Cite as: 603 U. S. ____ (2024)
27
Opinion of the Court
platforms’ practice of “favoring certain viewpoints.” Brief
for Texas 7; see id., at 27 (explaining that the platforms’
“discrimination” among messages “led to [the law’s] enactment”). The large social-media platforms throw out (or encumber) certain messages; Texas wants them kept in (and
free from encumbrances), because it thinks that would create a better speech balance. The current amalgam, the
State explained in earlier briefing, was “skewed” to one
side. 573 F. Supp. 3d, at 1116. And that assessment mirrored the stated views of those who enacted the law, save
that the latter had a bit more color. The law’s main sponsor
explained that the “West Coast oligarchs” who ran socialmedia companies were “silenc[ing] conservative viewpoints
and ideas.” Ibid. The Governor, in signing the legislation,
echoed the point: The companies were fomenting a “dangerous movement” to “silence” conservatives. Id., at 1108;
see id., at 1099 (“[S]ilencing conservative views is unAmerican, it’s un-Texan and it’s about to be illegal in
Texas”).
But a State may not interfere with private actors’ speech
to advance its own vision of ideological balance. States (and
their citizens) are of course right to want an expressive
realm in which the public has access to a wide range of
views. That is, indeed, a fundamental aim of the First
Amendment. But the way the First Amendment achieves
that goal is by preventing the government from “tilt[ing]
public debate in a preferred direction.” Sorrell v. IMS
Health Inc., 564 U. S. 552, 578–579 (2011). It is not by licensing the government to stop private actors from speaking as they wish and preferring some views over others.
And that is so even when those actors possess “enviable vehicle[s]” for expression. Hurley, 515 U. S., at 577. In a better world, there would be fewer inequities in speech opportunities; and the government can take many steps to bring
that world closer. But it cannot prohibit speech to improve
or better balance the speech market. On the spectrum of