IMDB.com Inc. v. Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists

Summary

In 2016, Screen Actors Guild (SAG) sponsored legislation that eventually became Assembly Bill 1687 (AB 1687), which prohibited a specified category of websites from publishing the ages and dates of birth of entertainment industry professionals, due to concerns about age discrimination in the entertainment industry. SAG called out IMDb.com Inc. (IMDb) specifically for facilitating discriminatory conduct. The California Legislature passed the measure and the governor signed it into law. The law required a subscription-based service like IMDb, upon a subscriber's request, to remove the subscriber's age or date of birth from that subscriber's paid-for profile. IMDb filed a complaint alleging AB 1687 violated both the First Amendment and Commerce Clause of the Constitution. The court granted IMDb's motion on First Amendment grounds and entered a preliminary injunction prohibiting enforcement of the statute. The court later granted IMDb's motion for summary judgment on its First Amendment facial challenge to AB 1687, applying a strict scrutiny analysis and finding the State failed to show AB 1687 was necessary.

Affirmed. The statute must further a compelling governmental interest and must be narrowly tailored to that end. Reed v. Town of Gilbert. "If a less restrictive alternative would serve the Government's purpose, the legislature must use that alternative." United States v. Playboy Entm't Grp., Inc. This court concluded AB 1687 did not regulate commercial speech, or any other form of speech entitled to reduced scrutiny, thus it applied strict scrutiny. The State did not explore a less restrictive means to combat age discrimination in the entertainment industry before resorting to the step of restricting speech. Neither the State nor SAG disputed speech-neutral remedies existed. The State failed to point to any evidence showing less restrictive measures would not have been effective. Moreover, on its face, AB 1687 addressed only websites like IMDb.com while leaving unrestricted every other avenue through which age information might be disseminated. Thus, the Bill was underinclusive because AB 1687 appeared designed to reach only IMDb. Furthermore, the statute limited its restrictions to those who both subscribed and requested the information to be removed. The statute was not narrowly tailored, and thus, was unconstitutional.

— Carlo Nardone