The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals denied the Federal Trade Commission’s emergency motion for stay on an injunction that bars the agency from moving ahead with a civil investigative demand (CID) it had issued to nonprofit media watchdog Media Matters. Media Matters sued the FTC in June to quash the CID, alleging that the FTC seeks to punish it “for its journalism and speech in exposing matters of substantial public concern—including how X.com has enabled and profited from extremist content that proliferated after Elon Musk took over the platform formerly known as Twitter.”
The district court had issued a preliminary injunction to stop the CID on the ground that Media Matters is likely to demonstrate that the CID was issued in retaliation for Media Matters’ speech. On appeal, the FTC asked the court for a temporary pause on the injunction so it could move ahead with the investigative demand. The D.C. Circuit denied the agency’s request. According to the court: “Given…existing and continuing First Amendment harms, the Commission is unlikely to succeed in showing that Media Matters must suffer through them unless and until—if ever—the Commission chooses to file suit to enforce the Demand. To hold otherwise would empower agencies to issue sweeping demands that inflict concrete and “ongoing injuries” that suppress speech and journalism…”
