Exhibit 1120

Defendants' Opposition to Plaintiffs' Motion for Indicative Ruling under Fed. R. Civ. P. 60, Trump v. Twitter, No. 21-cv-08378-JD (N.D. Cal.), Doc. 195

Exhibit 1120 · Court filing (brief)

Defendants' Opposition to Plaintiffs' Motion for Indicative Ruling under Fed. R. Civ. P. 60, Trump v. Twitter, No. 21-cv-08378-JD (N.D. Cal.), Doc. 195

The emails were phrased in advisory terms, flagging accounts they believed may violate Twitter's policies—and Twitter employees received them as such, independently reviewing the flagged Tweets.

Twitter's answer to plaintiffs' argument that the Twitter Files showed government coercion of Twitter. Twitter argues the FBI emails cited by plaintiffs contain no specific demand to remove content and no threat of sanction, that Twitter employees reviewed the flagged tweets independently, that the FBI payments were reimbursements under 18 U.S.C. 2706 for legal process, and in footnote 6 that the bulk of the FBI communications cited took place before the 2020 elections, 'while Trump was still in office'. It quotes an FBI San Francisco email sending Twitter a report of 207 tweets 'they believe may be in violation of our policies' (Pls.' Ex. A.30). A litigation position taken by a party opposing the motion, not a finding; the district court and Ninth Circuit rulings on the motion are separate.

Source: Twitter, Inc. and Jack Dorsey (WilmerHale), filed in the U.S. District Court, N.D. Cal.
Date: 1 June 2023
Quoted from: Opp'n at 12 (ECF p. 16 of 19)
Grade: Primary record
Document: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.387133/gov.uscourts.cand.387133.195.0.pdf
Accessed: 2026-11-10
Cited by: Findings citing this exhibit

Cited by

Finding INF-4.2: Primary record The FBI agent who ran the Bureau's platform contacts testified, from recollection, that about half of the items the FBI flagged led a platform to act under its terms of service. Twitter told a court in 2023 that its employees reviewed the FBI's flagged tweets independently.
Finding INF-4.13: Primary record The 2026 consent decree in Missouri v. Biden bars the Surgeon General, the CDC and CISA from threatening platforms with punishment unless they remove or reduce protected speech, and records no admission (para. 17). The Ninth Circuit held in O'Handley (2023) that compliance with a California office's flag was optional for Twitter, with no intimation of adverse consequences, and that Twitter's moderation was not state action. Twitter's 2023 brief in Trump v. Twitter, a litigation position, argues that coercion requires the threat of a government sanction and that the FBI's emails were advisory.