Item one: Texas’ app age verification law allowed to go into effect for now.
Texas’ law requiring app marketplace operators like Google and Apple to verify all users’ ages and seek parental permission before minors can download apps or make in-app purchases can go into effect for now, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals blocked a temporary injunction issued by a federal district judge in Austin, who wrote in December that the restrictions in Texas’ law likely violated the First Amendment. The 5th Circuit panel did not explain its reasoning for issuing the decision, which can still be reversed by the appeals court in the future.
Senate Bill 2420, which was supposed to activate on Jan. 1, establishes age verification requirements and mandates parental consent before a person under the age of 18 is allowed to download or make purchases within apps. The law also requires app developers to say whether their apps are appropriate for people in four categories: children under 13, teens aged 13-15, older teens aged 16-17 or adults 18 or older.
Its supporters say the law is needed to protect children as they navigate social media and online spaces, while critics say it would violate free speech rights. Louisiana and Utah have passed similar laws that have not yet gone into effect.
The Computer & Communications Industry Association, a tech trade group, and Students Engaged in Advancing Texas, an advocacy group, filed separate lawsuits in October challenging the law, both arguing it violates the First Amendment.
U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman sided with the plaintiffs in December, finding the law likely violates the First Amendment and issuing the temporary injunction blocking the law while the full case plays out in the district court.
“The Act is akin to a law that would require every bookstore to verify the age of every customer at the door and, for minors, require parental consent before the child or teen could enter and again when they try to purchase a book,” Pitman wrote in a 20-page ruling at the time.
See here for the previous update. This is an administrative stay, not a ruling on the merits, so things could get restored. It’s still the Fifth Circuit giving concierge service to Ken Paxton and that’s always annoying.
Item two: Federal court allows Texas immigration law to take effect, continuing legal seesaw:
A sweeping 2023 Texas immigration law that lets state authorities arrest and deport people suspected of having illegally crossed the U.S.-Mexico border can go into effect after a federal appeals court on Friday lifted a lower court’s stoppage of certain provisions.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued an unpublished order after Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office appealed the lower court’s May 14 injunction, which had blocked most of the law a day before it was set to take effect.
Friday’s ruling, which clears the law to take effect in its entirety, is the latest in a dizzying series of seesaw rulings over the fate of the measure known as Senate Bill 4. It comes as part of a lawsuit filed by civil rights groups contending parts of the landmark immigration law are unconstitutional.
The organizations brought the current lawsuit earlier this month to stop four key sections of Senate Bill 4: the creation of a crime for re-entering the country without authorization, even if a person has since gained legal status; the establishment of magistrates’ authority to order a person’s deportation; the creation of a crime for not complying with a magistrate’s order; and the requirement that magistrates continue a prosecution even if a person has an asylum claim or other pending immigration cases.
In a joint statement, the groups called the court’s decision “disappointing and out of step with the Constitution and the unbroken practice of other courts.”
“S.B. 4 will devastate our communities and families by turning our state’s legal system into an unconstitutional weapon to surveil, harass, and harm Texans based on their perceived immigration status,” the statement read, coming from the ACLU, the ACLU’s Texas chapter and the Texas Civil Rights Project.
[…]
U.S. District Judge David Alan Ezra previously granted the preliminary injunction against these sections of the law. The Reagan appointee had signaled during a Wednesday hearing that he considered them unconstitutional.
“Indeed, it is implausible to imagine each of the fifty United States having their own state immigration policy superseding the powers inherent in the United States as a Nation,” Ezra reiterated in his written ruling.
At the time, the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Texas and the Texas Civil Rights Project said his decision reaffirmed that immigration laws are not up to the states, while adding that SB 4 would cause widespread racial profiling.
“Texas cannot override the U.S. Constitution and should stop wasting time attempting to do so,” the groups said in a joint statement to The Texas Tribune.
This lawsuit came after the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals tossed a previous legal challenge against SB 4, which was brought by immigrants and organizations that work with migrants. But instead of ruling on the constitutionality of the law, the appeals court dismissed that case last month after finding that the plaintiffs did not have standing to sue.
See here and here for previous updates. This one is by far the worse of the two rulings, but perhaps the one more likely to be halted by SCOTUS before it gets out of hand. I know, that’s always a fraught thing to hope for. I say again, “court reform” that doesn’t include dealing with the lawlessness of this circuit is insufficient.