We were contacted by a pseudonymous Tweeter who had been informed by Twitter that a D.C. grand jury had issued a subpoena seeking his real identity, based on a Tweet saying, “I want to fuck Michelle Bachman in the ass with a Vietnam era machete.” In September 2011, we filed a motion to intervene on his behalf and to quash the subpoena, arguing that anonymous political speech is protected by the First Amendment and that the author’s Tweets, read as a whole, showed that he was making a political comment, not a threat. The government opposed the motion to quash, and in December 2011, the court issued an opinion denying the motion to quash on the ground that while our view of the facts was likely correct, it was not so certainly correct that the grand jury (really the FBI) shouldn’t be able to assure itself that the Tweeter wasn’t a real threat.
Our client was eager to end the FBI’s investigation of him, so we agreed not to appeal if the FBI would interview him in the presence of ACLU lawyers in his home state, and not interview his employer or his neighbors or go to his home unless that interview failed to allay their concerns. The interview went well and the investigation was closed. The court papers have now been unsealed, with potentially identifying details redacted at our client’s request.
