Experts in constitutional law do not always agree with Elon Musk – but on the Deepfake trial of X, some do

• The X of Elon Musk continued Minnesota during his law on deep faras, citing violations of freedom of expression.
• Legal experts claim that the case raises real constitutional red flags on the law.
• The law could be removed into court accordingly, they plan.

Elon Musk’s social media site pursues Minnesota on a state law that criminalizes the use of the AI ​​depths to influence an election – and legal experts claim that the case raises constitutional red flags on the status.

X corp. Makes in his trial against the Attorney General of Minnesota, Keith Ellison, that the Deepfake law in 2023 violates his rights of freedom of expression and other social media platforms under the first amendment.

The trial, tabled last month at the Federal Court of Minnesota, also indicates that the law of the State “contravenes directly” to a federal law of 1996 known as article 230, which protects the giants of technology as X of civil liability linked to the content published by their users.

Experts in the policy of the first amendment and technology told Business Insider that the Minnesota law had major constitutional questions, some predicting that the law will ultimately be canceled before the court.

The trial makes a “solid” case

“I am generally not in the field of acceptance with Elon Musk, but when the argument is good, the argument is good, and I think that the argument in this trial is quite strong,” said Alan Rozenshtein, professor of law at the University of Minnesota.

The Deepfake law, said Rozenshtein, is “very likely to be struck for constitutional and statutory reasons”.

Rozenshtein and other legal experts have stressed that political discourse is the most protected form of discourse and that the lie is generally protected by the first amendment.

“The government is not free to punish discourse only because it is wrong for the simple reason that a critical objective of the first amendment is to prevent the government from choosing the winners and losers, or the truth and lies, with regard to speech,” said colorado lawy J. Kirk McGill of the Hall Estill.

A Deepfake video, said McGill, is “basically, simply a lie” which falsely attributes words or actions to someone.

David Loy, the legal director of the non -profit organization of the First Amendment Coalition, added that it is “not the government’s company to use the force of law to punish the speech on the ground that the government thinks to be true or false”.

Loy said that the Minnesota Deepfake law has “important problems with the first amendment” and is similar to a California law in 2024, to which his organization opposed the legislative assembly and was finally interrupted by a federal judge.

The Minnesota law makes it a crime for a person to knowingly disseminate a fake deep or to conclude a contract or another agreement to disseminate a deep fake “made with the intention of injuring a candidate or influencing the result of an election” within 90 days preceding an election.

The trial of X – which seeks to block the law – says that by virtue of the law, the social media platforms which maintain the content “presenting a close call” to run the risk of criminal responsibility “, but there is no penalty to be mistaken on the side of too much censorship”.

“This system will inevitably lead to the censorship of large expanses of precious political discourse and comments,” said X in the trial.

The trial underlined how, in March 2023, an X user published images of AI representing the arrest of the police President Donald Trump.

“Thus, a social media company, like X Corp., could be accused of having violated the law – and potentially be subject to criminal responsibility – to have simply displayed these images on its platform within the setbacks” under the law, according to the trial.

Eugene Volokh, a scholarship holder of the first amendment, said that it is very likely that the X trial will conduct the law blocked for social media companies on the basis of article 230.

X would have a “solid defense” under article 230 in any prosecution under the law, said Volokh, professor of law at the University of California in Los Angeles.

“A decision to know if the law would violate the first amendment, I would therefore expect the situation to expect cases where people continue their own rights to publish such material,” said Volokh.

A minnesota republican legislator and a content creator have already challenged the Deepfake law, but a judge rejected his preliminary injunction request, and they appealed the decision.

“While the reference of the law to the prohibition of” false “depths” might seem benign, in reality, it would criminalize the harmless discourse and linked to the elections, including humor, and would make social media platforms criminally responsible for not having censored such a speech, “said X in a recent declaration.” Instead of defending democracy.

A minnesota general spokesman told Bi that the office “examines the trial and would respond in appropriate time.

The senator of the democratic state of Minnesota, Erin Maye Quade, who is the author of the law, described the trial of “erroneous” when she took a blow on Musk.

“Elon Musk has sent hundreds of millions of dollars to the presidential election of 2024 and tried to buy a Supreme Wisconsin Court seat,” quade in a statement.

“Of course, he is upset by the fact that Minnesota’s law prevents him from spreading deep leaflets that meant to harm the candidates and influence the elections,” she said. “The Minnesota law is clear and precise, while this trial is mean, wrong and a waste of time and resources of the Office of the Attorney General.”

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