September 5, 2025

Supreme Court

NTUF: U.S. Supreme Court Should End the Growing Trend of Governments Demanding Nonprofit Donor Lists

By Tyler Martinez

.....Donor privacy is back in front of the United States Supreme Court. First Choice Women’s Resource Centers v. Platkin centers on a sweeping “investigatory subpoena” that requires a pro-life pregnancy center to disclose all of its donors to the pro-choice New Jersey Attorney General, who says he wants to protect against consumer fraud for those who use the centers. NTUF filed an amicus curiae (“friend of the court”) brief to apprise the Supreme Court of the need to write a broad opinion protecting donor privacy. Our brief highlights the growing trend of “lawfare,” demanding donor lists as a means of intimidation and harassment, including against taxpayers.

The case raises some serious issues. New Jersey served a subpoena demanding the pregnancy center’s donor list, and one issue is whether such a subpoena is instantly enforceable (and therefore, ignoring it means instant contempt of court). A second issue is whether the pregnancy center has to fight the subpoena’s donor list demand on the home turf of the attorney general—the state courts of New Jersey—or if the federal right to privacy of association under the First Amendment can be heard instead in federal court. This is significant because the U.S. Supreme Court takes far more cases from lower federal courts than it reviews state supreme court cases.

Washington Legal Foundation: WLF Asks Supreme Court to Ensure First Amendment Claims May Be Heard in Federal Court

.....As WLF’s amicus brief explains, Congress has long provided the federal courts with jurisdiction over these types of cases because it feared state courts would fail to properly vindicate federally protected rights. Yet what happened to First Choice is a widespread problem beyond the nonprofit sector. Business interests deemed unpopular or “on the wrong side” by politically ambitious AGs have also been hit with similarly unconstitutional demands and then shunted to state court—the attorney general’s home turf, typically presided over by an elected judge. WLF urges a simple fix: access to the federal courts as Congress intended. As the brief says, “Life-tenured judges appointed by a nationally elected president by-and-with the consent of legislators representing the States are well-positioned to separate good-faith investigatory work from pernicious lawfare.”

The Courts

Washington Post: Judge rules Trump administration cannot withhold funding from Harvard

By Susan Svrluga, Joanna Slater and Laura Meckler

.....A federal judge ruled Wednesday that the Trump administration violated the Constitution by freezing federal research funding at Harvard University, dealing the White House a setback in its efforts to force change at the country’s oldest university and higher education nationwide.

U.S. District Judge Allison D. Burroughs said freezing and canceling more than $2 billion in research grants and other federal actions violated Harvard’s First Amendment rights and amounted to “retaliation, unconstitutional conditions, and unconstitutional coercion.”

Her ruling, which is likely to be appealed, vacated the government’s funding freeze and barred it from using similar reasoning to block grants to Harvard in the future.

Reason (Volokh Conspiracy): California County's Restriction on Being a Spectator at a Car "Sideshow" Violates First Amendment as Applied to Reporter

By Eugene Volokh

.....From today's Ninth Circuit decision in Garcia v. County of Alameda, by Judge Holly Thomas, joined by Judges John Owens and Mark Bennett; Alameda County contains Berkeley and Oakland:

Congress

New York Post: House GOP subpoenas three ActBlue lawyers in foreign donor fraud probe

By Josh Christenson

.....House Republicans issued subpoenas Thursday to top lawyers at Democratic fundraising powerhouse ActBlue amid an ongoing probe of allegedly fraudulent donations “from domestic and foreign sources” in the last election cycle, according to letters obtained by The Post.

Former ActBlue general counsel Darrin Hurwitz and ex-director and associate general counsel Aaron Ting were both compelled to come before House investigators for depositions.

Another, anonymous ActBlue legal counsel was also subpoenaed by the leaders of the House Administration, Judiciary and Oversight committees who authored the missives.

Free Expression

The Dispatch (Advisory Opinions): Free Speech and ‘The Executive Power’ | FIRE Crossover

By David French and Sarah Isgur

.....David French and Sarah Isgur speak with Nico Perrino to discuss the origin story of Advisory Opinions and the few free speech issues where they disagree with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression.

Reason: Graham Linehan's Speech Must Be Defended

By Robby Soave

.....At issue were three posts he wrote on X, including one in which he wrote this: "If a trans-identified male is in a female-only space, he is committing a violent, abusive act. Make a scene, call the cops, and if all else fails, punch him in the balls."

Such a statement is almost certainly protected by the First Amendment. For speech to lose First Amendment protection, it must include a call to imminent lawless action or violence against a particular person. That's not what Linehan is doing; he's telling a crude joke based on his conviction that if you lack the relevant genitalia, you are a man rather than a woman. If this sort of speech were unprotected, then similarly charged calls to, for instance, punch nazis—a staple of far-left rhetoric—could also be criminalized.

The U.K. does not have the First Amendment, however. In Britain, the authorities have broadly criminalized threatening, insulting, and abusive language that causes harassment. Linehan's X posts may very well violate the relevant laws: the Communications Act of 2003 and the Online Safety Act of 2023.

The States

New York Times: In Texas, a Senate Race Turns Brutal Before It’s Even Declared

By J. David Goodman

.....More tangibly, the attorney general’s attacks threaten the future of Mr. O’Rourke’s political organization, Powered by People, which has spent nearly $400,000, about $100,000 a week, on litigation so far.

“He may very well be able to bankrupt the most successful voter registration program in the state,” Mr. O’Rourke said in a telephone interview. “This is weaponizing the political system to persecute your political enemies.”