As I noted in my column last week, public officials of both major parties are united in thinking they should not have to put up with irksome criticism when they use their social media accounts for official purposes. Politicians ranging from Donald Trump to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D–N.Y.) have asserted the prerogative to block users whose opinions annoyed them. This week the U.S. Supreme Court heard two cases that raise the question of whether and when such blocking violates the First Amendment.
One case, O'Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier, involves two members of a southern California school board, Michelle O'Connor-Ratcliff and T.J. Zane, who were annoyed by criticism from two parents of students. Christopher and Kimberly Garnier "frequently left comments critical of" O'Connor-Ratcliff and Zane on the board members' pages, "sometimes posting the same long criticisms repeatedly," the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit noted last year. O'Connor-Ratcliff and Zane "eventually blocked the Garniers entirely from their social media pages."
