Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/23-411_3dq3.pdf
Page Number: 20

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

15 

Opinion of the Court 

a state representative counts as an injury to the State, be-
cause evidence 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 addi-
tional  false  claims  about  the  COVID–19  vaccine  for  chil-
dren.”  37 Record 11,457.  But they never say when Face-
book  took  action  against  the  official’s  post—and  a  causal 
link is possible only if the removal occurred after Facebook’s 
communication  with  the  CDC.    There  is  therefore  no  evi-
dence  to  support  the  States’  allegation  that  Facebook  re-
stricted  the  state  representative  pursuant  to  the  CDC-
influenced policy. 

Jayanta  Bhattacharya,  Martin  Kulldorff,  and  Aaron 
Kheriarty.  These plaintiffs are doctors who questioned the 
wisdom  of  then-prevailing  COVID–19  policies,  including 
lockdowns and mask and vaccine mandates.  Each faced his 
first  social-media  restriction  in  2020,  before  the  White 
House and the CDC entered discussions with the relevant 
platforms.  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  restricted  the  visibility  of  Dr.  Kheriarty’s  posts
about vaccine safety and efficacy, as well as the ethics sur-
rounding vaccine mandates.  Attempting to show causation,
the plaintiffs emphasize that in January 2022, Facebook re-
ported to White House officials that it had recently demoted 
one post advocating for natural immunity over vaccine im-
munity.  But neither the timing nor the platforms line up
(nor, in Dr. Kheriarty’s case, does the content), so the plain-
tiffs cannot show that these restrictions were traceable to 
the  White  House  officials.    In  fact,  there  is  no  record  evi-
dence that White House officials ever communicated at all 

—————— 

5 The Fifth Circuit held that States “sustain a direct injury when the 
social-media accounts of state officials are censored due to federal coer-
cion.”  83 F. 4th, at 372.  Because the State failed to show that its official 
was censored, we need not express a view on this theory.