NetChoice, joined by the Computer & Communication Industry Association (CCIA), Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), and Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), filed an amicus brief supporting TikTok against Texas’s motion to dismiss TikTok’s interlocutory appeal.
Texas law permits “electronic media” to file an appeal if they receiver certain unfavorable rulings from Texas courts when those claims or defenses rest of the First Amendment’s protection of speech and press (or the Texas analogues). Texas filed a motion to dismiss arguing that TikTok does not qualify as a member of the “electronic media” for purposes of the appeal.
NetChoice’s brief makes two key points. First, social media services (like TikTok) are the internet-age inheritors of the founding-era pamphleteers and clearly engage is speech and press activity. TikTok clearly qualifies for the statutory right of appeal contemplated by Texas law. Second, Texas’s attempt to cabin that right to appeal only to institutional, journalistic press outlets is atextual. Texas artificially inserts language into the statute in an attempt to shortchange the broad protection the legislature saw fit to enact.