New Jersey’s Showdown With Pro-Life Centers Reaches The High Court

New Jersey’s attorney general, Matthew Platkin,

 has spent the last few years turning crisis pregnancy centers into political targets,

 and now that campaign has landed at the U.S. Supreme Court. 

At the center of the fight is First Choice Women’s Resource Centers, a Christian nonprofit that offers ultrasounds, pregnancy tests, baby supplies, and counseling to women who want an alternative to abortion. In 2023, Platkin hit First Choice with a sweeping subpoena demanding internal records, ads, medical staffing information, and the names behind nearly 5,000 donations reaching back up to a decade, all under the banner of a “consumer fraud” investigation. The center fired back that this is not neutral oversight but a pressure campaign aimed at forcing pro-life organizations to either expose their supporters or shut down, and that it chills their First Amendment rights to speak, organize, and give privately on one of the most hot-button issues in America. 

On paper, the question the Supreme Court will hear in First Choice Women’s Resource Centers v. Platkin sounds technical: can a federal court step in now to protect the center’s constitutional rights, or must it wait until state courts and state agencies are finished with their own process? Behind that dry language, though, is a much bigger struggle over whether blue-state officials can use subpoenas and “consumer alerts” to bleed pro-life groups with legal costs and scare away donors without ever openly banning them. New Jersey’s courts have so far allowed the subpoena to stand, trimming it around the edges but leaving most of the demands in place, which means the case arrives in Washington as a kind of stress test for how far states can go in punishing speech and religious conviction they don’t like. 

Supporters of Platkin argue that the state is simply enforcing basic honesty rules. They say some crisis pregnancy centers advertise in ways that make women think they offer abortions or full medical services when they do not, and that asking for donor names and internal documents is normal in any serious fraud probe. From that angle, New Jersey is protecting vulnerable women from being misled during a crisis and making sure organizations that step into the health-care space are transparent and accountable. They also point out that the subpoena has not yet been fully enforced and that First Choice can argue its constitutional objections in state court, just like any other organization facing regulation. 

First Choice and its allies see almost the exact opposite. They note that the investigation followed public political attacks on crisis pregnancy centers by Democratic officials, and that the state’s consumer alert painted these ministries as deceptive “fake clinics” long before any real case-by-case review. For them, forcing disclosure of thousands of donor names in such a charged climate is not routine oversight but an intimidation tactic designed to dry up support. They warn that if New Jersey wins, any state government could weaponize subpoenas to build enemies lists of religious or political donors under the excuse of “fraud,” crushing unpopular viewpoints without ever passing a formal speech law. That, they argue, is exactly the sort of government behavior the First Amendment was written to stop. 

For the broader public, this case has become a proxy for deeper questions: in a post-Roe America, will pro-life organizations be allowed to operate freely in blue states, or will they survive only at the mercy of officials who openly oppose their mission? Many Americans who are not strongly pro-life still worry about government demanding donor lists from religious nonprofits, knowing that today’s target could be tomorrow’s church, gun-rights group, or civil-liberties organization. Others believe aggressive policing of crisis pregnancy centers is necessary to make sure women are not guilted or misled when they seek help. The Supreme Court now sits between these competing visions. Whatever it decides will not just affect one New Jersey ministry, but set the tone for how far states can push their political fights into the private lives of citizens who give, volunteer, and speak out on the most sensitive moral issues of our time. 

For visuals, imagine courtroom sketches of lawyers for First Choice and the New Jersey attorney general facing off under the Supreme Court’s marble columns; photos of peaceful, homelike pregnancy centers with cribs, baby clothes, and ultrasound machines; and side-by-side images of protestors outside the Court holding “Protect Free Speech” signs opposite “Stop Deception” banners. A short video could walk viewers through a map of New Jersey’s 50-plus crisis pregnancy centers, overlayed with shots of subpoenas, donor lists, and the Supreme Court calendar date when the justices will hear arguments, bringing home how a local investigation turned into a national constitutional showdown.

Please Like & Share 😉🪽

@1TheBrutalTruth1 Nov. 2025 Copyright Disclaimer under Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976: Allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education, and research.