In the lawsuit raising constitutional objections to limits on religious nonprofits being involved in endorsing candidates and doing other election related activities, a proposed joint consent decree, in which plaintiffs and the federal government would agree to what would be a huge shift in electoral politics:

6. The text of the Johnson Amendment may cause certain otherwise tax-exempt
   organizations to lose their § 501(c)(3) status if they “participate in, or intervene in . . . , any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office.” 26 U.S.C. § 501(c)(3).
7. When a house of worship in good faith speaks to its congregation, through its customary channels of communication on matters of faith in connection with religious services, concerning electoral politics viewed through the lens of religious faith, it neither “participate[s]” nor “intervene[s]” in a “political campaign,” within the ordinary meaning of those words. To “participate” in a political campaign is “to take part” in the political campaign, and to “intervene” in a political campaign is “to interfere with the outcome or course” of the political campaign. See Participate, Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary (2025); Intervene, Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary (2025). Bona fide communications internal to a house of worship, between the house of worship and its congregation, in connection with religious services, do neither of those things, any more than does a family discussion concerning candidates. Thus, communications from a house of worship to its congregation in connection with religious services through its usual channels of communication on matters of faith do not run afoul of the Johnson Amendment as properly interpreted.
8. This interpretation of the Johnson Amendment is in keeping with the IRS’s treatment of the Johnson Amendment in practice. As recounted in Plaintiffs’ Amended Complaint, the IRS generally has not enforced the Johnson Amendment against houses of worship for speech concerning electoral politics in the context of worship services. ECF 20 at 30-42; see Executive Order 13798 (May 9, 2017) (“[T]he Secretary of Treasury shall ensure, to the extent permitted by law, that the Department of the Treasury does not take any adverse action against any . . . house of worship . . . on the basis that such . . . organization speaks or has spoken about moral or political issues from a religious perspective, where speech of similar character has, consistent with law, not ordinarily been treated as participation of intervention in a political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) a candidate for public office by the Department of Treasury.”).
9. The doctrine of constitutional avoidance counsels in favor of interpreting the Johnson Amendment so that it does not reach communications from a house of worship to its congregation in connection with religious services through its usual channels of communication on matters of faith. See, e.g., Edward J. DeBartolo Corp. v. Fla. Gulf Coast Bldg. & Constr. Trades Council, 485 U.S. 568, 575 (1988) (“[W]here an otherwise acceptable construction of a statute would raise serious constitutional problems, the Court will construe the statute to avoid such problems unless such construction is plainly contrary to the intent of Congress.”). For many houses of worship, the exercise of their religious beliefs includes teaching or instructing their congregations regarding all aspects of life, including guidance concerning the impact of faith on the choices inherent in electoral politics. Interpreting the Johnson Amendment to reach such communications would create serious tension with the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause: That broad interpretation would treat religions that do not speak directly to matters of electoral politics more favorably than religions that do so—favoring some religions over others based on their speech to their own congregations in connection with religious services through customary channels of worship and religious communication. See Catholic Charities Bureau, Inc. v. Wisconsin Labor & Indus. Rev. Comm’n, 145 S. Ct. 1583, 1591 (2025) (“‘The clearest command of the Establishment Clause’ is that the government may not ‘officially prefe[r]’ one religious denomination over another.” (quoting Larson v. Valente, 456 U.S. 228, 246 (1982))).
10. For these reasons, the Johnson Amendment does not reach speech by a house of worship to its congregation, in connection with religious services through its customary channels of communication on matters of faith, concerning electoral politics viewed through the lens of religious faith.

I’ve written a bit about related issues. See the last part of Richard L. Hasen, Nonprofit Law as a Tool to Kill What Remains of Campaign Finance Law: Reluctant Lessons from Ellen Aprill, 56 Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review 1233 (2023) (festschrift symposium honoring Ellen Aprill)

NYT:

President-elect Donald J. Trump is keeping secret the names of the donors who are funding his transition effort, a break from tradition that could make it impossible to see what interest groups, businesses or wealthy people are helping launch his second term.

Mr. Trump has so far declined to sign an agreement with the Biden administration that imposes strict limits on that fund-raising in exchange for up to $7.2 million in federal funds earmarked for the transition. By dodging the agreement, Mr. Trump can raise unlimited amounts of money from unknown donors to pay for the staff, travel and office space involved in preparing to take over the government.

Mr. Trump is the first president-elect to sidestep the restrictions, provoking alarm among ethics experts.

Those seeking to curry favor with the incoming administration now have the opportunity to donate directly to the winning candidate without their names or potential conflicts ever entering the public sphere. And unlike with campaign contributions, foreign nationals are allowed to donate to the transition….

Mr. Trump’s transition team, formally known as Trump Vance 2025 Transition Inc., has revealed nothing about how much money it hopes to raise, who has contributed to the fund or how it is spending the money.

The current Trump transition, like its predecessors, is set up as a “dark money” nonprofit. Those groups typically do not have to disclose their donors, even to the Internal Revenue Service. But unlike Mr. Trump’s team this year, earlier transitions accepted financial support from the General Services Administration, which oversees much of the transition process. In exchange for that federal money, they agreed to conditions that other dark-money nonprofits do not have to follow, like capping individual contributions at $5,000 and disclosing the names of their donors.

When Barack Obama won the presidency in 2008, his transition raised $4.5 million while restricting donations to a maximum of $5,000, and pledging to refuse money from corporations, labor unions, political action committees, lobbyists and registered foreign agents. Nearly 60,000 people contributed, with an average donation of about $75….

Steven Sholk’s latest update.

You can read it here, and the citation is 56 Loy. L.A. L. Rev. 1233 (2023).

Abstract:

This brief Essay was prepared for a festschrift honoring the work of Professor Ellen Aprill. I explain in the Essay how Professor Aprill’s deep knowledge of nonprofit and tax law and her relentless intellectual honesty leads her (and us) to an unhappy place: a world in which many of the remaining regulations of money in politics could well be struck down as unconstitutional or rendered wholly ineffective by a Supreme Court increasingly hostile to the goals of campaign finance law and extremely solicitous of religious freedom. Just as the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission used the First Amendment rights of nonprofit corporations to open up direct political spending by large, for-profit corporations, additional arguments about the rights of charitable institutions and other nonprofits will be used to push further judicial deregulation of the political process for all.

Professor Aprill in her most recent writings at the intersection of nonprofit law and election law reluctantly shows the way: a path toward getting churches, synagogues and other charitable institutions directly in the business of politics; a means of striking down or rendering ineffective what remains of our campaign disclosure laws; and a self-reinforcing bootstrapping that relies upon legislative and agency inertia coupled with judicially-created loopholes to argue for the ineffectiveness of the system as a whole, triggering its demise through constitutional litigation. It is a sad but expertly told story of regulatory collapse.

Rolling Stone cites the former President’s plans on the Johnson Amendment: “We never enforced it.  We essentially ended it.  I wasn’t able to finish it.  But I’ll finish it this time.”

The Johnson Amendment prohibits 501(c)(3) nonprofits, contributions to which are tax-deductible, from participating in campaigns for or against candidates for public office.