Elon Musk’s X loses battle over federal request for Trump’s DMs
Prosecutors now have a “blueprint” to seize privileged communications, X warned.
Last year, special counsel Jack Smith asked X (formerly Twitter) to hand over Donald Trump’s direct messages from his presidency without telling Trump. Refusing to comply, X spent the past year arguing that the gag order was an unconstitutional prior restraint on X’s speech and an “end-run” around a record law shielding privileged presidential communications.
Under its so-called free speech absolutist owner Elon Musk, X took this fight all the way to the Supreme Court, only for the nation’s highest court to decline to review X’s appeal on Monday.
It’s unclear exactly why SCOTUS rejected X’s appeal, but in a court filing opposing SCOTUS review, Smith told the court that X’s “contentions lack merit and warrant no further review.” And SCOTUS seemingly agreed.