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How You Like THAT 'Deepfake,' Gavin? The Babylon Bee Sues California Over Laws Targeting Satire

Adapted from Gavin Newsom by Gage Skidmore (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)

In mid-September, Twitchy reported about the new hell coming to America from California (because, of course, it's California) that memes, parodies, and satires are now 'dangerous misinformation' that need to be made illegal. The idea originated with the hypocritical, hierarchical, greasy-haired snake oil salesman known as Governor Gavin Newsom, and then the legislature proudly handed him two unconstitutional bills outlawing 'materially deceptive content' (whatever that means) that he proudly signed into law

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In his pure tyrannical fervor, Newsom even threatened legal action against Elon Musk for AI-generated memes.

Unfortunately for Newsom, while he may continue to try to ruin California, he is not yet the dictator for life that he wants to be. A legal challenge was guaranteed to come in response and yesterday, that response came from one of the best possible litigants: The Babylon Bee. 

Twitchy readers will remember that the Bee was once suspended from Twitter for calling Rachel Levine a man (because he is one) only to be reinstated when Musk bought Twitter. It is only fitting that the popular parody site would be among the first to fire back at Newsom and California. 

Daily Wire reporter Zach Jewell outlined more details about the suit: 

The complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California and shared exclusively with The Daily Wire, begins by noting that in July of this year, Newsom tweeted that a parody video of Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris should be 'illegal.' 'The legislature heard the call and passed two laws that forbid political expression under the label of ‘materially deceptive content,' the lawsuit asserts. 

The complaint explains that one of California’s new laws will require social media platforms to become 'state snitches' and force them 'to field reports about user posts with ‘materially deceptive content’ and then remove or label them.'

In his first public statement on the lawsuit, Babylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon told Daily Wire news podcast 'Morning Wire' that one of the new California laws especially targets satirists, such as the writers at his company, 'by requiring them to put disclaimers to let you know that this is parody that you’re reading right now – which completely stifles and kills the joke.'

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It not only kills the joke, it kills free speech. 

Later in the article, Kristen Waggoner, president of the Alliance Defending Freedom which assisted The Babylon Bee in filing the suit, summed up the intent of the laws perfectly: 'These laws were passed by politicians to protect politicians from speech that they don’t like.'

Nailed it. 

Babylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon took to Twitter to note the insanity of having to file a suit against laws of this nature. 

Others echoed the same sentiment. 

Indeed. 

The case should be a slam dunk and likely will be if it goes all the way up to the Supreme Court, but that will take some time. We can only hope that there will be injunctions against the laws in the meantime. 

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Any sane American politician would be horrified to be enacting laws similar to those of Communist China. But this is Gavin Newsom we're talking about. He is likely proud of the comparison. 

HA. 

If that's not possible, the Lex Luthor approach from the original Superman movie in 1978 is also worth consideration.

We can't wait. They're guaranteed to be hilarious. 

They would be appalled, but the Saturday Night Live GIF is appropriate here. It will be interesting to see if other, more left-leaning satire outlets like SNL or The Onion show support for this suit, as they should, or remain silent. 

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We're pretty sure that Larry Flynt already won a case exactly like this against Jerry Falwell, but it will be great if that ruling is affirmed and California's new laws are struck down, burned to ash, buried, and salted over. 

This lawsuit isn't just for The Babylon Bee, though. It is for all of us. We love parody and satire here at Twitchy and we include a lot of that (and a ton of memes) in our articles. 

If California's laws are allowed to stand, it will limit free speech for everyone. 

We can only hope that sanity prevails in the courts and they remember that -- unlike the U.K., for instance -- we have a First Amendment in the United States which expressly forbids what the authoritarian Newsom and California legislature are trying to do to Americans. 

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