NYU Law Forum debates government efforts to halt social media misinformation
(Left to right) The NYU Law Forum panel was moderated by Ryan Goodman with panelists Kathryn Ruemmler, chief legal officer and general counsel at Goldman Sachs; Jameel Jaffer, executive director of Columbia University’s Knight First Amendment Institute; and Colin Stretch, chief legal officer and corporate secretary at Etsy and former general counsel at Facebook (now Meta).
NYU Law News
Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the federal government asked social media companies to take down misinformation about the spread of coronavirus and mask and vaccine efficacy. The Supreme Court is now considering a legal challenge to the constitutionality of these informal requests, known as government “jawboning.”
On March 6, in an NYU Law Forum sponsored by Latham & Watkins, experts in governmental legal practices, private sector platforms, and free speech advocacy convened at NYU Law to discuss the case, Murthy v. Missouri. In Murthy, the Supreme Court will consider whether or not these content moderation requests are “coercive”—suppressing free speech, rather than merely persuading companies to enforce their policies—and violate social media users’ First Amendment rights.
The panelists included Jameel Jaffer, executive director of Columbia University’s Knight First Amendment Institute and executive editor of Just Security; Kathryn Ruemmler, chief legal officer and general counsel at Goldman Sachs and former White House counsel to President Barack Obama; and Colin Stretch, chief legal officer and corporate secretary at Etsy and former general counsel at Facebook (now Meta). Ryan Goodman, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Professor of Law, moderated the discussion.
VIEW VIDEO OF PANEL DISCUSSION
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