NEW YORK, May 13 (Reuters) - Independent U.S.

presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr and a super PAC

supporting him filed a lawsuit on Monday against Facebook parent

Meta Platforms ( META ), alleging the tech giant interfered in

the election after it blocked a political advertisement.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in San Francisco by

Kennedy and the American Values 2024 super PAC, which paid for

the advertisement, a 30-minute video about Kennedy's life, says

Meta censored the video by removing it and blocking users on its

platforms from watching, sharing or posting a link to it.

Meta owns the Facebook, Instagram, Threads and WhatsApp

platforms.

The lawsuit said Meta began censoring the May 3 video

"within minutes" and cited a statement from Meta on May 5 that

said the video was no longer being censored. The lawsuit claims

the film is still being blocked for users.

"Defendants seem to believe that they can with legal

impunity issue threats to their users and deploy their vast

power of censorship, account-suspension, and deplatforming in

order to favor or target the presidential candidate of their

choice," the lawsuit stated.

Meta declined to comment on the lawsuit.

A Meta spokesperson in a statement last week said: "The link

was mistakenly blocked and was quickly restored once the issue

was discovered."

After the ad was blocked, Kennedy and scores of others took

to social media to criticize what they said was an injustice.

Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of social media platform X,

reposted the video on X, saying it was "worth watching."

The video, called "Who Is Bobby Kennedy" and narrated by

actor Woody Harrelson, is a 30-minute dive into Kennedy's life,

famed family, and the media's "crank" perception of him. It

highlights Kennedy's background as an environmental lawyer, and

his fear of a "rushed" coronavirus vaccine along with skepticism

around the effectiveness of pandemic-era lockdowns.

Kennedy, who has been banned in the past from Alphabet Inc's ( GOOG )

YouTube and Meta's Instagram for spreading

misinformation about vaccines, as well as about the COVID-19

pandemic, rejects the anti-vaccine label, saying vaccines should

have more rigorous testing.

A post from Kennedy on Facebook in which he shares the video

has about 10,000 "likes." The same post on social media platform

X has about 84,000 "likes."

Kennedy, who is challenging Republican former President

Donald Trump and Democratic President Joe Biden for the White

House in November, could pick up 8% of voters nationwide, a

Reuters/Ipsos poll in March showed.