Trump, Twitter, mootness, and attorney's fees

Josh Blackman raises a question about the government's cert petition in Trump v. Knight Foundation, holding that the President violated the First Amendment by blocking people on Twitter: Does the ban moot the case and will the Court issue a Munsingwear order vacating and remanding with instructions to vacate the judgment. But Josh's question is, so to speak, moot. The case always was going to become moot at noon on January 20 when Trump left office and any federal action disappeared. It is conceivable the Court waited on the case for that reason--had Trump won reelection, the case would have remained alive for another four years; when he lost, it was a matter of waiting out the extra few months.

A secondary question is whether the plaintiffs will be able to get attorney's fees under the EAJA if and when the judgment is vacated. Courts and cases are all over the map on whether a plaintiff is a prevailing party if it obtains interim relief that is dissolved on mootness grounds on appeal. Courts look to a number of factors, including whether the interim relief changed the defendant's conduct and gave the plaintiff what it asked for while it lasted and the length of time the interim relief was in place. Under that, Knight should be a prevailing party. The district court issued its judgment in May 2018 and the Second Circuit affirmed in 2019, meaning the plaintiffs have gotten what they wanted--being unblocked and able to read the President's tweets--for more than two years. More importantly, the plaintiff's desire and constitutional entitlement to continue doing so was always time-limited, ending whenever Trump's term ended (January 20 2025, at the latest). That sounds like a meaningful change in the relationship between the parties for the precise period the plaintiffs wanted.

Also relevant is that the district court granted declaratory, but not injunctive, relief against Trump (the aide who run his Twitter account was enjoined). Courts are again mixed as to whether a declaratory judgment alone is sufficient to make a plaintiff a prevailing party, especially where other relief is denied. Here, it should be relevant that a DJ is the only remedy the plaintiff could get from Trump, since courts will not, and perhaps cannot, enjoin the President (as opposed to All the President's Men).