Laura Loomer Loses Litigation (Again)–Loomer v. Zuckerberg

October 7, 2023 · by · in Content Regulation, Derivative Liability

Loomer produces trash content, which got her banned at Facebook and Twitter. In response, she has brought several trash lawsuits, which have gone as well as you’d expect. Her latest trash lawsuit claimed that social media, the government, and Procter & Gamble were all doing the RICO against her. It’s never the RICO.

The court dismisses the lawsuit on several grounds, including res judicata. I’ll focus on the Section 230 piece.

With respect to the social media services’ status as publishers, the court says:

the plaintiff’s RICO claims depend on Twitter and Facebook’s acting as publishers. Her RICO theory generally is that the alleged enterprise unlawfully bans conservatives from social-media platforms and thereby interferes in elections. She alleges that she became a victim of this scheme when she was banned from Twitter and Facebook and then her political campaign was banned, too. Those were decisions by Facebook and Twitter to exclude third parties’ content, meaning that Facebook and Twitter are immune from liability for those decisions.

Loomer unsuccessfully tried to use Roommates.com to work around Section 230:

The conduct of Twitter and Facebook at issue here is not enough to make them information-content providers, for several reasons. First, content that “comes entirely from subscribers and is passively displayed by [the website operator]” does not make the website operator an information-content provider. Second, the plaintiff has not cognizably alleged that Twitter and Facebook’s manipulating or editing users’ content contributes to any illegality. For example, she does not explain how flagging posts as factually misleading amounts to anticompetitive conduct. Third, what is at issue here is not the “alleged unlawfulness” of any content on Twitter and Facebook, but rather Twitter and Facebook’s removal of the plaintiff’s accounts

The fact that RICO is a federal crime doesn’t change Section 230’s application to a RICO civil claim.

I’m sure this ruling won’t the last one in this case or in Loomer’s broader litigation campaign. For now, this ruling expands the ever-growing list of unsuccessful lawsuits over account terminations and content removal–a list to which Loomer has personally contributed before.

Case Citation: Loomer v. Zuckerberg, 2023 WL 6464133 (N.D. Cal. Sept. 30, 2023). The complaint.