Minnesota faces First Amendment suit over social media warning label law

MINNEAPOLIS (CN) — An internet trade association took Minnesota to federal court Wednesday to block a first-of-its-kind law forcing social media giants to display a government-mandated mental health warning to users.

NetChoice, a prominent lobbying group with members including Meta, Google, TikTok and other major media companies, claims state politicians are using “public health” to justify a backdoor means to control online speech.

In the 48-page complaint filed in Minnesota federal court, the group argues the state is overstepping its constitutional bounds by compelling private companies to speak the government’s message.

In addition to the warning label, Minnesota’s law, scheduled to be implemented on July 1, requires users to acknowledge potential harm before they can proceed to the site each and every time they access a social media platform. It also prohibits platforms from adding extra information to the warning label if it obscures the state’s message.

The Minnesota Department of Health previously released guidelines containing several pages of potential warning labels, including messages such as “Warning: Social Media use may negatively impact your mental health” and “The app shows what gets clicks, not what is true.”

NetChoice contends these are not purely factual warnings, like those found on cigarette packages, but rather highly controversial opinions on topics currently debated by scientists and lawmakers across the country.

“Minnesota cannot place conditions on the right to publish lawful speech, but that is exactly what this law does,” Paul Taske, co-director of the NetChoice Litigation Center, said in a Wednesday release. “It doesn’t matter whether it’s a billboard, newspaper or website. The government can’t force publishers to disseminate its propaganda.”

State lawmakers and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz approved the law last year, becoming the first state to require social media sites to provide a blanket mental health warning to their users.

“The evidence is clear that social media is linked with poor mental health outcomes, particularly among children,” Minnesota state Representative Zack Stephenson, the main sponsor of the law, said last year, encouraging Minnesotans not to make the same mistake previous generations made with tobacco.

“Future Minnesotans will look back on this time the same way we look back today on the 50s and 60s and the big tobacco companies,” he said in a press conference. “We ask how on Earth did they allow cigarette smoking on airplanes. They will ask how on Earth did they allow teenagers to spend five hours a day on TikTok.”

NetChoice claims the law to be overly broad and too much of a one-size-fits-all mandate, finding it unreasonable in the complaint that a 70-year-old professor watching a cooking tutorial must click through the same potential for harm warning as a teenager — especially as there is no option to permanently dismiss the warning.

Moreover, the lobbying group claims the law targets social media but exempts nearly identical interactive services like e-commerce, online gaming chats and search engines — claiming the state is unfairly picking on certain companies.

Former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called for warning labels to be placed on social media sites in 2024 — pointing to research demonstrating worsening mental health outcomes, eating disorders and body image issues among younger demographics with prolonged social media use.

Likewise, the fight over social media and mental health has ramped up in recent years as researchers continue to delve into the potential risk of harm to the youth population. Last month, Meta and Google were hit with a $6 million verdict in a landmark social media addiction trial.

“NetChoice can try to frame this lawsuit as a fight about free speech, but at its core, it is really about Big Tech using millions of dollars, lawyers and lobbyists to defeat measures intended to protect children, and others, online,” Erich Mische, CEO of Suicide Awareness Voices of Education, told Courthouse News in an email.

“Social media should not be treated as untouchable simply because Big Tech doesn’t like being held to account for the harms its product inflicts on children,” he added.

NetChoice is currently fighting other compelled speech battles across the country in states like South Carolina, Virginia and Arkansas. A similar warning label requirement in Colorado specifically for younger users with high usage was enjoined by a court in 2025, a precedent NetChoice hopes Minnesota courts will follow.

As with any First Amendment suit, Minnesota must now prove it adopted the “least restrictive means” to achieve a compelling state interest, a hurdle tech giants are betting the state can’t clear.

The Minnesota Attorney General’s Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday.