The Supreme Court agreed Monday to review New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin’s (D) subpoena seeking donor records from a network of anti-abortion clinics.
In a brief order, the justices said they will examine whether First Choice Women’s Resource Centers can mount a First Amendment challenge in federal court.
Lower judges ruled the group’s free speech claim was not ripe because it could be brought in state court instead, but First Choice said such a holding would create a “Catch-22” that prevents a federal judge from ever reviewing the subpoena’s constitutionality.
“For a century and a half, Congress has provided the targets of a state official’s malfeasance with a federal forum in which to raise their constitutional claims,” the group wrote in its petition. “Yet the Third and Fifth Circuits have eliminated that forum for the targets of state investigative demands.”