Trump Asks Judge to Give Him His Twitter Account Back

Former President Donald Trump has gone to court to force Twitter to reinstate his account while a lawsuit against the social media platform progresses. The filing late Friday in Miami asks for a preliminary injunction against the company, the Washington Post reports. The permanent ban is censorship, the filing contends. It also says Twitter "exercises a degree of power and control over political discourse in this country that is immeasurable, historically unprecedented, and profoundly dangerous to open democratic debate." Twitter and Trump's office did not comment Saturday on the filing.

The ban also violates Florida's new social media law, argues Trump, who lives in the state. That legislation bars social media companies from knowingly removing politicians from their platforms, per the Verge, and mandates that the sites apply their standards consistently. Trump's filing says Twitter has not met the "consistent" test. The law hasn't taken effect yet, however; it was blocked by a judge, and Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis is appealing that decision.

Twitter kicked Trump off two days after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, citing concern over possible "further incitement of violence." Facebook, Snapchat, and YouTube did the same thing. The new filing says that in making the decision, Twitter was "coerced by members of the United States Congress"—his political opponents. Trump has sued Twitter and its CEO, Jack Dorsey. Trump's new filing points out that Twitter has not removed the account of the Taliban rulers of Afghanistan, per CNN. His account had 88 million followers when it was shut down. (More Donald Trump stories.)