Judge: Trump can’t deport researchers just for working in content moderation

CITR argued an injunction was necessary to avoid irreparable harms, and the government didn’t even dispute that, Boasberg said, seemingly expecting to prove that the CITR had no standing and focusing its arguments there. However, CITR presented evidence, corroborated by other researchers, that the policy chilled research, advocacy, and travel. For CITR, the policy specifically impaired its reporting, messed with events, increased its costs, and diminished its public-facing work. Boasberg ruled that CITR showed enough evidence of harm to likely prove that the policy violated the First Amendment by improperly censoring researchers based on their viewpoints. “Much of American political debate consists of disagreement over whether a practice is liberty or regulation, safety or suppression, accountability or censorship,” Boasberg wrote. “The First Amendment does not permit officials to resolve that dispute by attaching legal burdens to the side they condemn.” Further, the State Department could not connect any of the other targeted researchers to its policy interest in barring their entry into the US. Boasberg did not suggest the policy itself is illegal, only the seemingly unconstitutional enforcement of the policy against people working in content moderation without concerning ties to foreign governments. He warned that CITR was likely to prevail on First Amendment claims, given the “mismatch” between the department’s “asserted interest and the policy’s demonstrated operation is stark.” Researchers targeted by the State Department celebrated the ruling, even though fears of broader retaliation remain as the lawsuit proceeds. Imran Ahmed, the CEO and founder of the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), faced the threat of deportation with no advance notice, which was only temporarily blocked after filing a separate lawsuit that remains ongoing. The CCDH publicly sparred with Musk in lengthy litigation over an X ad boycott that Musk ultimately lost, with a judge ruling that X’s lawsuit was about “punishing” the CCDH for its speech. The State Department didn’t mention X specifically but claimed that they targeted Ahmed due to “CCDH’s research documenting hate and disinformation” on social media platforms and “its campaigns pressing advertisers and the platforms to act on what it found,” Boasberg wrote. In a statement provided to Ars, Ahmed suggested that Big Tech interests influenced the Trump administration’s attack on trust and safety researchers. “I started the Center for Countering Digital Hate, or CCDH, 10 years ago to shed light on the staggering amount of hate, fraud, even self-harm and violence facilitated by social media,” Ahmed said. “Billionaire (now trillionaire) tech executives, their lobbyists, and the politicians who do their bidding call that ‘censorship.’ But seeking to increase transparency about major tech platforms is not censorship. Censorship occurs when the government tries to revoke the green cards of people whose views its biggest donors would prefer not to hear. Holding up a mirror to power is not censorship. Deporting the person holding the mirror is.” Anna-Lena von Hodenberg and Josephine Ballon agreed with Ahmed that the State Department was moving to benefit social media companies that risk losing ad revenue when their platforms are deemed unsafe. The CEOs of HateAid, a German nonprofit that helps victims of online abuse get harmful content removed, were targeted seemingly solely for the work that they do. In a joint statement on Boasberg’s ruling, the CEOs said that “today’s decision sends a powerful message. Independent tech researchers who are working to understand the risks posed by online platforms to children and society—including the dissemination of disinformation and antisemitism—must not be punished for doing so. This ruling makes it clear that fundamental rights in the United States must not be sacrificed for the sake of online platforms’ commercial interests.” Finally, the co-founder of the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), Clare Melford, was similarly targeted for that group’s former work publishing “disinformation risk ratings” to help news and information sites assess platform trustworthiness. In a statement, she joined others praising the court’s decision to pause enforcement and lift travel restrictions. “This is a victory for free speech and a defeat for those who fear it. GDI informs free market transactions in online advertising,” Melford said. “Banning me as CEO from travel to the United States was an unacceptable attempt by the government to censor me and interfere in the free market.”