If it's YouTube deleting the comments of their own accord, no. Private companies can do whatever they want except refuse to bake a cake.
If it's a gov't official/worker telling YouTube to delete the comments, then yes. From what I read of the Twitter cases, those comments could be considered protected speech.
I'd guess that a gov't official/worker is clicking a "disable comments" button after submitting the video and the comments "disappeared". They'll then claim that they weren't deleted or blocked because reasons.
If a case were to go to court, the mental gymnastics the court and gov't would have to go through would be worthy of gold medals.
Till then I'd suggest archiving as much of the comments as you can. Set up a site like MostDamagingWikiLeaks and wait for the buyout offers or death threats.
Couldn’t someone sue the white house for deleting their comments the same way trump was sued for blocking people on Twitter?
Latches, No Standing, Moot!
Depends on who is doing the "deleting".
If it's YouTube deleting the comments of their own accord, no. Private companies can do whatever they want except refuse to bake a cake.
If it's a gov't official/worker telling YouTube to delete the comments, then yes. From what I read of the Twitter cases, those comments could be considered protected speech.
Trump can't block Twitter users over their political views, NY federal judge says
I'd guess that a gov't official/worker is clicking a "disable comments" button after submitting the video and the comments "disappeared". They'll then claim that they weren't deleted or blocked because reasons.
If a case were to go to court, the mental gymnastics the court and gov't would have to go through would be worthy of gold medals.
Till then I'd suggest archiving as much of the comments as you can. Set up a site like MostDamagingWikiLeaks and wait for the buyout offers or death threats.