US top court declines to curb govt contact with social media firms [Video]

The US Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected a Republican-led bid to curb government contact with social media companies to moderate their content, a ruling that could bolster official efforts to fight misinformation in a key election year.

The decision hands a win to President Joe Biden’s administration and top government agencies ahead of the presidential vote in November, allowing them to continue notifying major platforms such as Facebook and X about what they deem as false or hateful content.

The justices, voting 6-3, threw out the case on the grounds that the challengers — including two states and social media users — had not suffered a direct injury that provided a legal standing to sue.

“The plaintiffs, without any concrete link between their injuries and the defendants’ conduct, ask us to conduct a review of the years-long communications between dozens of federal officials, across different agencies, with different social-media platforms, …