Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a law on Monday, May 24, aiming to curb Big Tech censorship and give citizens the ability to punish Silicon Valley oligarchs for engaging in partisan deplatforming, reported The Federalist.
“This session, we took action to ensure that ‘We the People’ — real Floridians across the Sunshine State — are guaranteed protection against the Silicon Valley elites,” the Republican said in a statement. “Many in our state have experienced censorship and other tyrannical behavior firsthand in Cuba and Venezuela. If Big Tech censors enforce rules inconsistently, to discriminate in favor of the dominant Silicon Valley ideology, they will now be held accountable.”
Under the new law, Floridians that are censored or banned by tech giants will be able to sue them for up to US$100,000 in monetary damages.
“This reform safeguards the rights of every Floridian by requiring social media companies to be transparent about their content moderation practices and give users proper notice of changes to those policies, which prevents Big Tech bureaucrats from ‘moving the goalposts’ to silence viewpoints they don’t like,” a news release from the governor’s office explained.
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