The Online Speech Wars

In theory, individuals should have the same rights online as they do in the physical world. But in practice, this is uncharted legal territory. Perhaps the most contentious area is free-speech law.

“Your First Amendment rights exist in a digital space, just as much as they exist in the real world,” says Lata Nott, the executive director of the First Amendment Center of the Freedom Forum Institute, in a new animated video. Nott goes on to explain how a group of Twitter users who were blocked by President Donald Trump’s official Twitter account took this idea to the courts—and won.

This video is part of The Speech Wars, a project of The Atlantic, and is supported by the Charles Koch Foundation, the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press, and the Fetzer Institute.

Cast: The Atlantic, Rohan McDonald and Elyse Kelly