X sued the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit in July 2023 after it published a series of reports critical of the site. X alleged that the group improperly gained access to data about X to “falsely claim” that the social media platform was overwhelmed with harmful content. It argued that those claims influenced advertisers to spend less money on the site, costing X tens of millions of dollars in lost revenue.
The ruling is a win for research groups that study online platforms and a blow to Musk’s campaign to portray X’s loss of advertisers as a vast conspiracy against him. Under Musk, X has also sued the nonprofit Media Matters for America in a case that is ongoing in federal court in Texas, and it threatened to sue the Anti-Defamation League before reaching a détente with that group.
Breyer dismissed the suit under California’s strict laws against what are known as SLAPPs, or strategic lawsuits against public participation. The judge did not mince words in his finding that the suit lacked merit and appeared to be a blatant attempt to intimidate researchers and critics.
“Sometimes it is unclear what is driving a litigation, and only by reading between the lines of a complaint can one attempt to surmise a plaintiff’s true purpose,” Breyer wrote. “Other times, a complaint is so unabashedly and vociferously about one thing that there can be no mistaking that purpose. This case represents the latter circumstance. This case is about punishing the Defendants for their speech.”
Under California’s anti-SLAPP statute, defendants are entitled to have their legal fees paid by the plaintiffs who filed the frivolous suit.
Imran Ahmed, CCDH’s CEO, cheered Breyer’s ruling in a phone interview Monday, calling it a “complete victory” that should “embolden” public-interest researchers everywhere to continue their work.
“It is quite clear that this was an unconstitutional attempt to shut down the free speech of critics of Elon Musk, by Elon Musk, a self-proclaimed ‘free-speech absolutist,’” Ahmed said. “It’s an enormous relief to the team at CCDH that we now can continue our mission to hold these companies accountable.”
Jonathan Hawk, an attorney representing X in the case, declined to comment. Musk could not be reached for comment, and a request for comment from X was met with an autoreply.
Musk bought Twitter in October 2022, taking it private and later renaming it X, in what he said was a bid to make it a haven for free speech. He dramatically slashed the company’s workforce, relaxed the site’s rules against hate speech and misinformation and welcomed back users previously banned from the platform.
CCDH was one of several research groups that found a rise in hate speech on the site after Musk took over. As some advertisers paused spending on the site, Musk attempted to control the damage, even claiming in November 2022 that hate speech had fallen “below our prior norms.”
On Nov. 10, 2022, CCDH published what it called a “fact-check” of those claims. The group said that data from an analytics tool for advertisers called Brandwatch showed that the use of some particularly vile slurs had spiked dramatically.
In February 2023, another CCDH report titled “Toxic Twitter” found that a group of 10 extremist accounts whose bans were lifted by Musk were generating billions of views with their tweets and likely bringing in millions in ad revenue. The implication was that Musk was profiting from the speech of people such as neo-Nazi Andrew Anglin, self-described “misogynist influencer” Andrew Tate and leading vaccine conspiracy theorists.
X cited both reports, along with a previous report that CCDH published prior to Musk’s purchase of Twitter, in its lawsuit. The company said the group violated its terms of service, improperly used the Brandwatch advertising tool and violated the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act’s provision against unauthorized access to machines and data.
But while X accused CCDH of harming its reputation, it did not bring a legal claim of defamation against the organization, which would have required it to prove that the reports were untrue. CCDH’s lawyers suggested that might be because X didn’t want to open itself to a legal discovery process that would generate evidence about “the truth about the content on its platform.”
Breyer, the judge, took note of that choice, writing in his ruling that X wanted to “have it both ways — to be spared the burdens of pleading a defamation claim, while bemoaning the harm to its reputation, and seeking punishing damages based on reputational harm.”
Alejandra Caraballo, a clinical instructor at Harvard Law School’s Cyberlaw Clinic, said the ruling was “probably the best decision that could have come out of this case with a view toward actually protecting free speech.” She noted that Musk appears to have a penchant for suing critics, which can deter others from speaking out lest they be hauled into court next.
“We don’t want the wealthy, the powerful and others to silence dissent through litigation they know is frivolous just because they have the resources,” Caraballo said.
While Musk has billed himself as a “free-speech absolutist,” he has on several occasions barred journalists and activists from the site for posting information that he said violated its rules. Caraballo experienced that last week when her X account was banned after she amplified the identity of anonymous neo-Nazi comic artist StoneToss. The platform cracked down on mentions of the users’ supposed identity and changed the terms of service to prohibit naming the person behind an anonymous account. (Her account has since been reinstated.)
“Musk appeals to the liberal values of free speech while in practice being very authoritarian in the way he implements this,” Caraballo said.
In a similar case, X sued the liberal media watchdog group Media Matters in Texas in November 2023 after it published a report showing that the site appeared to be running ads alongside blatantly pro-Nazi posts. Multiple businesses, including IBM, Apple and Disney, subsequently suspended their advertising on the platform. In that case, X did make a defamation claim.
The win for CCDH in California doesn’t necessarily mean Media Matters will prevail as well, Caraballo said. Texas law prevents litigators from applying anti-SLAPP statutes in federal cases. After the judge who was originally assigned the case recused himself, it was reassigned to Judge Reed O’Connor, known for a 2018 ruling that aimed to overturn the Affordable Care Act.
“There’s an appearance that this lawsuit may have been forum-shopping for a place where they knew they’d get a favorable judge more aligned in a partisan way,” Caraballo said.
Texas has become a favored venue for Musk as he has battled lawsuits in other jurisdictions. He moved Tesla’s corporate headquarters from California to Austin in 2021, and he moved the incorporation of SpaceX to Texas from Delaware in February, after a Delaware judge voided his $56 billion pay package for Tesla. The day Musk filed his lawsuit against Media Matters, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton launched a fraud investigation into the non-profit, subpoenaing materials related to its reporting.
Joseph Menn contributed to this report.
