In win for YouTube, Trump censorship lawsuit heads to Bay Area – San Francisco Chronicle

Former President Donald Trump’s lawsuit seeking to restore his YouTube account, cut off after an incendiary Jan. 6 posting claiming the presidential election was stolen, is apparently headed for the Bay Area.Trump sued YouTube in July, saying the video-sharing platform violated his constitutional rights by terminating the account he had started as a private citizen in 2015 and maintained during his presidency. The suit, joined by six individuals and a conservative group whose accounts have been suspended, was filed in Florida, where Trump lives at his Mar-a-Lago resort. But U.S. District Judge K. Michael Moore of Miami on Wednesday granted YouTube’s request to transfer the case to the Northern District of California. He cited the company’s customer contracts requiring legal disputes to be heard in federal or state courts in Santa Clara County, which includes YouTube’s home of San Bruno. The Northern District is based in San Francisco but also has courts in San Jose. Trump and his lawyers argued that the suit should be heard in Florida under the state’s laws — one of which, recently blocked by another federal judge, would penalize social media companies that interfere with postings by political candidates. But Moore said the suit involves…
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