X has added more companies to a massive lawsuit alleging an advertising boycott that began after Elon Musk bought the social media platform.
Major brands Nestlé, Abbott Laboratories, Colgate-Palmolive, Lego, Pinterest, Tyson Foods, and Shell were added as defendants Saturday in an amended complaint as part of a lawsuit originally filed in August, Business Insider reported.
Companies previously named in the lawsuit included CVS, the Amazon-owned social media company Twitch, CVS Health, Mars, and the Danish power company Orsted, the New York Post reported.
Unilever had been named in the lawsuit but was removed after reaching a settlement with X, the Post added.
The amended complaint, which was filed in a Texas court, claims that at least 18 members of the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM) stopped advertising on Twitter in the U.S. or worldwide between November and December 2022. Musk's $44 billion acquisition of Twitter closed in October of that year, Business Insider reported.
In August, X CEO Linda Yaccarino said in a letter to advertisers that the company had filed a lawsuit against GARM and its members after their financial boycotts of the social media site caused harm to customers and the company.
At the time, Yaccarino took to X to say a U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee's investigation "had found evidence of an illegal boycott against many companies, including X."
GARM was a now-defunct initiative from the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), which previously said it planned to contest the suit and that it was confident in its adherence to competition law.
In its latest legal filing, X alleges WFA "organized an advertiser boycott of Twitter through GARM, with the goal of coercing Twitter to comply with the GARM Brand Safety Standards to the satisfaction of GARM," Business Insider reported.
Musk's attorneys argued that social media companies should be able to set their own brand safety standards, ones that are "optimal" for the platform and users, USA Today reported. Advertisers then could determine where to advertise.
The outlet also reported X's latest complaint alleges that GARM member companies applauded when Musk's platform failed to meet its forecast revenue goals and that the boycott continues to affect X, despite the company applying standards "which meet or exceed those specified by GARM."
Charlie McCarthy ✉
Charlie McCarthy, a writer/editor at Newsmax, has nearly 40 years of experience covering news, sports, and politics.
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