With the supreme court recently declining to take a strong, upfront stance on the obviously bad texas abortion bill, I don't think it's safe to rely on precedent and actual constitutionality anymore.
Plus how would they even enforce this? If the company in question isn't in Texas how could they possibly compel a company outside of Texas' jurisdiction to comply?
First, a lot of big companies do operate in Texas, for lots of reasons, including decent connectivity, an interesting energy market, and some amount of low cost workforce.
If that doesn't work, then you can always follow the money and sanction companies that do business with the company you want to sanction. No Texas advertising would make an impact.
But you have to bring charges or sue in the state the company is headquartered in or in federal court. Facebook is headquartered in California. Texas can't legally compel Facebook to do anything. They can attempt to sue in California court but the case would have no merit because it's not in violation of California law. Now Texas could potentially sue Facebook in absentia in a Texas court but would have no way to enforce the judgement. Besides if it came down to that Facebook could just block traffic from Texas which would probably end this nonsense real quick.
I'm unqualified to opine on the jurisdictional issue, but I had assumed if the person harmed was in the state and the business operated in the state and had substantial presence in the state, there would be a case to sue in the state. I will be happy to read any references you can provide to help illuminate me on this.
This note seems to indicate suing out of state corporations in state courts is often accepted, and the exceptions seem to be cases where there's no real connection for the corporation to the state: https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/amendment-14/...
I also saw https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BNSF_Railway_Co._v._Tyrrell where the company does have some presence in the state, but it was not its state of incorporation or principle place of business, and the plantiffs were not resident in the state and the events in the case didn't take place in that state either.
On enforcing the judgement, I would assume under a Writ of Execution local sheriffs could seize Facebook property at their offices in Austin or Dallas, or their data centers in Fort Worth. Those buildings (if owned and not leased) and/or their contents are certainly subject to judgements in the state of Texas.
all that matters to republicans is gamification of democracy.
if these laws push their supporters to the polls because libruls might interfere, thats all the reason to pass them.
but i would not rely on the federal courts to squash these things in any speed or even at Ll given the carpet bombing trump did to bias the judicial system
Is anyone else watching this series of laws get passed and wonder how many companies are going to pull out or stop investing in Texas? Houston was starting to look like a tech hub, but it seems like the brakes are being slammed so Texas stays red.
This law maybe, but I'm not convinced the Abortion bounty bill would actually have an effect on Texas businesses. Programming is a full on sausage fest, so it wouldn't exactly stop them from hiring developers
No one thinks what this does for sites like the Gab-clones....lol. All these partisan hackjobs don't sem to realize there are blowback effects that can be leveraged, every...single...time.
As long as it was a legal option, I would immediately exclude all of Texas from having user accounts or advertising on my network. In the case of FB, public pressure would immediately work in my favor.
There are plenty of financial groups and apps that exclude based on territory due to local laws and regulations, I believe it is a legal option. It's a little flex and would result in short term advertising revenue loss but should end any further meddling in my "free" to join business.
"Your representatives believe they have the right to meddle in the content policies of our organization, they do not, until these foolish new regulations are repealed, Texas is no longer part of Facebook, please contact your representatives about this matter, a download of your account content will remain available "here" - Thank You, The Lizard King"
The stupidity of (most) comments here is typical HN, they accurately represent this site.
Nothing more than I'm told I have to hate Texas so I will. Total inability of independent thought.
This seems to be doing an amazing thing.This law is what the world needs. If it's a bad implementation then explain why. Yes it might fail higher courts.
50 million active users is a fucking utility by any normal persons definition.
Utilities should not be able to discriminate.
> The law applies to web services with more than 50 million active users that let people “communicate with other users for the primary purpose of posting information, comments, messages, or images,”
26 comments
[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 77.7 ms ] threadFirst, a lot of big companies do operate in Texas, for lots of reasons, including decent connectivity, an interesting energy market, and some amount of low cost workforce.
If that doesn't work, then you can always follow the money and sanction companies that do business with the company you want to sanction. No Texas advertising would make an impact.
1: https://www.facebook.com/careers/v2/locations/?job_region=No...
This note seems to indicate suing out of state corporations in state courts is often accepted, and the exceptions seem to be cases where there's no real connection for the corporation to the state: https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/amendment-14/...
I also saw https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BNSF_Railway_Co._v._Tyrrell where the company does have some presence in the state, but it was not its state of incorporation or principle place of business, and the plantiffs were not resident in the state and the events in the case didn't take place in that state either.
On enforcing the judgement, I would assume under a Writ of Execution local sheriffs could seize Facebook property at their offices in Austin or Dallas, or their data centers in Fort Worth. Those buildings (if owned and not leased) and/or their contents are certainly subject to judgements in the state of Texas.
if these laws push their supporters to the polls because libruls might interfere, thats all the reason to pass them.
but i would not rely on the federal courts to squash these things in any speed or even at Ll given the carpet bombing trump did to bias the judicial system
A "left-leaning" blog or newspaper had better hope they never get too popular, though.
There are plenty of financial groups and apps that exclude based on territory due to local laws and regulations, I believe it is a legal option. It's a little flex and would result in short term advertising revenue loss but should end any further meddling in my "free" to join business.
"Your representatives believe they have the right to meddle in the content policies of our organization, they do not, until these foolish new regulations are repealed, Texas is no longer part of Facebook, please contact your representatives about this matter, a download of your account content will remain available "here" - Thank You, The Lizard King"
Nothing more than I'm told I have to hate Texas so I will. Total inability of independent thought.
This seems to be doing an amazing thing.This law is what the world needs. If it's a bad implementation then explain why. Yes it might fail higher courts.
50 million active users is a fucking utility by any normal persons definition.
Utilities should not be able to discriminate.
> The law applies to web services with more than 50 million active users that let people “communicate with other users for the primary purpose of posting information, comments, messages, or images,”
Big defenders of freedom of political speech and conscience and so on
lol.