The Next ‘Major Threat’ To Free Speech Online Could Come From This Court Case
A state attorney general's legal victory resulted in Meta having to pay a historic-level fine — which may have dire consequences for free expression online, experts say.
Sean Moran·Oct 22, 2026·8 min read
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A state attorney general’s legal victory resulted in Meta having to pay a historic-level fine — which may have dire consequences for free expression online, experts say.
New Mexico District Court Judge Francis J. Mathew on Wednesday ordered Meta to pay a $25 billion fine after a jury found that the company had misled consumers about its privacy policies. Democratic New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez sued Meta’s platform Facebook, claiming that the company mishandled New Mexicans’ personal information.
Free speech advocates warn that this may stifle free speech by threatening fines against those who do not sufficiently crack down on alleged hate speech and misinformation.
“This decision is a major threat to free speech. It would allow a few lawyers in a few states to regulate speech online in violation of federal law and the First Amendment. I hope Meta sticks to its guns and appeals this decision to protect not only its own rights, but everyone’s,” Casey Mattox, a constitutional attorney and vice president of legal strategy for Stand Together, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
“This is a historic day for New Mexico and for consumers across the country. For too long, powerful technology companies have operated as though their size and influence put them beyond the reach of the law. A New Mexico jury found nearly 44 million violations of our consumer protection statute, and this penalty order demonstrates that those violations carry real consequences,” Attorney General Torrez said in a statement on Wednesday, according to the New Mexico Department of Justice. “We took on one of the largest companies in the world because New Mexicans deserve honesty, accountability, and the protection of their personal information. Today’s result makes clear that no corporation is too powerful to be held accountable.”
Torrez’s office did not immediately respond to a DCNF comment request.
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The Next ‘Major Threat’ To Free Speech Online Could Come From This Court Case — IJR
The fine against Meta far exceeds what many national governments have levied against alleged fraudsters and others in alleged antitrust violations.
The $25 billion fine against Meta is more than double the state’s annual budget, per its fiscal year 2027 budget overview and exceeds the largest fine ever issued by the Department of Justice when then-Attorney General Eric Holder issued a $16 billion fine against Bank of America in 2014 for financial fraud leading up to the 2008 financial crisis, per an archived Justice Department press release. Meta’s fine is more than five times the largest fine issued by the European Union, when the supranational government issued a €4.1 billion antitrust fine against Google in July, per Reuters.
Meta plans to appeal the decision, saying that the attorney general seeks to enforce free speech policies.
“This ruling, and the Attorney General’s approach to enforcement, makes it all but impossible to do business in the state of New Mexico. At its core, this lawsuit seeks to impose a tax on speech to enforce new rules for what people can say online,” C.J. Mahoney, Meta’s Chief Legal Officer, said in a statement to the DCNF.
“We are confident we will prevail on appeal,” added Mahoney, who previously served as Deputy United States Trade Representative during the first Trump administration. “In the meantime, Meta will continue to build a safe and free platform to connect millions of Americans, grow small businesses, and help the country maintain its competitive edge.”
Torrez’s political career benefitted from significant donations from leftist megadonor George Soros.
When he successfully ran for Bernalillo County district attorney, the leftist super PAC New Mexico Safety & Justice, which was funded by Soros, spent roughly $93,000 in media buys backing Torrez plus an additional $11,500 in polling, the New Mexico Political Report noted in 2016.
Simon Kubiak, Torrez’s Republican opponent at the time, soon dropped out of the race.
“New Mexicans cannot afford to challenge anyone who has unlimited resources and support from a multibillionaire from another country,” Kubiak said in 2016, in an apparent reference to Soros, according to the New Mexico Political Report.
‘Hate Speech And Misinformation’
A substantial part of the violations laid against Meta involved statements about Meta’s alleged inability to curb alleged “hate speech” and “misinformation.”
The judgment for the case found “Facebook promises regarding the prevalence and nature of misinformation and hate speech on the platform and assured the public that the users on the platform would, no matter who they were, be treated equally. The jury found those statements to be false as well,” according to the court’s conclusions of law.
“Facebook made repeated statements to the public respecting its ability to identify and remove hate speech and misinformation despite knowing those statements to be deceptive,” the court’s findings of facts stated.
The findings of fact stated that Facebook’s internal system, including its “CrossCheck” or “XCheck,” often allowed content that purportedly violated the platform’s misinformation policy to stay up and accrue millions of views.
“In its many statements respecting hate speech and misinformation, Facebook disclosed the extent or impact of the XCheck system,” the court stated in its findings.
“New Mexico found a way to fine platforms for speech it didn’t delete,” Ken Macon of Reclaim The Net, wrote in early October about the suit against Meta.
During the openings and closings, lawyers for New Mexico accused Meta of dropping its third-party fact-checking to gain favor with President Donald Trump.
The lawyers told the jury that when Trump “came into office for the second time in January of last year, January 2025, and he was one of the people who didn’t like having information removed or flagged, Zuckerberg announced they were canceling the third-party fact checkers and firing all of them,” according to a source who shared their knowledge of the trial.
The state argued that “because nobody likes being fact-checked, particularly people in power, when Trump ascends to the presidency again … Facebook announces we’re getting rid of third-party, fact-checking program,” the source added. The lawyers for New Mexico said that was “just a coincidence.”
During the court case, the jury was shown internal Meta emails about Joe Rogan, the popular podcaster whose show Zuckerberg had appeared on. Zuckerberg in September 2023 sent an email asking that Rogan’s account be put on a “list of accounts that we double review before taking action on them” to reduce false flags of policy violations that may lead to a deleted account,” the source continued.
‘Censoring Speech’
Other critics warned that the fine against Meta serves as a pressure campaign to stifle free speech on its platforms.
“New Mexico’s Attorney General should not dictate what Americans can say online or use massive financial penalties to pressure companies into censorship. Meta has stood for free speech, and we hope the higher courts will uphold the First Amendment and put an end to this abuse of power,” Jordan Sekulow, the president of the American Center for Law and Justice, wrote on X this week.
“New Mexico’s Attorney General shouldn’t get to use a $25 billion penalty to strong-arm Meta into censoring speech. Meta already ditched the biased third-party fact-checkers who could kill a post’s reach with a label. Higher courts need to stop this clear attempt to punish free expression,” Christian Collins, the founder and president of the Texas Youth Summit, wrote on X this week.
In January 2025, Meta announced it would end its fact-checking program move to a community notes model to allow more speech.
“Some people believe giving more people a voice is driving division rather than bringing us together. More people across the spectrum believe that achieving the political outcomes they think matter is more important than every person having a voice. I think that’s dangerous,” Zuckerberg said during a 2019 speech at Georgetown University about how limiting free speech may reinforce institutions rather than empowering people, according to a Meta press release.
The New Mexico attorney general said Facebook once “bragged” about the company’s prior fact-check regime but “when Donald Trump wins the presidency again a second time …Facebook announces we’re getting rid of their fact-check program, and we’re just going to what everybody else has — the community notes program,” according to the Daily Wire.
The New Mexico Democratic attorney general said he and other Democratic attorneys general have met “daily” for the first 90 days to strategize lawsuits, Fox News reported in January.
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