Florida Bid to Ban Kids From Snapchat Blocked by Federal Court

Florida children can continue to use Snapchat after a federal judge denied state Attorney General James Uthmeier’s request for a temporary injunction.

Florida can’t establish it’s likely to win on the merits because its law prohibiting children and limiting teenagers from creating certain social media accounts is likely unconstitutional, Judge Mark E. Walker said Wednesday for the US District Court for the Northern District of Florida.

Florida, in a separate ruling issued by Walker, also lost its bid to have the case returned to state court. Walker was also the judge who blocked Uthmeier (R) from enforcing parts of the law, known as HB 3, during the course of related litigation brought by tech industry groups.

The law would block children 13 and younger from creating accounts on its prohibited social media sites, such as Youtube and Facebook, and require parental consent for teenagers who are 14 or 15.

But young people have First Amendment rights, even without parental consent, the court said in June. And there are ways less burdensome to those rights Florida can use to address the addictiveness of social media platforms, the court said.

Public Service Announcements

Snapchat’s corporate parent, Snap Inc., has carried out public information campaigns, acting as a federal officer in relation to an official act, Walker said, meaning he has jurisdiction under the federal officer removal statute.

Snap argued that the Food and Drug Administration uses Snapchat to tell teenagers not to vape or smoke cigarettes. The FDA’s third-party marketing agency meets with a Snap representative biweekly during anti-smoking campaigns, according to court documents.

Snap also distributes ads to teens on behalf of the Department of Homeland Security, and performs custom research on teens’ awareness of online risks, Walker said.

“At first glance, Snap’s relationships with DHS and FDA may not seem of the kind that federal officer removal is designed to protect,” Walker said, but the statute is liberally interpreted to prevent state governments from interfering with federal officials. If Florida ultimately prevailed, its claim would “directly interfere with existing federal contracts designed to further the federal government’s task of communicating information to youth in Florida,” the court said.

Even if only part of Florida’s social media rules related to Snap’s work for the federal government, it’s sufficient for federal officer jurisdiction, the court said.

Hogan Lovells US LLP, Continental PLLC, and AnchorsGordon PA represent Snap Inc.

The case is Office of the Attorney Gen., State of Florida, Dep’t of Legal Affairs v. Snap Inc, N.D. Fla., No. 3:25-cv-00676, 8/13/25.