Tenn. Attorney General Opposes Preliminary Injunction on Age Verification Law
Tennessee Attorney General Jonathon Skrmetti (R) on Thursday opposed NetChoice’s renewed motion for a preliminary injunction on a law about kids’ access to social media. The AG said that the state has already responded to a motion for a preliminary injunction.
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“That motion, as NetChoice appreciates, remains ‘pending,’ so there is nothing for NetChoice to ‘renew,’” the state AG said. “And it would be improper for NetChoice to refile the same motion twice, perhaps planning to make new arguments and submit new evidence in its ‘renewed’ reply that it omitted from its original preliminary-injunction motion. This Court should treat the parties’ original filings as the relevant papers for purposes of the preliminary injunction (and any interlocutory appeal), and it should strike or disregard anything new that NetChoice submits in reply to support its still-pending request for a preliminary injunction.”
The case, 24-01191, started in October when NetChoice sued the attorney general over privacy and First Amendment concerns about HB-1891. The law required social media companies to verify the age of account holders and gain parental consent before users younger than 18 could open accounts (see 2501170070).
Last week, NetChoice submitted a renewed motion for a preliminary injunction. The tech association claimed that it was entitled to that because the first motion was not given a timely response (see 2501060056). NetChoice also requested that the court issue a temporary restraining order as soon as possible.