Rio Grande Foundation v. Maggie Toulouse Oliver, in Her Official Capacity as Secretary of State of New Mexico

First Amendment exacting scrutiny requires a “substantial relation” between a campaign-finance disclosure regime and a sufficiently important governmental interest—namely, the informational interest in identifying those who support candidates for office. The question presented is whether New Mexico’s informational interest is sufficient under exacting scrutiny to justify applying its disclosure regime to issue advocacy organizations, like Petitioner, that engage in no express advocacy or its functional equivalent.

Under Buckley v. Valeo, campaign-finance disclosure requirements serve the government’s informational interest only when applied to organizations whose “major purpose” is the election of candidates, or—for issue-advocacy organizations that lack that major purpose—when those organizations make expenditures that expressly advocate the election or defeat of a candidate. The question is whether applying New Mexico’s disclosure regime to an organization that does not meet Buckley’s “major purpose” test and does not engage in express advocacy, like Petitioner, constitutes narrow tailoring under exacting scrutiny absent donor earmarking.

This Court has long held that laws that burden political speech are subject to strict scrutiny, and, similarly, that content-based speech regulations are subject to strict scrutiny. The question is whether disclosure regimes applied to issue advocacy organizations, like Petitioner, that engage exclusively in political speech—without express advocacy or its functional equivalent—must satisfy strict scrutiny rather than exacting scrutiny.