Cite as: 603 U. S. ____ (2024)
5
Syllabus
post’s viewpoint. That limitation profoundly alters the platforms’
choices about the views they convey.
The Court has repeatedly held that type of regulation to interfere
with protected speech. Like the editors, cable operators, and parade
organizers this Court has previously considered, the major social-media platforms curate their feeds by combining “multifarious voices” to
create a distinctive expressive offering. Hurley, 515 U. S., at 569.
Their choices about which messages are appropriate give the feed a
particular expressive quality and “constitute the exercise” of protected
“editorial control.” Tornillo, 418 U. S., at 258. And the Texas law targets those expressive choices by forcing the platforms to present and
promote content on their feeds that they regard as objectionable.
That those platforms happily convey the lion’s share of posts submitted to them makes no significant First Amendment difference. In
Hurley, the Court held that the parade organizers’ “lenient” admissions policy did “not forfeit” their right to reject the few messages they
found harmful or offensive. 515 U. S., at 569. Similarly here, that
Facebook and YouTube convey a mass of messages does not license
Texas to prohibit them from deleting posts they disfavor. Pp. 19–26.
(3) The interest Texas relies on cannot sustain its law. In the
usual First Amendment case, the Court must decide whether to apply
strict or intermediate scrutiny. But here, Texas’s law does not pass
even the less stringent form of review. Under that standard, a law
must further a “substantial governmental interest” that is “unrelated
to the suppression of free expression.” United States v. O’Brien, 391
U. S. 367, 377. Many possible interests relating to social media can
meet that test. But Texas’s asserted interest relates to the suppression
of free expression, and it is not valid, let alone substantial.
Texas has never been shy, and always been consistent, about its interest: The objective is to correct the mix of viewpoints that major platforms present. 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. 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, not by licensing the government to stop
private actors from speaking as they wish and preferring some views
over others. A State cannot prohibit speech to rebalance the speech
market. That unadorned interest is not “unrelated to the suppression
of free expression.” And Texas may not pursue it consistent with the
First Amendment. Pp. 26–29.
No. 22–277, 34 F. 4th 1196; No. 22–555, 49 F. 4th 439; vacated and remanded.