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Courts & Legal Status: Rehearing granted; panel ruling vacated

Full Fifth Circuit Will Rehear Challenge to Texas SCOPE Act, Vacating Panel Ruling That Blocked Key Parts

By AFNS Research Desk · · 1 min read

The John Minor Wisdom U.S. Court of Appeals Building in New Orleans, home of the Fifth Circuit
Photo: ajay_suresh / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0 (cropped)

Status: Rehearing granted; panel ruling vacated. The full court has not ruled on the law yet.

What happened

On Oct. 28, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit voted to rehear en banc the challenge to Texas's SCOPE Act, HB 18 (order). A majority of the court's active judges voted for rehearing in an unsigned order. Granting rehearing automatically vacates the July 2026 panel opinion that had blocked key parts of the law (Bloomberg Law).

The law and the challenge

The SCOPE Act requires apps and websites to take steps to shield minors from harmful content. Tech trade groups, including CCIA, and student groups challenged it in the Western District of Texas on First Amendment and other grounds. On July 24, a panel ruled against key features, holding the monitoring-and-filtering requirement preempted by Section 230 (FindLaw). Texas sought rehearing.

What's next

The order gives Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton another chance to enforce the law in full. Oral argument and supplemental briefing dates will be set later. Bloomberg Law reports the case could set up a Supreme Court fight.

Sources

  1. Fifth Circuit order (PDF) www.ca5.uscourts.gov
  2. Bloomberg Law news.bloomberglaw.com
  3. FindLaw: the July panel opinion caselaw.findlaw.com

See our sourcing & corrections standards.

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