Member of Congress Devin Nunes last year filed a lawsuit against Twitter, demanding $250 million in damages over tweets by an account called “Devin Nunes’ Cow.” Nunes has lost his case against Twitter.
Who is Devine Nunes
Devin Gerald Nunes is an American Republican politician and former dairy farmer serving as the U.S. Representative for California’s 22nd congressional district since 2003. He was Chair of the House Intelligence Committee from 2015 to 2019 and a member of President Trump’s transition team.
Lawsuit Against Twitter
This suit cites a series of anti-Nunes tweets from the @devincow account. “Devin Nunes’ Cow has made, published and republished hundreds of false and defamatory statements of and concerning Nunes, including the following: Nunes is a ‘treasonous cowpoke’ and ‘Devin’s boots are full of manure’; He’s ‘udder-ly worthless and its pasture time to move him to prison’; ‘Devin is whey over his head in crime,’” among other messages.
This $250 million lawsuit was made right in June 2019. He claimed the social media platform allowed the parody accounts to spread misinformation about him, and in so doing, affecting his reelection campaign.
Nunes also decided to sue the users behind the accounts “Devin Nunes’ Cow” and “Devin Nunes’ Mom.” Republican strategist Liz Mair was also named in the suit as well.
In a Friday ruling, Virginia Judge John Marshall said Nunes could not sue Twitter because the platform was not liable for what people posted under federal law. Marshall wrote that Nunes “seeks to have to court treat Twitter as the publisher or speaker of the content provided by others based on its allowing or not allowing certain content to be on its internet platform. The court refuses to do so.”
But none of this was able to stop The Devin Nunes’ Cow account as they reacted to the court’s decision by posting a photo of Nunes covered in milk, adding “I had to hide the [ice cream emoji] so they didn’t throw it as well,” the account tweeted.
Although Twitter has been removed from the lawsuit, Nunes is still not backing down as he is still suing Mair and the creators of the two parody accounts. However, the names of the creators have remained anonymous despite Nunes’ attempts to make Twitter reveal them.
A Twitter spokesperson said in September
“Defending and respecting the user’s voice is one of our core values at Twitter, This value is a two-part commitment to freedom of expression and privacy.”
Nunes’ lawyer, Steven Biss, alleged in June that Twitter was involved in censorship. “They’re promoting an anti-Nunes agenda,” Biss said. “They’re banning conservative accounts and they’re knowingly encouraging it.”
Previous Lawsuits
This is not the first time Nunes decided to sue a Company. He filed a defamation lawsuit for $435,350,000 against CNN in December after a story on the network said he had travelled to Vienna for a meeting with Viktor Shokin, the former prosecutor general of Ukraine, about obtaining information about Joe Biden and his son, Hunter. This is still ongoing.
In December, Nunes threatened to sue California Representative Ted Lieu after Lieu suggested Nunes may have been involved with events in Ukraine that factored into impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump.
Other lawsuits in the past, the Washington Post, Hearst, McClatchy, and Fusion GPS.
Sources https://www.newsweek.com/devin-nunes-lawsuit-against-twitter-over-fake-cow-thrown-out-judge-1513250
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/06/devin-nunes-loses-legal-battle-with-twitter-cow.html
