Anti-abortion advocate takes Google to court, citing Florida’s Big Tech censorship law after Gmail suspension

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A local anti-abortion activist is suing Google, claiming her Gmail account was terminated without any justification and the company has refused to return the data she had stored on her server.

Her attorneys are claiming Google has violated Florida’s Big Tech censorship law, potentially setting it up to be one of the first test cases of the law, which has been in legal limbo since its passage in 2021.

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According to the lawsuit filed in state court, Jacksonville anti-abortion activist Gertrude Perez-Poveda sent an email last September to other activists announcing an upcoming Catholic Mass event outside of A Woman’s Choice clinic.

“But also for a prayer for everyone involved. Both the people who work in the clinic, the mothers, as well as the babies,” Perez-Poveda’s attorney Musa Farmand said.

Farmand claims within an hour, his client’s account was deleted.

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Despite multiple attempts to have her account restored, get an explanation for what she’d done to violate Google’s terms of service or even just get her data back, Farmand claims she never got a straight answer and her data was never returned.

“She said, you know, it’s kind of like furnishing your home with mementos and furnishings that takes you 12 years to do this and you’re all proud of it and you come home one day and you have no access to your home,” Farmand said. “You’re locked out and on top of that you find out that all your stuff is gone and to make it worse no one is even giving you an explanation as to why.”

The lawsuit claims Google violated Florida’s Big Tech censorship law, which is designed to allow individuals to sue if they’re wrongly deplatformed by social media companies.

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But Kelly Flynn, President and CEO of a Woman’s Choice, told Action News Jax the claim Perez-Poveda simply participates in prayer outside her clinic doesn’t tell the whole story.

“It is a lot of yelling, and harassment towards the staff, the physicians, and the patients and it gets scary at times,” Flynn said.

But according to a Google spokesperson, the content of Perez-Poveda’s emails had nothing to do with the suspension of her account.

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“This account was flagged repeatedly by a large proportion of recipients for sending spam so per our standard policy, the account was suspended and provided with a way to be reactivated,” Google spokesperson José Castañeda said.

Additionally, Google claimed Perez-Poveda was able to get her account back months before the lawsuit was filed.

“They reactivated the account months ago but were since suspended for an unpaid bill. They can still choose to pay the bill or take all their saved content,” Castañeda said.

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Beyond the factual disputes, there are also questions regarding whether Florida’s Big Tech censorship law is even enforceable, as it was blocked by a federal court before it was ever able to take effect.

Even still, Farmand believes a recent decision by the U.S. Supreme Court set the stage for a case like this one to move forward.

“They couldn’t declare this unconstitutional, and they didn’t, and they sent it back to the lower courts. And secondly, in the conjuring opinion they gave us a lot of clues as to what they’re going to do with a Gmail account,” Farmand said.

Read a copy of the lawsuit below:

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