Breaking: Supreme Court Takes Case Involving False Campaign Speech

Today the Court issued an order granting cert in Susan B. Anthony List v. Driehaus.

The cert. petition raises two questions, the second of which is substantive on the question of false campaign speech laws:

Did the Sixth Circuit err by holding, in direct conflict with the Eighth Circuit, that state laws proscribing “false” political speech are not subject to pre-enforcement First Amendment review so long as the speaker maintains that its speech is true, even if others who enforce the law
manifestly disagree?

Marcia Coyle’s preview of this case is here. It is not clear to me that the Court in this case is going to reach the merits of the constitutionality of laws barring false campaign speech (the Court may instead simply say that courts have to decide such challenges). But if the Court reaches the merits, I believe the Court is likely to hold at least some state laws barring false campaign speech unconstitutional. I’ve addressed the issues of the constitutionality of limits on campaign lies after US v. Alvarez in A Constitutional Right to Lie in Campaigns and Elections?

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