In a significant legal victory for Texas and its Attorney General Ken Paxton, PornHub, a prominent pornography platform, has announced its decision to cease operations statewide.
This move comes after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit overturned a previous injunction against Texas’s age-verification law, leaving the regulation intact.
While the court upheld the requirement for age-verification, it did strike down a provision of House Bill 1181 mandating the display of health warnings on PornHub’s landing page and advertisements.
In response, PornHub issued an open letter to its users, asserting that the age-verification law violates its First Amendment rights while addressing concerns over its effectiveness in protecting minors. The company emphasized the potential for such regulations to drive users to less regulated platforms.
“As you may know, your elected officials in Texas are requiring us to verify your age before allowing you access to our website. Not only does this impinge on the rights of adults to access protected speech, it fails strict scrutiny by employing the least effective and yet also most restrictive means of accomplishing Texas’s stated purpose of allegedly protecting minors,” the letter read.
“Attempting to mandate age verification without any means to enforce at scale gives platforms the choice to comply or not, leaving thousands of platforms open and accessible,” it continued. “As we’ve seen in other states, such bills have failed to protect minors, by driving users from those few websites which comply, to the thousands of websites, with far fewer safety measures in place, which do not comply.”
Citing concerns over safety and the law’s perceived ineffectiveness, PornHub announced its decision to shut down operations in Texas, aligning with the legislation while criticizing its efficacy.
Conservative groups, including the Texas Family Project, celebrated the court’s decision, considering it a win for Texas families.
Texas is not alone in implementing such legislation, with Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina, Utah, and Virginia also passing similar age verification laws.
Consequently, PornHub has ceased operations in these states as well.
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