US top court nixes ruling in Trump Twitter critics case

WASHINGTON

The Supreme Court dismissed a lower court's ruling on Monday that found former US President Donald Trump violated the First Amendment rights of his critics on Twitter by blocking them.

The top court said in an unsigned order the ruling by the Second Circuit court has been rendered "moot" by the fact that Trump is no longer in office.

The lawsuit against Trump had been long-standing, dating back to his earliest days in office in 2017. The Second Circuit determined that Twitter's comment threads are a "public forum," and that Trump's use of Twitter's block feature unconstitutionally silenced critics while he was a government official.

After becoming a private citizen due to his loss in November's presidential race there is no longer a legal basis for the case to proceed, the court determined.

Trump was also banned from Twitter in January after a group of his supporters stormed the US Capitol, killing one law enforcement officer who died of the wounds he sustained Jan. 6. Two other officers who were there that day later took their lives.

Trump was banned for violating Twitter's policies in relation to posts he made regarding the riot.

Justice Clarence Thomas said in an accompanying opinion to the unsigned order "that some aspects of Mr. Trump’s account resemble a constitutionally protected public forum," but said Trump's expulsion raises questions about the power of big tech wields, which the court will need to address.

"Today’s digital platforms provide avenues for historically unprecedented amounts of speech, including speech by government actors," he wrote.

"Also unprecedented, however, is the concentrated control of so much speech in the hands of a few private parties. We will soon have no choice but to address how our legal doctrines apply to highly concentrated, privately owned information infrastructure such as digital platforms," he added.