MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Twitter users blocked by Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill filed a lawsuit against him Wednesday, arguing he’s blocking their right to free speech in a “modern day town square.”
The lawsuit contends that Merrill is putting a “viewpoint-based restriction” to information about, and interaction with, his public office. The three plaintiffs said Merrill had blocked them from his Twitter account “because of opinions they expressed or questions they asked.”
“Essentially, what is happening here is the secretary of state uses his Twitter feed for official public functions,” said Randall Marshall, director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama. “Blocking people from your public feed violates the First Amendment, in our view.” The ACLU is representing plaintiffs in the lawsuit.
Merrill said Wednesday that he has blocked people he considers harassing, rude or who “won’t listen to reason.” Merrill said he readily makes himself available to the public and blocking Twitter users “doesn’t stop them from communicating with me” in other formats, including his cellphone. Merrill said he lists his cellphone number on his office business card.
“Anybody who wants to reach me can reach me whenever they want to,” Merrill said.
Merrill is a prolific Twitter user and has tweeted more than 12,000 times from his JohnHMerrill account.
The Alabama filing comes after a group of Twitter users succeeded in a similar 2017 lawsuit against President Donald Trump. In that case, U.S. District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald said people have a free-speech right to reply directly to politicians who use their accounts as public forums to conduct official business.
The lawsuit filed in federal court in Birmingham asked the court to declare the “viewpoint-based” blocking unconstitutional.