X sues the state media authority: Everything for the Nazi slogan

Stefan Homburg looks as if he is happy about the renewed attention. On Wednesday he was sitting in the audience at the Hanover Administrative Court and was eagerly following the trial that the company X Internet Unlimited Company (XIUC), formerly known as Twitter, was conducting against the Lower Saxony State Media Authority. Because of his post.

The 65-year-old financial scientist, formerly a professor at Leibniz University Hannover, caused a sensation during the corona pandemic when he radicalized from a critic of the measures to a conspiracy theorist. Since then, he has also gained a high number of followers on social media. At X it is 255,000.

The posts in question here are said to have been seen by many more people. During the European Football Championship in June 2024, he dealt with the much-discussed wolf salute of the Turkish fans - a distinctive sign of the right-wing extremist Gray Wolves, which many - like Homburg - like to understand or trivialize as a patriotic gesture.

Homburg complained that patriotism was often met with hostility in Germany. Like the common phrase “Everything for Germany”. Now, at least since the proceedings against the AfD politician and history teacher Björn Höcke, which were widely covered in the media, pretty much everyone knows that the use of this slogan is forbidden because it is assigned to the SA and therefore represents an unconstitutional symbol according to Section 86a of the Criminal Code - like Hitler salutes and swastikas.

Homburg has therefore already been sentenced to a fine of 10,400 euros in proceedings before the Hanover district court. However, the verdict is not final because he has lodged an appeal.

Regardless of this criminal prosecution, the Lower Saxony State Media Authority (NLM) - following a tip from the Federal Criminal Police Office - had also classified the post as unconstitutional and asked Platform X to block or delete it.

The platform is again suing against this decision. X attacks the decision on several levels. In terms of content, they deny that the post is unconstitutional, but instead consider it to be covered by freedom of expression - which X owner Elon Musk likes to interpret very broadly.

This refers to the social adequacy clause, which defines exceptions in paragraph 86a. Anyone who uses the anti-constitutional symbols within the framework of an artistic, scientific or other enlightenment-critical intention is allowed to do so. Homburg and with him X now claim that this is the case here because he wanted to complain about the taboo nature of such terms.

The second level is legally more difficult, but also more promising. There, X simply denies that the state media authority is responsible at all. The Irish-based company explains that European law, specifically the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the E-Commerce Directive, must take precedence.

And they demand that the country of origin principle applies here. This means that Ireland would initially be responsible and other EU member states would have to contact the Irish supervisory authorities or the EU Commission via the prescribed reporting channels.

The NLM, on the other hand, insists that this does not apply to such individual posts or other problematic content. She is represented by Elisabeth Clausen-Muradian. The media rights activist is involved in her free time as a Green local politician - which, in Homburg's eyes, of course only confirms that the left-Green, filthy censorship state has its fingers in the game here.

The State Media Authority derives its responsibility from the State Treaty on the Protection of Minors in the Media (JMStV) and the State Media Treaty (MStV), which obliges it to take remedial action if it becomes aware of content that endangers the protection of minors. Lower Saxony is responsible because Homburg lives here and the 14 state media authorities share the relevant procedures accordingly via the Commission for Youth Media Protection (KJM).

The Digital Services Act, argues Clausen-Muradian, is primarily aimed at creating a uniform Europe-wide approach to structural and organizational requirements. This concerns, for example, age restrictions or reporting channels for complaints - not every EU country should invent its own regulations here. However, the tracking of individual problematic content is unaffected. Otherwise it would no longer be possible to enforce national regulations at all.

The core of the legal dispute revolves around this fundamental question. Because the DSA has only been in force since 2024, a whole series of lawsuits are currently dealing with it - for example against porn platforms such as Youporn and Pornhub, which are based in Cyprus.

A final decision is therefore not expected in Hanover; both parties indicated during the oral hearing that they wanted to go to the next instance. The administrative court would also have the option of submitting the dispute to the European Court of Justice (ECJ). A decision had not yet been made at the time of going to press.