00:02Wealthy investors bind their way to the front of the queue for U.S. presidential announcements.
00:07Is that even legal?
00:09Well, that's the question at the center of a lawsuit by a news organization
00:13and a press freedom non-profit against Donald Trump and White House officials
00:19over a new service on social media platform Truth Social.
00:24The service, which costs up to $100,000 per month,
00:30gives access to high-profile posts, including Trump's own, before regular users see them.
00:37And you've guessed it, there has been a lot of backlash.
00:41Critics argue that because the U.S. president often uses the platform to make official announcements,
00:47the arrangement is basically charging for early access to government information.
00:54Trump's statements on Truth Social are official government records.
00:58They're subject to a law called the Presidential Records Act.
01:01They're acts of government.
01:03That's Seth Stern from the Freedom of the Press Foundation.
01:08They're the ones suing Donald Trump, together with the investigative news site The Intercept.
01:13He says if Trump's posts are official government communications,
01:18they shouldn't be treated like a premium product.
01:21But has this ever happened before?
01:24Katie Fallow of the Knight First Amendment Institute is a lawyer with expertise in free speech,
01:31press freedom and digital platforms.
01:34She says courts have already addressed similar questions.
01:38The courts have held that when a public official such as the president is using a privately run social media
01:48account to make official pronouncements
01:51and that the official, the public official is authorized to speak on behalf of the government, which of course President
01:58Trump is,
01:59that those communications are official government communications.
02:05They're not private communications.
02:08So even though anyone can access the posts, it's about whether some people should get government information first simply because
02:17they're paying for it.
02:18I think here there is no compelling government interest in saying certain people have faster access to critical government information
02:27than other people.
02:29And the only difference is whether you're willing to pay money.
02:32I mean, this is unprecedented.
02:34Donald Trump is the largest shareholder in Trump media.
02:40Now, it's been suffering from some financial struggles.
02:43And the company says subscribers receive information only slightly faster than everyone else.
02:50It calls that information market moving.
02:53Experts say a small head start could be financially profitable for investors.
02:59Trump has used Truth Social to announce major decisions, including tariffs and developments in the Middle East.
03:07We've all seen how much Trump's announcements, official announcements about tariffs, about the war in Iran, about, you know, any
03:17number of things affects the market in these wild swings.
03:20And I think that just as conditioning early access to his posts would distort the marketplace of ideas from a
03:30free speech perspective, it threatens to, you know, distort the market itself.
03:35For critics, the concern is straightforward.
03:38If information from the president can move markets, then even a brief timing advantage could create winners and losers before
03:45the wider public has access.
03:47So the issue isn't only what buyers might gain.
03:51It's also who receives the money for early access.
03:54And it's essentially a government official getting money that's going to go to him through his private company for fast
04:04access to what we all know are market moving pronouncements.
04:10I mean, that's why people would be willing to pay $100,000.
04:12And, you know, like so many things that President Trump does, it's so unprecedented, it frankly seems quite corrupt.
04:23No president has ever had the nerve to attempt to charge for access to his official statements for the benefit
04:31of a private business he controls.
04:33For Katie Fallow, this is fundamentally about free speech guaranteed by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
04:40I think it is certainly a free speech issue in the sense of the public's right of access on equal
04:47terms and non-discriminatory terms to critical government information.
04:52So there are several ways to approach that from a First Amendment free speech position, including, you know, again, if
05:00the government makes information available, it has to have a reason for saying, well, you're allowed to get it in
05:06one way or you're not allowed to get it.
05:08And here, there is no legitimate government interest.
05:12The only interest here is President Trump's private financial interests.
05:18A spokesperson for Trump media told U.S. broadcaster CBS News that information from President Trump is disseminated by countless
05:27platforms and news outlets, many of which offer subscription APIs.
05:32One of those channels is Truth Social, which was founded as an uncancellable haven for free speech after the president
05:40was unjustly de-platformed.
05:43Now, left-wing activists are trying to wrongfully weaponize the courts to censor him again and harm our shareholders.
05:51Now, what he referred to there was when tech companies banned Donald Trump from social media in the wake of
05:59the U.S. Capitol riots in 2021.
06:02They said he violated their policies against inciting violence and posed a severe risk to public safety over his posts.
06:12Now, back to where we are now.
06:14The plaintiffs argue the case also has implications for journalism.
06:19Their concern is that independent media could be priced out of direct access to presidential information.
06:27In fact, that is the whole marketing pitch behind this early access endeavor, that Truth Social posts move markets and
06:37none moves markets more than Trump's posts.
06:40So to give non-paying people, particularly journalists, access on a tier below those who are willing to pay up,
06:51that's absurd.
06:53And that's clearly unconstitutional.
06:56Imagine if the White House Communications Office made people pay to access press releases or to get press releases by
07:05email.
07:05You can't do that.
07:07These are public statements.
07:08They're not a business.
07:09But what about those who support Trump media's move?
07:12They argue the service doesn't deny access altogether.
07:16But critics say that creating different levels of access is itself the problem.
07:21When you look at it from a First Amendment standpoint, a free speech standpoint, and again, this central principle of
07:27the people having a right of access to information about what their government is doing.
07:32So, you know, again, it's been very clear that even if there's just a burden on access to speech, even
07:40if it's a relatively small burden.
07:41I mean, there were cases in Trump's first term where he had blocked people from his at real Donald Trump
07:49Twitter account and the effect of the blocking, you know, the individuals were blocked.
07:54They could have opened another account, they could have just seen it, you know, reported in the news or they
07:59had other ways to access it.
08:01But there, the court said, but they are still being burdened.
08:05There is an additional hurdle or there's an additional obstacle for their right of access and the government needs to
08:11justify it.
08:13Critics worry that if courts allow this arrangement to stand, future presidents could go much further, creating new tiers of
08:21access to government information for those willing to pay.
08:25If this principle is allowed to stand, that government officials are essentially allowed to, like, auction off, you know, early
08:33access to their decisions or their pronouncements, that you could see a level of corruption that's, you know, unheard of.
08:41Despite the novelty of the case, its supporters believe they have strong legal arguments.
08:46At the heart of this arrangement just seems very corrupt and anti sort of American in terms of being required
08:56to pay for access for government information.
08:59Now it's up to the courts to decide whether this is simply a subscription service or whether some government information
09:05is too important to be sold to the highest bidder.
09:08I'm Pablo Folilias in Berlin. A big thanks to the whole team, David Levitz, Paul Hurst, Ricardo Grijalba, Stephen Herbig,
09:17Isabella Nadobny and Philip Cheka.
09:20Thanks for watching. I'll see you again soon.
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