Free speech advocates can rejoice following an initial ruling from a lawsuit on Brazil’s online speech crackdown.
Rumble announced in a Tuesday press release that the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida had rejected Brazilian Justice Alexandre de Moraes’s attempt to force Rumble and Truth Social to shut down the American accounts of a prominent Brazilian dissident. Rumble called the ruling a “complete victory for free speech, digital sovereignty, and the right of American companies to operate without foreign judicial interference.”
According to Rumble, the U.S. District Court ruled that De Moraes did not properly serve his orders through either U.S. or international law, meaning that the companies have no obligation to comply with the orders. The court also suggested it would intervene to shield the American companies and freedom of speech should De Moraes double down, a ruling which “sends a strong message to foreign governments that they cannot bypass U.S. law to impose censorship on American platforms” wrote Rumble.
Reuters reported that the case involves Allan dos Santos, a Brazilian influencer and supporter of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who fled an arrest warrant in Brazil over “disinformation and hate” to live in the United States. De Moraes sought to force Rumble and Truth Social to shut down the influencer’s American accounts.
Separately, Devin Nunes, CEO of Truth Social’s parent Trump Media and Technology Group Corp., declared, “This is a major victory for free speech and free expression online. The ruling confirms that would-be dictators in any country can’t force Trump Media or Rumble to censor their opponents. We congratulate our partner Rumble on its principled stand for freedom.”
Nunes reiterated his free speech position in a Truth Social post Tuesday: “We won’t be threatened by any foreign government trying to suppress #FreedomOfSpeech 🇺🇸.”
Rumble CEO Chris Pavlovski, meanwhile, directed his comment straight at De Moraes. “The other day you said I’m a criminal because I expressed the opinion that your secret orders were illegal. Today, a US federal court determined that your orders are invalid. Again, we will see you in court… if you decide to show up,” Pavlovski wrote on X Tuesday.
Pavlovski subsequently bragged, “There is no company that fights for free speech like Rumble.”
Rumble has more than once demonstrated that it would make the platform unavailable in Brazil rather than comply with orders to censor, most recently over the above legal dispute, which occurred almost immediately after the platform was restored from its previous withdrawal from the country.
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