On Tuesday, April 7, 2026, Idaho’s federal district court struck down a subpoena served on pro-life advocacy organization Right to Life of Idaho, Inc. (“RTLI”), in Matsumoto v. Labrador. The court found that the First Amendment shields political advocacy organizations like RTLI from being forced to release their communications to legislators when doing so could chill the organization’s speech.
The plaintiffs, pro-abortion entities seeking to overturn an Idaho law prohibiting the trafficking of minors for abortion, had targeted their ideological opponent, pro-life RTLI, with a subpoena issued in September 2025, attempting to dig through RTLI’s communications and records. The subpoena demanded that RTLI, which was not even a party to the case, provide years’ worth of its communications with legislators concerning Idaho House Bills 242 and 98.
RTLI argued that, as an organization whose chief purpose and strategy relies on its ability to communicate freely with legislators, a ruling that would require it to release such communications any time related litigation was filed would certainly inflict direct harm on its ability to engage in such speech and association. Legislators would be less inclined to communicate with RTLI if those communications could be demanded on a whim any time pro-abortion groups filed a lawsuit.
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The court agreed, finding that RTLI’s First Amendment rights were at stake. The court also found that the plaintiffs had not established a need for the documents sufficient to overcome the First Amendment’s protections. Indeed, binding Ninth Circuit precedent plainly requires a party seeking such discovery to obtain it, if possible, from sources that do not implicate the First Amendment—yet the plaintiffs had not even attempted the simple step of lodging a request under Idaho’s robust public records law before dragging RTLI into court. Accordingly, the court declined to enforce the subpoena.
James Bopp, Jr., of The Bopp Law Firm, PC, and counsel for RTLI, said, “The First Amendment does not magically cease to exist in civil litigation discovery. The court correctly recognized that a party cannot overcome its protections of speech and association by simply filing a lawsuit—particularly when that party has not even tried to take simple, reasonable steps to obtain the discovery in a manner that does not implicate the First Amendment at all. The court correctly stopped the plaintiffs’ attempt to force RTLI, their ideological opponent, to hand over its private communications.”
