Uvalde Police Department's Facebook page says it 'does not allow comments.' Is it legal?
The Uvalde Police Department has faced widespread criticism for its delayed response to the gunman who entered Robb Elementary School and killed 19 children and two teachers on May 24, 2022. That criticism extended to social media, where public outcry led to the department's decision to disable comments on its Facebook page that previously allowed public engagement.
"The Uvalde Police Department Facebook Page is an informational page only and does not allow comments," the department's page reads. A similar note appears on the city of Uvalde's Facebook page.
Additionally, beneath each post, a disclaimer from the social media platform states, "Uvalde Police Department limited who can comment on this post."
Many residents assert that prohibiting comments is a violation of free speech covered under the First Amendment, but this interpretation may not be accurate.
Man sues the city of Uvalde, Uvalde Police Department for restricting comments on social media
New York resident Michael W. Palmer sued the city and Uvalde Police Department for $500,000 in April for their restriction on comments on their Facebook pages, according to the Uvalde Leader-News.
The lawsuit comes after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in March clarified that public officials' online accounts may fall under state action criteria if they wield state authority and establish such authority on their posts, even if it's on their personal accounts. Although it did not specifically outline protocols for governmental agencies, the lawsuit alleges that the city of Uvalde and Uvalde Police Department's restrictions on Facebook do not comply with the recent high court's decision because government officials run the page.
“The city does not have a lawful right to block users comments or even the users, since the Facebook Page(s), is considered ran by government officials,” the lawsuit reads.
A decision has not yet been made.
What did the Supreme Court ruling say about government official's social media accounts?
In Lindke v. Freed, James Freed, the city manager of Port Huron, Mich., posted about the COVID-19 pandemic on his personal Facebook page. Facebook user Kevin Lindke responded, expressing his displeasure with the city's response to the pandemic. Initially, Freed deleted the comments but later blocked Lindke from commenting. Because Freed identified himself as the city manager on his Facebook page, Lindke sued Freed, alleging that his First Amendment rights were violated, as he believed the page constituted a public forum.
In the Supreme Court opinion, Justice Amy Coney Barrett asserted that many government officials use social media for personal communication, and in cases in which officials have distinctly separated their personal social media posts and accounts from official business, they retain their rights as private citizens and have the capability to block users and comments.
"A close look is definitely necessary in the context of a public official using social media. There are approximately 20 million state and local government employees across the Nation, with an extraordinarily wide range of job descriptions—from Governors, mayors, and police chiefs to teachers, healthcare professionals, and transportation workers," she wrote. "Many use social media for personal communication, official communication, or both—and the line between the two is often blurred."
She wrote that such officials "may look like they are always on the clock" and it could be "tempting to characterize every encounter as part of the job," but they are "also private citizens with their own constitutional rights."
But Freed's page was not designated either "personal" or "official," and he often posted information related to his job.
In the official ruling, the Supreme Court established new guidelines and unanimously held that “A public official who prevents someone from commenting on the official’s social-media page engages in state action under §1983 only if the official both (1) possessed actual authority to speak on the State’s behalf on a particular matter, and (2) purported to exercise that authority when speaking in the relevant social-media posts.”
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What official government pages can and cannot do
Information from the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana website suggests the issue is more nuanced than the lawsuit alleges. According to the ACLU, official government pages cannot:
Prevent people from joining a public conversation on the social media account because of their views on the topics at hand.
Block critical voices from asking for government services through the social media account because of those critical viewpoints.
Prevent people from being able to see social media posts that publicly announce government information or policy because of their viewpoints.
But the organization states that the associated page can limit other kinds of interactions, and that includes restricting all comments or deleting comments not relevant to the post.
"An official can also preclude all comments or in certain circumstances limit discussions to certain subjects," the website states. "In other words, government officials may have no obligation to open the social media account up for public comment, but if they do, they cannot discriminate as to which views get to be expressed in those comments."
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Is it legal for Uvalde police to turn off comments on Facebook?
