  Publishing  Co.  v.  Tornillo,  418  U. S.  241  (1974) 
(newspaper).  But we have rejected such claims in other cir-
cumstances.  For example, in PruneYard Shopping Center 
v.  Robins,  447  U. S.  74  (1980),  we  rejected  the  argument 
that the owner of a shopping mall had “a First Amendment
right not to be forced by the State to use his property as a 
forum for the speech of others.”  Id., at 85.  And in Turner 
Broadcasting System, Inc. v. FCC, 512 U. S. 622 (1994), we
declined to apply strict scrutiny to rules that “interfere[d] 
with  cable  operators’  editorial  discretion  by  compelling
them  to  offer  carriage  to  a  certain  minimum  number  of 
broadcast stations.”  Id., at 643–644; see generally E. Vo-
lokh, Treating Social Media Platforms Like Common Carri-
ers? 1 J. Free Speech Law 377 (2021).

It is not at all obvious how our existing precedents, which 
predate the age of the internet, should apply to large social 
media companies, but Texas argues that its law is permis-
sible under our case law.  First, Texas contends that §7 does 
not  require  social  media  platforms  to  host  any  particular
message but only to refrain from discrimination against a 
user’s speech on the basis of “viewpoint,” App. 49a, and in 
this  respect  the  statute  may  be  a  permissible  attempt  to
prevent “repression of [the freedom of speech] by private in-
terests,” Associated Press v. United States, 326 U. S. 1, 20 
(1945).  Second,  Texas  argues  that  HB20  applies  only  to
platforms that hold themselves out as “open to the public,”