A 76-year-old woman in Jacksonville is suing Google for deplatforming her about an hour after she emailed members of her pro-life group calling for a peaceful Catholic Mass and gathering in front of A Woman's Choice, an abortion business in Florida.
Trudy Perez-Poveda says Google targeted her after she sent the correspondence through Gmail. Google refused to allow Perez-Poveda to access her more than 11-year trove of stored emails, photographs, calendars, contacts and other data, her attorneys say.
Perez-Poveda is being represented by the Thomas More Society, which filed a first-of-its-kind lawsuit against Google in Florida citing the Sunshine State's anti-censorship law, which was challenged at the Supreme Court in the case of Moody v. Net Choice.
"That law prohibits large social media companies from censoring or deplatforming private users without immediately and thoroughly explaining why," writes Nancy Flanders for LifeSiteNews about Florida's anti-censorship law.
Google refused to tell Perez-Poveda which acceptable use policy she violated
This is not the first time that Perez-Poveda has been in the news for her pro-life actions. In a previous encounter at A Woman's Choice, Perez-Poveda was reportedly shoved to the ground by a 19-year-old woman who visited the facility to get an abortion, this after Perez-Poveda was accused of taking pictures of cars in the parking lot.
In that case, the teen who assaulted Perez-Poveda was charged with battery on a person over the age of 65.
"People ask me what it felt like when Google abruptly shut me down," Perez-Poveda commented about her current legal struggle. "My reply is, 'It felt like coming home to a house, which took me 12 years to furnish with family mementos and treasures, and find it completely empty without even a note explaining why."
Perez-Poveda is a volunteer at Family for Life, a pro-life group that describes itself as a collection of "persons who pray, counsel, and sometimes hold Catholic Mass and Eucharistic processions near abortion clinics."
When Perez-Poveda pressed Google as to why her account was nuked, a representative from the company told her she violated Google's acceptable use policy. Court documents reveal, however, that Google never told Perez-Poveda which policies she violated, instead issuing to her the following statement:
"Due to security reasons we are unable to share the exact policy which was violated."
In her defense, the Thomas More Society filed a legal demand for information from Google on Perez-Poveda's behalf, to which Google failed to respond.
"There is an ominous growth of censorship in this country," commented Thomas More Society Senior Counsel Matt Heffron.
"Large social-media companies act as a 'digital public square,' and play a central role in the debate of ideas. Our case, Trudy v. Google, is part of the urgent and overdue pushback against this rising tide of censorship. Nobody should be treated the way Google treated Trudy Perez. She is a delightful person: humorous, warm, peaceful, prayerful, and absolutely persistent. Thomas More Society is proud to be fighting for her."
Since there are many alternatives to Google these days, people have a choice when it comes to which search engine they use. Does Google represent your values, or is it time to make a switch?
"Anyone still using Google is crazy," one commenter wrote. "There are so many good alternatives and Google is one of the biggest woke companies out there. Get out of Google!"
Another questioned why Perez-Poveda would store her valuable information on Google in the first place.
"Why place your trust and source of information in the internet god?" this person asked. "Then you complain that this web you are entangled in doesn't care about you?"
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