Media Matters for America (MMFA)—a nonprofit that Elon Musk accused of sparking a supposedly illegal ad boycott on X—won its bid to block a sweeping Federal Trade Commission (FTC) probe that appeared to have rushed to silence Musk's foe without ever adequately explaining why the government needed to get involved.
In her opinion granting MMFA's preliminary injunction, US District Judge Sparkle L. Sooknanan—a Joe Biden appointee—agreed that the FTC's probe was likely to be ruled as a retaliatory violation of the First Amendment.
Warning that the FTC's targeting of reporters was particularly concerning, Sooknanan wrote that the "case presents a straightforward First Amendment violation," where it's reasonable to conclude that conservative FTC staffers were perhaps motivated to eliminate a media organization dedicated to correcting conservative misinformation online.
