In Sacramento, a legal battle over free speech is making headlines as Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) attorneys filed a federal lawsuit against California on behalf of Rumble and its Canadian subsidiary. At the heart of the case is California’s newly passed AB 2655, a law critics describe as a direct attack on the First Amendment.
AB 2655 compels online platforms like Rumble to act as the government’s censorship police by deciding if user-generated content harms the reputation or electoral prospects of candidates, election officials, or elected officials, or undermines confidence in elections. Rumble argues this forces the platform to alter its speech and censor its user’s speech, while also compelling the platform’s speech, violating the First Amendment.
“California’s war against political speech is censorship, plain and simple. We can’t trust the government to decide what is true in our online political debates,” stated ADF Senior Counsel Phil Sechler. He lauded Rumble for resisting this trend, standing as one of the few platforms advocating for free speech amidst growing censorship.
The dispute escalated after Gov. Gavin Newsom condemned a parody video of Vice President Kamala Harris as “illegal.” This triggered a legislative response culminating in AB 2655. The law’s vague criteria, such as content “reasonably likely to harm reputations,” have drawn criticism for being impossible to enforce fairly, with government officials and pollsters often failing to agree on what constitutes harm.
The broader implications of the law have alarmed free speech advocates. California Family Council’s Vice President Greg Burt voiced his concerns, stating, “You can’t put media platforms in charge of deciding what claims about candidates and elected officials are true or false to the extent that their reputation would be harmed or undermine confidence in elections. That is simply part of the debating process that happens in a free exchange of ideas. If someone is slandering another person, the courts are available to handle those disputes.”
Adding fuel to the debate is California’s parallel effort to enforce AB 2839, targeting speech around election-related content, including political memes and satire. ADF attorneys filed a similar lawsuit in September on behalf of The Babylon Bee, a Christian satire site, and California attorney Kelly Chang Rickert. Last month, California officials agreed they cannot enforce AB 2839 against The Babylon Bee and Rickert after a federal district court ruled that the law likely violates the First Amendment. As such, The Bee and Rickert were free to post their political content online during the election season without fear of violating the law while the case continues.
The lawsuit, Rumble v. Bonta, aims to reaffirm protections for online political expression. If successful, it could establish a critical precedent for resisting government overreach in regulating speech. As Sechler emphasized, “Other online platforms and media companies must see these laws for what they are—a threat to their existence.”
This legal confrontation highlights the tension between government regulation and free speech in the digital age, with platforms like Rumble and advocates such as ADF on the front lines of defending constitutional freedoms.
