President Donald Trump’s attempt to charge for early access to his Truth Social posts has hit a legal snag after groups filed a lawsuit on Wednesday challenging the move.
The lawsuit alleges that Trump’s Truth Social plan violates the First and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution and asks the court to prohibit Trump and White House employees from carrying it out.
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In July, Trump Media & Technology Group CEO Kevin McGurn announced it would allow investors early access to Trump’s posts, labeling them as “market-moving,” according to the lawsuit. The feature, called Truth API, costs up to $100,000 per month and launched on Aug. 1. The company said 10 customers have already signed up.
What’s in the lawsuit?
The lawsuit was filed by the Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) and The Intercept, a news outlet, in U.S. District Court in Manhattan. It argues that granting paid subscribers preferential access to Trump’s public statements violates the First Amendment, which guarantees equal access to the president’s public announcements.
The groups also argue that Truth Social’s plan violates the Fifth Amendment because it allows a government official to impose unreasonable conditions on the availability of government benefits.
“Trump’s crooked scheme is particularly outrageous because … he frequently uses his Truth Social account to berate journalists and even to announce his plans to sue them and criminally investigate them,” FPF Chief of Advocacy Seth Stern said. “Then, he makes them wait in line behind paying customers to find out about it unless they’re willing to subsidize the platform he uses to attack them. This brazen grift targets not only the markets but the First Amendment. It cannot stand.”
In addition to the constitutional violations the lawsuit alleges, the groups also argue the plan is an opportunity for Trump to make money. The president holds the largest stake in Trump Media, more than 41%, through The Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust. The lawsuit alleged the shares are collectively worth more than $1 billion, something lawyers representing the groups called “obscene.”
“President Trump trampling on the Constitution for the sake of his personal profiteering is nothing new, but this latest scheme is obscene,” said Nikhel Sus, chief counsel with the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. “All Americans are entitled to timely access to their president’s public statements, not just those willing to pay the president’s company $100,000 a month.”
Charging for access
According to the suit, Truth API currently provides subscribers early access to posts from the 10 most popular accounts on the site. Trump is the most popular account, with others in his administration, like Vice President JD Vance and FBI Director Kash Patel, among the top 10.
Trump posts on Truth Social frequently, the plaintiffs say, posting between 9,000 and 11,000 times since he returned to office. That’s between 15 and 19 posts a day, on average.
The lawsuit argues that many of Trump’s posts have the potential to move markets. Straight Arrow previously reported on an analysis of Trump’s posts by JPMorgan that showed the market may actually be moving away from using the president’s posts as a source of important investment information.
McGurn said during a quarterly earnings call on Monday that he was in talks with some large news organizations and artificial intelligence companies about expanding the platform’s services, according to CNBC.
“Looking ahead, we expect the next phase of the API to include broader third-party distribution, for example, news feeds, financial data terminals, and specialty publications, which we believe will bring more visibility to this business over time,” he said.
Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Adam Schiff, D-Calif., urged federal regulators last month to investigate whether Truth API is legal. The Democratic lawmakers called the plan a “shocking abuse of the office of the President” and pushed the Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate if it violates any federal securities law.
“Early access to President Trump’s social media posts for Wall Street firms, wealthy insiders and high-frequency traders will erode investor confidence in basic fairness of the markets,” the senators wrote in a letter to the SEC.