A New Jersey pro-life pregnancy care center can continue challenging a subpoena seeking its private donor information after a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court ruling, but the state’s attorney general is asking a judge to move forward with enforcing the order.

A spokesperson for New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport’s office told The Christian Post there is no additional comment beyond an April 30 letter sent to Superior Court Judge Lisa M. Adubato, who presides over the General Equity Division in Essex County.

“The Court determined that First Choice has Article III standing to proceed with a federal-court challenge to the Division of Consumer Affairs’ November 15, 2023, subpoena at issue in this case. The Court, however, did not ‘decide the merits of First Choice’s’ challenge to the Subpoena,” the letter stated.

The letter, signed by Davenport and Deputy Attorney General Lauren E. Van Driesen, argued there is “no basis for this Court to stay its hand while the federal-court litigation proceeds simultaneously.”

The request follows a Supreme Court ruling last week allowing First Choice Women’s Resource Centers to challenge a subpoena issued in November 2023 by former New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin.

Justice Neil Gorsuch, who authored the court’s 9-0 opinion, said the subpoena request “injures the group’s First Amendment associational rights.”

“The Attorney General does not dispute much of this,” Gorsuch wrote.

“An official demand for private donor information is enough to discourage reasonable individuals from associating with a group. It is enough to discourage groups from expressing dissident views,” he added. “A government that chooses to make private donor information public may make the damage worse.”

In response to the April 30 letter, Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) Counsel Erin Hawley accused Davenport of “doubling down on her predecessor’s hostile crusade to keep First Choice from vindicating its First Amendment rights in federal court.”

“Just one day after the Supreme Court unanimously affirmed that her office’s donor demands burden the ministry’s First Amendment rights, Attorney General Davenport requested that the state court fast-track its enforcement proceedings to preempt the federal court’s review,” Hawley said in a Friday statement.

“That move disregards the Supreme Court’s ruling and underscores the stark reality of this case: For more than two years, New Jersey state officials have targeted First Choice simply because they dislike its pro-life views,” Hawley added. “But this week, the Supreme Court sent a clear message: First Choice is entitled to its day in federal court.”

First Choice Women’s Resource Centers is a collection of five centers in New Jersey that offer free counseling and support services to pregnant women, including those considering abortion.

The ADF represented First Choice after Platkin issued the 2023 subpoena demanding donor lists and private correspondence as part of an investigation into whether the group violated the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act.

Before the subpoena deadline, First Choice filed a lawsuit against Platkin in December 2023, arguing the subpoena was overly broad and unconstitutional.

Platkin was also among 16 Democratic attorneys general who signed a letter in 2023 accusing pro-life pregnancy centers of spreading “misinformation and harm” by allegedly “misleading consumers and delaying access to” abortion.

U.S. District Judge Michael A. Shipp ruled against First Choice in January 2024, writing that the “claims related to the Subpoena's enforceability in this matter would ripen only after the contingent future event that forms the basis of its alleged injury occurs.”

In February 2024, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the centers' emergency request to block the subpoena, denying it “without prejudice to reconsideration by the merits panel and/or the filing of a request for an expedited briefing schedule.”

While the nation’s highest court initially declined to take up the case in May 2024, it later agreed to hear oral arguments in June.

News Source : https://www.christianpost.com/news/new-jersey-ag-targets-pregnancy-center-despite-scotus-ruling.html