State of Texas v. Snap Inc.
Issue
Whether Snap may remove to federal court under the federal officer removal statute, and whether the First Amendment and Section 230 constitute colorable federal defenses against Texas DTPA and SCOPE Act claims targeting Snapchat's content ratings, safety disclosures, and parental control obligations.
What Happened
The State of Texas filed a twelve-count action in Texas state court alleging that Snap violated the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act by misrepresenting Snapchat's content maturity ratings in the Apple, Google Play, and Microsoft app stores, and violated the SCOPE Act by failing to provide adequate parental verification and supervision tools. Snap removed to federal court under 28 U.S.C. § 1442(a)(1), the federal officer removal statute, arguing that its work assisting DHS (Know2Protect, Pledge2Protect, and Blue Campaign) and the FDA (tobacco/vaping public health campaigns) constitutes action "under color of federal office" sufficient to confer federal jurisdiction. In its notice of removal, Snap expressly identified Section 230 and the First Amendment as colorable federal defenses, arguing that the DTPA claims impermissibly compel disclosure of highly subjective opinions about content harms (citing NetChoice v. Bonta), that platform features like notifications and lenses implicate Snap's own protected speech (citing Moody v. NetChoice), and that the SCOPE Act's content-based exemptions render it unconstitutional under strict scrutiny.
Why It Matters
This case presents a significant intersection of First Amendment compelled-speech doctrine and state child-safety platform regulation, directly implicating the Moody v. NetChoice framework as applied to disclosure and content-rating mandates; the explicit invocation of Section 230 as a colorable federal defense to state consumer protection claims targeting platform safety representations also tracks the growing debate over whether Section 230 and First Amendment defenses can preempt state AG enforcement actions aimed at platform design and content policies.
Related Filings
Other proceedings in the same litigation tracked by this monitor.
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