Judge weighs case against Trump, Natalie Harp after Truth Social change
A judge is set to decide whether to issue an injunction temporarily halting Truth Social’s paid Truth API service, which charges subscribers up to $100,000 a month for access to a direct feed of posts from influential accounts, including government officials.
The latest update comes after President Donald Trump, his White House aide Natalie Harp, White House Deputy Chief of Staff Daniel Scavino and other members of the White House office were named in a lawsuit filed in August by The Intercept and the Freedom of the Press Foundation.
The plaintiffs argue that Truth Social’s paid Truth API service unlawfully gives subscribers earlier access to official government communications.
The Intercept’s case is one of several legal challenges to the program. Separate lawsuits have also been filed by watchdog groups American Oversight and Campaign for Accountability, as well as the City and County of San Francisco.
Newsweek has reached out to legal teams for Trump and the plaintiffs via email for comment.
What The Intercept Wants
In its request for a preliminary injunction, The Intercept Media, Inc. and Freedom of the Press Foundation asked the court to stop Trump and other government officials from using Truth Social to give paid subscribers earlier access to government information.
“The President is selling early access to official government information for his own profit. Such a scheme is unconstitutional,” they said in a filing on October 1.
The filing argues that irreparable harm is occurring every day the program remains in operation because paying subscribers receive government information before non-paying users, depriving journalists and members of the public of equal and timely access that cannot later be restored.
They argue that Truth Media itself has advertised Truth API as providing a speed advantage worth up to $100,000 per month.
Plaintiffs said that the First Amendment requires equal access to government information once it is made publicly available, and that the Truth API violates equal protection principles under the Fifth Amendment.
They also noted that “markets already move on Truth Social posts,” arguing that if paying customers receive policy announcements, personnel changes, tariff announcements, military announcements, or other official information before everyone else, they gain a real-world advantage that cannot later be undone.
Another newer point emphasized in the injunction briefing is that subscribers allegedly obtain access to a historical archive of Truth Social posts. Plaintiffs say this means subscribers can see posts that are later edited or deleted, while non-subscribers may not have access to the same information.
Richard Painter, a longtime Republican who left the party and later ran as a Democrat for the U.S. Senate in 2018 and for Congress in 2022, told Newsweek: “I’m not convinced this is a news access issue,” explaining that the White House often gives interviews to some outlets and not others.
Painter argued that the key concern is not whether reporters get news slightly later than paying subscribers, but whether investors could gain a financial advantage from earlier access to market-moving government information, such as tariff announcements or other policy decisions.
What Trump’s Team Says
Defendants have urged the judge to reject the injunction in full, arguing that the court cannot grant the requested relief because federal courts cannot issue injunctions telling the president how to perform official duties.
In a filing Trump’s attorneys called it “judicial micromanagement,” before arguing that Truth API is a private business decision, not government action.
The court document argues that Truth API is “created and operated entirely by Trump Media & Technology Group, a private company,” and therefore cannot be regulated by the Constitution.
They also argue that harm is being exaggerated. According to the filing, subscribers receive at most a “50-millisecond advantage” on posts compared to those that do not pay.
What Judge Must Decide
The judge is not deciding if Truth API is ultimately constitutional. Instead, the immediate question is whether the plaintiffs have shown that they are likely to succeed on the merits of its claims, that they are suffering irreparable harm, and that the balance of equities and public interest favor an injunction.
The lawsuit is one of several challenges to Truth Social’s Truth API service, but it appears to be among the furthest advanced and could become the first to result in a preliminary injunction temporarily suspending the program.
What Is Truth API?
Truth API is a paid data service launched by Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) that provides subscribers with a direct feed of Truth Social posts from selected accounts.
Instead of waiting for posts to appear through the Truth Social website, subscribers instead get a direct machine-readable feed that can be plugged into trading systems, news alerts, databases and other monitoring software.
In Trump Media’s announcement of the service, they said that the service provides access to the platform’s “most influential accounts,” including government officials for $100,000 per month.
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Matthew Cannon and Cristina Diciu.
