On Wednesday the Biden administration filed a notice of appeal. The notice of appeal brings the preliminary injunction before the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. …

What is the government to do without the authority to cajole, harass, and coerce social media into suppressing “misinformation,” “disinformation,” and the like? It’s an emergency and the government’s wise counsel is not illegal in any event (e.g., “Defendants maintain their interest in being able to report misinformation and warn social media companies of foreign actors’ misinformation campaigns outweighs the Plaintiffs’ interest in the right of free speech”). I think that will have to be the gist of the thing in addition to the other legal issues discussed in the memorandum. It seems to me that Judge Doughty has written a strong opinion in the most important free speech case to have come down the pike since I don’t know when.

[Scott points out that Judge Terry Doughty appears to have anticipated an application for a stay at the Fifth Circuit with his memorandum accompanying the injunction. It lays out in devastating detail the evidence found in discovery about viewpoint suppression and interference in dissent and debate by the executive branch with social-media platforms. One potential outcome, however, might be that the Fifth Circuit finds the injunction too expansive in terms of potential defendants and remands it back to Doughty for a more practical construct. — Ed]