NetChoice v. Bonta

Background

On December 31, 2024, the court ruled on NetChoice’s motion for a preliminary injunction against California Senate Bill 976, the Protecting Our Kids from Social Media Addiction Act. The law imposed four categories of requirements on social media and similar companies: limits on minors’ access to certain personalized feeds; limits on notifications to minors at certain times; settings that parents could use to control their children’s social media use; and public disclosures about the number of minors using the services.

In that earlier order, the court declined to block the personalized-feed provisions and two required settings. One setting limited minors’ ability to see the number of likes and other feedback on their posts. The other created a private mode restricting third parties from viewing or interacting with minors unless they were expressly connected with the minor. The court did block the notification and compelled-disclosure provisions.

NetChoice filed an appeal the same day. It then moved under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 62(d) for an injunction pending appeal, meaning an order temporarily preventing enforcement while the appeal proceeds. NetChoice asked the court to issue the order by the end of January 2, 2025.

Legal standard

The court stated that injunctions pending appeal are evaluated under a standard similar to the standard for preliminary injunctions. The relevant considerations are whether the moving party is likely to succeed on the merits, likely to suffer irreparable harm without relief, whether the balance of equities favors relief, and whether an injunction serves the public interest.

The court explained that an injunction pending appeal is not identical to a preliminary injunction and does not necessarily require the court to reconsider its earlier decision under the high standard for reconsideration. A court may issue an injunction pending appeal after denying preliminary relief when the case presents a difficult and important legal question and the equities support maintaining the status quo. Because the court had previously found that a preliminary injunction was unwarranted in part, however, it said that unusual circumstances and serious questions about the merits were required, along with other injunction factors that strongly favored relief.

Court’s analysis

The court found those circumstances present. It described the First Amendment issues raised by SB 976 as novel, difficult, and important, particularly the personalized-feed provisions. The court stated that if NetChoice were correct that the entire law violated the First Amendment, NetChoice’s members and the community could suffer significant harm from restrictions on speech, and many members might need to make substantial changes to their feeds. The court also stated that the public interest would strongly favor NetChoice in that event because of the interest in maintaining the free flow of speech.

The court did not find that NetChoice had shown, on the current record, that it was likely to succeed on its claim that SB 976 entirely violated the First Amendment. It nevertheless found that the importance of appellate review justified temporarily blocking enforcement before the law took effect. The court also recognized Defendant’s interest in allowing at least the portions of the law that the court had already found likely constitutional to take effect.

Disposition

The court GRANTED IN PART NetChoice’s motion for an injunction pending appeal. It enjoined Defendant Rob Bonta from enforcing the entirety of SB 976 for 30 days, until February 1, 2025, at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time. If the Ninth Circuit had not extended the injunction or issued its own injunction by then, the temporary order would dissolve and the more limited injunction from the December 31 preliminary-injunction order would take effect.