The Biden administration on Monday filed an emergency stay with the 5th U.S. District Court of Appeals to temporarily suspend a federal judge's ruling that limited government officials’ contact with social media companies concerning misinformation.
Fox News Digital reports the request came shortly after U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty rejected the Biden administration's request to stay his own order – which he issued July 4 – while they pursue an appeal. That order came in a lawsuit filed by Republican attorneys general in Louisiana and Missouri, as well as a conservative website owner and four individual critics of government COVID-19 policies.
The lawsuit claimed the administration, in effect, censored free speech by using threats of regulatory action or protection while pressuring companies to remove what it deemed misinformation.
Doughty’s injunction blocked the Department of Health and Human Services, the FBI and multiple other government agencies and administration officials from meeting with or contacting social media companies for the purpose of "encouraging, pressuring, or inducing in any manner the removal, deletion, suppression, or reduction of content containing protected free speech."
"Defendants do not identify any specific conduct that they claim is lawful but prevented by the injunction," Doughty said in Monday's ruling. He refused to block his own order while it is appealed to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans. The administration can also ask the appeals court for a stay.
Doughty’s order, meanwhile, accused the Biden administration of assuming a role "similar to an Orwellian 'Ministry of Truth.'"
The Biden administration argued that the injunction would prevent it from speaking "on matters of public concern" and conducting its primary law enforcement responsibilities.
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