Chief U.S. District Judge James Boasberg temporarily halted the Trump administration’s effort to deny visas to people it says helped perpetuate censorship against Americans. The order blocks the State Department from enforcing the policy against foreign officials and other foreign nationals covered by the restriction.
James Boasberg and the State Department
Boasberg said the federal government has a legitimate interest in responding when foreign officials use sovereign power to suppress protected expression in the United States. He still found the policy may amount to viewpoint discrimination under the First Amendment.
“The policy, at its core, does not burden all speech about platforms, all research into content moderation, or all advocacy about online harms,” he wrote. “It presses its enforcement thumb against one side of the scale: the view that platforms should do more to moderate content, label disinformation, restrict abuse, share data with researchers, or take responsibility for the harms their systems amplify.”
First Amendment ruling
Boasberg also wrote, “The Government, in other words, has not set itself against everyone who speaks about platform governance. It has set itself against those whose work favors more moderation rather than less.” His order leaves the State Department policy halted unless a higher court changes the ruling.
The policy followed a Biden-era controversy involving the Global Disinformation Index, which produced alleged blacklists of certain news websites and received federal funding. Conservatives argued that the index’s ratings contributed to advertisers withholding revenue from conservative outlets, and the visa restriction was aimed at people involved with GDI and similar organizations.
Boston H-1B ruling
The ruling came as a separate federal judge in Boston rejected the Trump administration’s $100,000 fee for H-1B visas, calling it an unauthorized tax. That fee had been lifted from a typical $2,000-$5,000 range, and the Trump administration is appealing the Boston decision.
For people drawn into the visa policy, the immediate change is simple: the State Department cannot use this restriction while Boasberg’s order remains in place. The remaining fight is over whether the government’s effort to tie visa access to speech, research, and platform-moderation views survives First Amendment review.
