VICTORY: 9-0 Supreme Court Decision To Protect Pro-Life Centers

Not long ago, we informed you of the growing, coordinated effort to sideline Pregnancy Resource Centers through government pressure and public smears.

Today, the Supreme Court took an important step to change that playbook – aligning with arguments we advanced. The ACLJ filed an amicus brief in this case, and the Court’s ruling reflects key positions our legal team presented.

In First Choice Women’s Resource Centers v. Davenport, the Court unanimously held that a faith-based pregnancy center can go to federal court now to challenge a state investigation that threatens its First Amendment rights – a constitutional issue. This is a huge win for the pro-life community and for First Amendment rights.

The case arose after the New Jersey Attorney General issued a sweeping subpoena to First Choice Women’s Resource Centers, demanding internal documents and donor information under the banner of investigating alleged “deceptive” and “fraudulent” practices.

First Choice pushed back, arguing the subpoena violated its rights to free speech and association. Lower courts refused to hear the case, saying the center had to wait and raise those defenses in state court.

The Supreme Court rejected that approach.

Sign our petition to protect pro-life centers.

That matters because compelled disclosure – especially of donors – does not wait to cause harm. It chills speech immediately. It deters support. And for ministries already under political pressure, it can be existential.

The Court’s decision ensures those constitutional claims can be heard in federal court before the damage is done.

This ruling lands in the middle of what we have documented as a broader campaign against pro-life centers.

As we detailed in our prior analysis, state officials and activist groups have increasingly labeled these centers “deceptive,” “dangerous,” or “misleading,” while using regulatory tools to scrutinize and burden their operations.

We are seeing the same pattern in litigation, including cases like A Woman’s Concern, Inc. v. Healey, where government messaging and enforcement efforts have targeted pro-life pregnancy centers for what they believe and say.

What the Supreme Court made clear today is simple: Government officials cannot use investigations as a workaround to burden disfavored speech – and then avoid federal review by forcing targets into drawn-out state proceedings.

Indeed,

Since the 1950s, this Court has confronted one official demand after another like the Attorney General’s. Over and again, we have held those demands burden the exercise of First Amendment rights. Disputing none of these precedents but seeking ways around them, the Attorney General has offered a variety of arguments. Some are old, some are new, but none succeeds.

That Supreme Court precedent protects far more than one organization in New Jersey. It safeguards pregnancy centers, their supporters, and the broader freedom to speak and associate without government intimidation.

To be clear, the Court did not decide whether the subpoena itself is unconstitutional. That fight continues. But the Court did something just as important: It ensured that the Constitution would be meaningfully applied before irreversible harm occurs.

The strategy of “investigate now, litigate later” depends on delay. It depends on the chilling effect doing its work before a court ever reaches the merits. The Supreme Court just disrupted that strategy.

The broader effort to sideline Pregnancy Resource Centers is not theoretical. It is happening – in public messaging campaigns, in regulatory actions, and in coordinated pressure efforts we have already exposed.

What today’s decision confirms is that those efforts are not above constitutional scrutiny.

The First Amendment does not yield to political convenience. It does not allow the government to target speech it dislikes and then hide behind procedure.

At the ACLJ, we will continue to press these cases forward – defending pregnancy centers, protecting donors and supporters, and ensuring that government officials are held to the limits the Constitution imposes.

Because when those limits are enforced, the outcome is clear: The government does not get to silence one side of the debate.

Take action. Sign our petition: Protect Pro-Life Centers, Defeat Pro-Abortion Propaganda.