Quote of the Day
SCOTUS decision in First Choice Women’s Resource Centers v. NJ is huge. Despite the iconic SCOTUS decision in NAACP v. Alabama, and the more recent decision in Americans for Prosperity Fdn v. Bonta, many lower courts have continued to insist that compelled disclosure of one’s affiliations is not a harm that can even support a challenge to the government’s actions.
Yesterday the Supreme Court firmly rejected that approach:
“Demands for private donor information … ‘chill’ protected 1st Amendment associational rights even when those demands contemplate disclosure only to government officials and not ‘the general public. …“An injury in fact does not arise only when a defendant causes a tangible harm to a plaintiff, like a physical injury or monetary loss. It can also arise when a defendant burdens a plaintiff ’s constitutional rights. And our cases have long recognized that demands for a charity’s private member or donor information have just that effect.”
This is a huge win for privacy and freedom, a huge blow to those who seek to “cancel” individuals or intimidate them from participating in public debate with threats of government retaliation, direct or indirect.
Brad Smith @CommishSmith
Posted on X, April 30, 2026
This is great news. For years the anti-gun people wanted the NRA membership list. This should at least slow them down. Of course, pro-gun people cannot get the anti-gun organization lists either. But then, that is only a few thousand people compared to the millions of people who belong to the CCRKBA, FPC, GOA, NRA, SAF, etc. And the anti-gun people are becoming less and less irrelevant.
As Mark Smith at The Four Boxes Diner says, “The trend is our friend.”
It also demonstrates that most courts have no respect for the Constitution, or for binding precedent. Not if it gets in the way of their left wing ideology.
I’m unaware of paid memberships to the graboids “organizations”. Some chumps donate, but their “member lists” would be mostly “people” that follow on social media.
I think you meant “less and less RELEVANT” in the next-to-last line.
This has been Supreme Court precedent since 1958 in NAACP v Alabama. NAACP cited danger to its members if the list were disclosed. With the current assassination cult on the left, that would seem to apply today. I am not really sure why this came up again.
It came up again because — as usual — someone on the Left decided that the rules don’t apply to them.
In First Choice Women’s Resource Centers v. NJ, First Choice is a religious non-profit that provides counseling and services to pregnant women, but does NOT provide abortions or counsel women to seek them. The Attorney General of New Jersey subpoenaed and sought to expose First Choice’s donor’s personal information, and First Choice filed suit under the 1st Amendment.
If a Red State sought to expose, say, Planned Parenthood’s donor list, Leftists would be apoplectic — and rightfully so, and they’ll cite NAACP v. Alabama all day and night.
But then they’ll turn around and defend to the death the “right” of a Blue State to expose the donors of a pro-life organization, citing “Reproductive Rights,” of all things.
Because the Left doesn’t believe the rules apply to them.
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As an aside, cases like these drive me nuts. Cases like Bruen, too, which fall under the same category.
The title of that category is “Stuff that’s already been decided but we have to re-litigate because Leftists on the lower courts aren’t following it.”
First Choice Women’s Resource Centers v. NJ isn’t a First Amendment victory, and Bruen wasn’t a Second Amendment victory. Neither breaks new ground or strengthens Constitutional protections. Both just restate and reaffirm prior SCOTUS precedents (NAACP v. Alabama for the former, DC v. Heller for the latter). They maintain the status quo after activist judges defied established precedent.
It’s a problem because SCOTUS accepts scant few cases per year. In the 2A context, we get MAYBE ONE case per season/year; it’s usually more like one case every couple years.
Having to use our ONE case to re-litigate questions that were already decided in our favor years ago wastes our resources, opportunities, and time. We will never define the full scope of the Second Amendment (or the First or any other protected right, for that matter) if we keep having to use our limited time before the Court to re-tread old ground.
That’s why I’m a big advocate for SCOTUS sending the U.S. Marshals after lower court judges who openly flaunt and defy precedents, arrest them, hold them in contempt, and remove them from the bench. Unless a case has some compelling evidence or unique circumstance that justifies ignoring clear precedent, the lower courts need to be following the spirit and letter of SCOTUS’ instructions.
How might this affect demands for disclosure of ActBlue donors, for investigation of foreign donations or other improper campaign contributions?
IANAL, but ActBlue donors’ protections should be stronger now (as they should be). Foreign donations are questionable (does the First Amendment apply to foreign donors?)
And the First Amendment is not a shield for illegal behavior, so I would think authorities should still be able to investigate improper campaign contributions.
But again, IANAL.
Good comments all.
As stated, this decision does absolutely nothing to actually stop the communist left from their “long march”. And even with this power our side will be hard pressed to find a judge and jury to actually apply it to their communist “fellow travelers”.
To me this is about the same as the big ATF roll-back of regulations that is getting all the news.
What stops the next president Gavin from putting in his own director and changing it all back to something even worse?
Just as Biden’s auto-pen did?
Were a nation at war. (And all the foreign crap is just a cover-up for the take-down of the big enchilada, US.)
And the real problem is our side refuses to see it that way.
War, (in all it’s forms), is something the communists embrace as part of their cult membership.
We’re just now finding out the hard way that even owning SCOTUS isn’t going to change much.
Which is something the communists knew all along.
Our government always fails to act.
Their government never fails to take advantage.
Anyone else seeing the pattern here?