Ohio
Earlier this year a group of eight Republicans on the state’s Civil Justice Committee approved a bill that would attempt to prohibit social media platforms from removing speech based on users’ viewpoints. Unlike other bills, Ohio’s HB 441does not let the state actually enforce the bill. Instead, it would grant everyday Ohioans the power to file civil suits against social media companies with more than 50 million active monthly users in the U.S.. By ceding punitive power to individuals, Ohio’s social media laws resemble Texas’ restrictive abortion law which lets individuals sue doctors believed to have performed an abortion.
The bill’s text makes some of the broadest, loftiest claims of most states. In the bill, lawmakers refer to certain social media companies as, “common carriers,” and use the term “censor” broadly to refer to essentially any action taken by a platform to engage in content moderation, even if it clearly does not violate the company’s own stated policies.
