 Conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who authored the Supreme Court's ruling, wrote that the states and the other plaintiffs lacked the required legal standing to sue the administration in federal court. Barrett went on to say the plaintiffs could not show a concrete link between the administration's conduct and any harm that the plaintiffs may have suffered. The plaintiffs emphasized that hearing unfettered speech on social media is critical to their work, but they do not point to any specific instance of content moderation that caused them identifiable harm. The ruling effectively overturned the free speech issue