Musk's X sues to block New York social media transparency law

Elon Musk's X Corp. has filed a lawsuit challenging a New York state law that requires social media companies to report how they moderate hate speech and disinformation.
The complaint, filed in a federal court in Manhattan, seeks to halt the law, which X argues violates the First Amendment by forcing platforms to disclose sensitive information about their content moderation practices.
"Today, @X filed a First Amendment lawsuit against a New York law, NY S895B," X's Global Government Affairs team posted Tuesday, adding that it had successfully challenged a similar law in California.
"X is the only platform fighting for its users by challenging the law, and we are confident we will prevail in this case as well," the company said.
The New York law requires social media companies with over $100 million in annual revenue to submit semiannual reports detailing how they define and moderate hate speech, racism, extremism, disinformation and harassment.
Companies face fines of $15,000 per day for violations, which can be sought by the attorney general's office.
X says the law is "an impermissible attempt by the State to inject itself into the content-moderation editorial process" and seeks to pressure platforms into restricting constitutionally protected speech.
- 'Stop Hiding Hate' -
Reporters Without Borders said in a statement that asking X "account for their actions against misinformation is by no means an infringement of freedom of expression, but the bare minimum to clean up the digital space."
"Freedom of expression does not come without responsibilities," it added.
The lawsuit comes after X successfully challenged a nearly identical California law last year, according to the filing. New York's law is "a carbon copy" of the California provisions that were struck down, the filing adds.
X claims New York lawmakers refused to discuss changes to the bill after the California ruling, with sponsors saying they declined to meet because of content on X promoted by owner Musk that "threatens the foundations of our democracy."
The company argues this indicated "viewpoint discriminatory motives" behind the law's passage.
Senator Brad Hoylman-Sigal and Assembly member Grace Lee -- who introduced the law -- said in a statement that their act "does not infringe upon the First Amendment rights of social media companies, nor does it conflict with federal law."
"Instead, the Stop Hiding Hate Act requires narrowly tailored disclosures by social media companies to allow consumers to better decide which social media platforms they utilize," they added.

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As evidence, he cited Sihlobo's estimates of the average share of black farmers in commercial agricultural output between 2015 and 2019 (though he mistakenly said 2015 to 2020). To calculate the output of white farmers, Jooste seems to have simply subtracted Sihlobo's figures from 100%. For instance, Sihlobo estimated black farmers produced 1.3% of commercially sold wheat, leading Jooste to conclude that white farmers must then produce the other '98.7% of all the wheat'. But this ignores key context. Widely shared stats are incomplete 'guesstimates' The original statistics came from a paper called Agriculture in South Africa, written by Sihlobo and Prof Johann Kirsten, director of Stellenbosch University's Bureau for Economic Research (BER). Their data was based on records from the National Agricultural Marketing Council (NAMC), which collects figures from agricultural organisations. For example, the Citrus Growers' Association tracks citrus exports and levies based on reports from its members. These organisations have committed to initiatives addressing inequalities in farming, and so keep some data related to race. But these records do not represent all agricultural activity in South Africa. The NAMC's data is limited to commercial activity reported by individual agricultural organisations. Kirsten told Africa Check that although quoted extensively, these numbers were 'incomplete … and in any case only a guesstimate'. He said 'it is very difficult to allocate a race dimension to agricultural output' without more comprehensive data and concluded the number was an 'inaccurate' minimum that could be much higher. Speaking to Africa Check, Sihlobo described Jooste's framing as 'a 'naughty' use of our valuable research'. Not only could these figures from 2019 have changed since, but black farmers in South Africa may well have a larger share in commercial agriculture than the statistics represent. While these figures are misleading, black farmers are underrepresented in agricultural output – but Jooste obscured the reasons why. Historical divides in commercial agriculture In his book A Country of Two Agricultures, Sihlobo explains that agricultural surveys typically exclude 'transactions in small value chains and sales in small local markets'. It is worth nothing that most South African households that farm do so mainly to feed themselves. According to Statistics South Africa estimates based on the 2022 census, 80.7% of agricultural households grow food only for their own use, and another 7.7% also sell some of it. These households usually don't appear in agricultural surveys based on commercial data. In his post, Jooste conflated commercial agriculture – produce eventually sold in formal markets – with 'all' produce grown in South Africa. There are many reasons why produce grown by black farmers is less likely to be recorded in these kinds of formal surveys. Dr Siphe Zantsi, an economist at the Agricultural Research Council, explained that historical divides resulted in black farmers not having access to the commercial sector to begin with. For example, Zantsi said, apartheid-era spatial planning has meant 'black smallholder farmers are located in remote areas (former homelands) that are far from the output markets'. These areas, also called 'Bantustans', were segregated areas designed to keep black South Africans out of major urban areas and political life. Zantsi also referred to a 2015 paper by South African researcher Stefan Schirmer, which noted that 'Apartheid … massively increased the barriers that black farmers were forced to confront', who were cut off from markets and confined to unproductive land, locking many into 'almost permanent forms of unemployment or employment in very low income jobs'. Kirsten further told Africa Check that an often-overlooked issue was 'who owns the best quality land and most productive land'. This helps explain why white farmers still dominate commercial agriculture. Zantsi noted that most agribusinesses in South Africa were white-owned, while black farmers often owned smaller pieces of land that were usually further from economic hubs, making it harder for them to sell in formal markets. This is supported by research that suggests South African commercial agriculture has been increasingly dominated by large, well-resourced farms. Zantsi cited 2013 research showing that as supermarkets became more powerful, they were incentivised to buy mainly from large commercial farms, pushing small-scale farmers out of supply chains. On top of this, there is the issue of land ownership, something that Jooste apparently tried to side-step, but not very deftly. It wasn't in the first version of his tweet, but at some point Jooste tacked on the claim that black farmers owned 'approximately 50% of all the land area'. This statistic veers far from all reliable data on the topic. Experts say inequality in agricultural land ownership is substantial and a key reason why black farmers have a smaller role in commercial agriculture. According to the 2017 land audit report, the most recent national data available, 72% of all individually owned land was held by white people. Land owned by individuals of all other racial groupings made up the remainder, including just 4% by 'African' or black individuals. 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