Nonprofit organization Children’s Health Defense has filed a lawsuit against massive media corporations for allegedly violating antitrust laws and the U.S. Constitution for their collusion with Big Tech companies to censor news online.
The nonprofit, founded by Democrat presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has partnered with several individuals, including Gateway Pundit founder Jim Hoft, to file the 108-page lawsuit last week against The Washington Post, the BBC, The Associated Press and Reuters, all of whom are members of the Trusted News Initiative (TNI).
According to the BBC, the TNI is a “unique global partnership bringing together organizations across media and technology to tackle harmful disinformation in real time.”
Other members of the group include Google, YouTube, Twitter and Microsoft.
Children’s Health Defense and the other plaintiffs argue in the lawsuit that they were “censored, banned, de-platformed, shadow banned or otherwise penalized by the Big Tech firms partnering with the [Trusted News Initiative], because the views and content they published were deemed ‘misinformation’ or ‘disinformation,’” according to reporting from the Defender, which publishes articles about the Children’s Health Defense.
While the lawsuit was initially filed in Texas in January of this year, but the plaintiffs were forced to withdraw their case and refile in a Louisiana-based federal district court because of what they said was a clerical error in the court.
The original lawsuit’s plaintiffs included the Children’s Health Defense, Kennedy Jr., Hoft, “Ringside Politics” radio host Jeff Crouere and founders of “The Truth About Cancer” and “The Truth About Vaccines” Ty Bollinger and Charlene Bollinger, among others.
The second lawsuit includes all of the original plaintiffs except Kennedy Jr., who is on leave from the Children’s Health Defense due to his 2024 presidential campaign — though he is still serving as volunteer legal counsel for the lawsuit, according to the nonprofit.
Children’s Health Defense announced the lawsuit on Twitter, quoting lawyer Kim Rosenberg’s condemnation of TNI.
“Instead of the ‘truth police’ they purport to be, TNI members censor accurate reporting in order to protect their own financial interests. Further, the TNI members deprive the public of critically important information,” the tweet read.
“Instead of the ‘truth police’ they purport to be, TNI members censor accurate reporting in order to protect their own financial interests. Further, the TNI members deprive the public of critically important information…" @KimMRosenberg#TheDefenderhttps://t.co/S0QhYjpgJu
— Children’s Health Defense (@ChildrensHD) June 2, 2023
