Christian and conservative broadcasters sue to be exempt from hate speech law

A group representing religious and conservative broadcasters has joined a lawsuit seeking to block a California law that requires social media companies to publish their policies on removing hate speech, Religion News Service reported.

“In an environment where much religious viewpoint expression is considered ‘controversial’ speech, NRB is acting to stop the weaponization of new laws against Christian communicators,” National Religious Broadcasters chief executive officer Troy Miller said in a statement, adding that the law affects its members “by having their speech repressed” and causes them to “become agents of the state for First Amendment suppression.”

“This is something that NRB is unwilling to allow,” the statement read.

The law requires companies must make transparent how they remove content that contains hate speech, disinformation, extremism, harassment and foreign political interference. Companies that don’t comply could be fined up to $15,000 per violation per day.

Faith-based and conservative leaning groups have joined internet freedom and tech lobbying organizations in opposing the law. Also joining the lawsuit is the conservative satire website The Babylon Bee and conservative broadcaster Tim Pool.

The lawsuit states that NRB “continues its work to protect the free speech rights of its members by advocating those rights in governmental, corporate, and media sectors.”

NRB members operate social media platforms such as GodTube.com and TeacherTube.com, which allows users to create public profile and subscribe to other users’ content.

Sky Palma

Before launching DeadState back in 2012, Sky Palma has been blogging about politics, social issues and religion for over a decade. He lives in Los Angeles and also enjoys Brazilian jiu jitsu, chess, music and art.