Tech Justice Law Project welcomes the court's First Amendment ruling
Tech Justice Law ProjectLegal advocacy group and co-counsel for Megan Garcia, in a public statement
The Tech Justice Law Project calls the May 2025 ruling historic and says the defendants failed to convince the court that the harms in the case came from constitutionally protected speech, which it expects will make that argument harder for companies to make.
Responding to
The First Amendment bars Megan Garcia's claims against Character.AI because they would impose liability for expressive content that the platform's users have a right to receive.
“This decision is truly historic. It sends a clear signal to companies developing and deploying LLM-powered products at scale that they cannot evade legal consequences for the real-world harm their products cause, regardless of the technology’s novelty. Crucially, the defendants failed to convince the Court that those harms were a result of constitutionally-protected speech, which will make it harder for companies to argue so in the future, even when their products involve machine-mediated “conversations” with users.”
Official statement
Original text
Where this statement fits
Character.AI argues the First Amendment bars a lawsuit blaming its chatbot for a teen's suicide
Character.AI argued in federal court that the First Amendment bars a lawsuit blaming its chatbot for a 14-year-old's suicide, because the claims target speech its users have a right to receive. The mother's lawyers argued that the chatbot's output is not protected speech. A judge declined to treat it as speech at an early stage, and the case later settled.
Source and context
Official statement
About this source
The Tech Justice Law Project, one of the legal teams representing Megan Garcia, welcomes the court's May 21, 2025 order and describes what it sees as the decision's main holdings, including on the First Amendment.
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About this source
Senior U.S. District Judge Anne C. Conway grants in part and denies in part the defendants' motions to dismiss. The order holds that Character Technologies can assert its users' First Amendment rights, but says the court is not prepared, at this stage of the case, to hold that the output of Character.AI's language model is speech. Court filing as mirrored by CourtListener (RECAP).
Archived copy (opens in a new tab)Before the quotation
The group applauds Judge Anne C. Conway's May 21, 2025 order allowing its client's claims to proceed against Character.AI, its co-founders and Google.
After the quotation
The statement's list of takeaways says the model's outputs are not protected speech because they lack human intent. The order itself said the court was not prepared to hold that the output is speech at that stage of the case.
How this statement is classified
The label describes this statement's response within the context above.
Why this label?
The reference point is Character.AI's argument that the First Amendment bars tort claims seeking to hold it liable for its chatbots' output. Condemned: the statement treats the defense as a failed argument that should not shield companies from liability for harm their products cause. The closest competing label is Challenged characterization; it loses because the group rejects the defense itself rather than only a label used in it.
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More from this case
Read the full caseEFF says chatbot output can be protected expression but harms can be addressed
Electronic Frontier Foundation
“Far from being the speech of a robot, chatbot output often reflects human expression that is entitled to First Amendment protection. ... None of this is to suggest that chatbots cannot be regulated or that the harms they cause cannot be addressed. The First Amendment simply requires that those regulations be appropriately tailored to the harm to avoid unduly burdening the right to express oneself through the medium of a chatbot, or to receive the information it provides.”Read statement
FIRE says chatbot output is speech and urges an immediate appeal
Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression
“Contrary to the court’s uncertainty about whether “words strung together by an LLM” are speech, assembling words to convey messages and information is the essence of speech. ... If it is not speech, plaintiffs will be able to impose liability for the distribution of ideas in a way that courts have steadfastly rejected for other forms of media.”Read statement
Clay Calvert says chatbot output is speech
“The fact that users’ inputs influence speech produced by chatbots doesn’t change the fact that chatbot output is speech. ... It would be a mistake for Conway to conclude that Garcia doesn’t involve speech.”Read statement
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- Tech Justice Law Project welcomes the court's First Amendment ruling
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The Dispute Index. "Tech Justice Law Project welcomes the court's First Amendment ruling". First published: 2026-10-14. Last updated: 2026-10-14. https://disputeindex.com/events/5722-the-tech-justice-law-project-calls-the-may