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Does this mean all public officials are not allowed to block twitter users? Or this court ruling only works on Trump?

bcheung 8y ago
It has to do with denying citizens access to information from the government. So it would probably depend on whether public officials are using an account for official government usage or if it is personal.
mikeash 8y ago
Public officials would be fine blocking people on their personal accounts as long as they draw a clear line between their personal and official accounts. Trump ran afoul of the law here because he didn’t do that.
- psergeant 8y ago
  Despite being downvotes, this is on the money. Had he maintained some kind of separation between himself and the office on Twitter, it’d have been fine, but he announces policy change first on Twitter, for example.
  - FireBeyond 8y ago
    The issue is that he had no interest in using the @potus account, because his narcissism wanted the follower bump on his personal Twitter account.
ibejoeb 8y ago
This is a legitimate question and should not be downvoted.
dragonwriter 8y ago
> Does this mean all public officials are not allowed to block twitter users? If the use of their account meets certain legal criteria which make it a limited public forum, yes; that's generally true of official government accounts, whether of an office or office holder, but can be true of notionally personal accounts if used for government purposes (as the court has evidence, including White House statements, was the case for Trump's “personal” account.) Note that while Trump's Twitter account is the highest visibility case on this issue, there have been a number of similar cases regarding local government offices and officials accounts on various social media platforms with the same general result before the case about Trump's account was filed.
bertil 8y ago
I suspect that, just like you have physical guards protecting official buildings from abuse, and their right to evacuate disruptive citizens has been established, there will be a case of a (probably local) government account willing to flag, or block a very annoying troll. The peculiarity of this case is more that Trump’s thin skin and refusal to understand how the First Amendment applies to him.

It has to do with denying citizens access to information from the government. So it would probably depend on whether public officials are using an account for official government usage or if it is personal.

mikeash 8y ago

Public officials would be fine blocking people on their personal accounts as long as they draw a clear line between their personal and official accounts. Trump ran afoul of the law here because he didn’t do that.

psergeant 8y ago
Despite being downvotes, this is on the money. Had he maintained some kind of separation between himself and the office on Twitter, it’d have been fine, but he announces policy change first on Twitter, for example.
- FireBeyond 8y ago
  The issue is that he had no interest in using the @potus account, because his narcissism wanted the follower bump on his personal Twitter account.

ibejoeb 8y ago

This is a legitimate question and should not be downvoted.

dragonwriter 8y ago

> Does this mean all public officials are not allowed to block twitter users? If the use of their account meets certain legal criteria which make it a limited public forum, yes; that's generally true of official government accounts, whether of an office or office holder, but can be true of notionally personal accounts if used for government purposes (as the court has evidence, including White House statements, was the case for Trump's “personal” account.) Note that while Trump's Twitter account is the highest visibility case on this issue, there have been a number of similar cases regarding local government offices and officials accounts on various social media platforms with the same general result before the case about Trump's account was filed.

bertil 8y ago

I suspect that, just like you have physical guards protecting official buildings from abuse, and their right to evacuate disruptive citizens has been established, there will be a case of a (probably local) government account willing to flag, or block a very annoying troll. The peculiarity of this case is more that Trump’s thin skin and refusal to understand how the First Amendment applies to him.