Amicus Curiae Brief — Public Interest Legal Foundation, Petitioner v. Al Schmidt, Secretary of Pennsylvania, et al.

No. 25-379

In the

Supreme Court of the United States

_____________

PUBLIC INTEREST LEGAL FOUNDATION, INC.,

Petitioner,

v.

AL SCHMIDT, in his official capacity as Secretary of the

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and JONATHAN M.

MARKS, in his official capacity as Deputy Secretary for

Elections and Commissions,

Respondents.

_____________

On Petition for a Writ of Certiorari to the

United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit

_____________

BRIEF OF CENTER FOR ELECTION

CONFIDENCE AS AMICUS CURIAE IN

SUPPORT OF PETITIONER

_____________

BRADLEY A. BENBROOK

Counsel of Record

STEPHEN M. DUVERNAY

Benbrook Law Group, PC

701 University Ave., Ste. 106

Sacramento, California 95825

(916) 447-4900

brad@benbrooklawgroup.com

Counsel for Amicus Curiae

i

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Table of Authorities.............................................................. ii

Interest of Amicus Curiae ................................................... 1

Summary of Argument ........................................................ 1

Argument .............................................................................. 4

I. The NVRA’s Public Disclosure Provision Promotes

Electoral Integrity By Ensuring Public Oversight

Over State Election Officials’ Voter-Roll

Maintenance .................................................................. 4

II. Lower Courts Have Improperly Ignored That

Organizations Like Petitioner Suffer Significant

First Amendment Harms When They Are Denied

Records Under Public Disclosure “Sunshine” Laws

Like NVRA And FOIA ................................................ 8

A. Public Citizen And Akins Confirm That A

Plaintiff Suffers A Concrete Injury-In-Fact When

They Are Denied Information Under A PublicDisclosure Statute .................................................. 11

B. The Panel’s Approach Further Imperils Speech

Rights By Engaging In Viewpoint

Discrimination ........................................................ 18

Conclusion ........................................................................... 23

ii

TABLE OF AUTHORITIES

Cases

Bd. Of Educ., Island Trees Union Free Sch. Dist.

No. 26 v. Pico,

457 U.S. 853 (1982) ..........................................................10

Bellitto v. Snipes,

302 F. Supp. 3d 1335 (S.D. Fla. 2017) .............................6

Campaign Legal Ctr. v. FEC,

952 F.3d 352 (D.C. Cir. 2020) .....................................9, 14

Campaign Legal Ctr. v. Scott,

49 F.4th 931 (5th Cir. 2022) ..............................7, 8, 16, 19

Citizens United v. Fed. Election Comm’n,

558 U.S. 310 (2010) ..........................................................10

Duke Power Co. v. Envtl. Study Grp.,

438 U.S. 59 (1978) ............................................................17

Durns v. Bureau of Prisons,

804 F.2d 701 (D.C. Cir. 1986) ...........................................6

F.B.I. v. Abramson,

456 U.S. 615 (1982) ............................................................6

Federal Election Commission v. Akins,

524 U.S. 11 (1998) ........................................3, 9, 12, 13, 14

First Nat’l Bank of Boston v. Bellotti,

435 U.S. 765 (1978) ..........................................................22

Greater Birmingham Ministries v. Sec’y of State

for Alabama,

105 F.4th 1324 (11th Cir. 2024) ........................................7

Havens Realty Corp. v. Coleman,

455 U.S. 363 (1982) ..........................................................18

Judicial Watch, Inc. v. Lamone,

399 F. Supp. 3d 425 (D. Md. 2019) ..................................7

iii

Laufer v. Naranda Hotels, LLC,

60 F.4th 156 (4th Cir. 2023) ............................................17

Massachusetts v. EPA,

549 U.S. 497 (2007) ..........................................................17

N. L. R. B. v. Sears, Roebuck & Co.,

421 U.S. 132 (1975) ............................................................6

NAACP v. Button,

371 U.S. 415 (1963) ............................................................7

Nat’l Wildlife Fed’n v. Hodel,

839 F.2d 694 (D.C. Cir.1988) ..........................................17

Police Dept. of Chicago v. Mosley,

408 U.S. 92 (1972) ............................................................21

Project Vote/Voting for America, Inc. v. Long,

682 F.3d 331 (4th Cir. 2012) .............................................7

Pub. Interest Legal Found. v. Bellows,

92 F.4th 36 (1st Cir. 2024) ..........................................5, 17

Pub. Interest Legal Found. v. Benson,

136 F.4th 613 (6th Cir. 2025) ................................8, 16, 20

Pub. Interest Legal Found. v. Sec’y

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,

136 F.4th 456 (3d Cir. 2025) ...........................8, 16, 19, 20

Public Citizen v. U.S. Department of Justice,

491 U.S. 440 (1989) ............................................3, 9, 11, 14

Reed v. Town of Gilbert, Ariz.,

576 U.S. 155 (2015) ..........................................................21

Republican Nat’l Comm. v. Benson,

No. 24-1985, 2025 WL 2731704 (6th Cir. Sept. 25,

2025) ....................................................................................7

Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc.,

564 U.S. 552, 577 (2011) ..................................................22

iv

Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins,

578 U.S. 330 (2016) ..........................................................17

Stanley v. Georgia,

394 U.S. 557 (1969) ..........................................................10

TransUnion v. Ramirez,

594 U.S. 413 (2021) ..................................................2, 8, 15

U.S. Dep’t of Just. v. Reps. Comm. For Freedom of

Press,

489 U.S. 749 (1989) ............................................................6

Virginia Coalition for Immigrant Rights v. Beals,

No. 1:24-cv-1778, 2025 WL 2345822 (E.D. Va.

Aug. 12, 2025) .....................................................................7

Voter Reference Found., LLC v. Balderas,

616 F. Supp. 3d 1132 (D.N.M. 2022) ...............................7

Warth v. Seldin,

422 U.S. 490 (1975) ..........................................................10

Whitmore v. Arkansas,

495 U.S. 149 (1990) ..........................................................10

Statutes

5 U.S.C. § 552 .........................................................................6

52 U.S.C. § 20501(b) ..........................................................2, 4

52 U.S.C. § 20501(b)(3), (4) .................................................19

52 U.S.C. § 20507(a)(6)..........................................................5

52 U.S.C. § 20507(i)(1) ....................................................5, 21

Other Authorities

H.R. Rep. 103-9 (1993) ..........................................................5

S. Rep. No. 103-6 (1993) ...................................................4, 5

1

INTEREST OF AMICUS CURIAE 1

Center for Election Confidence, Inc. (CEC), is a nonprofit organization that promotes ethics, integrity, and

professionalism in the electoral process. CEC works to

ensure that all eligible citizens can vote freely within an

election system of reasonable procedures that promote

election integrity, prevent vote dilution and disenfranchisement, and instill public confidence in election systems and outcomes. To accomplish these objectives, CEC

conducts, funds, and publishes research and analysis regarding the effectiveness of current and proposed election

methods. CEC is a resource for lawyers, journalists, policymakers, courts, and others interested in the electoral

process. CEC also periodically engages in public-interest

litigation to uphold the rule of law and election integrity

and files amicus briefs in cases where its background, expertise, and national perspective may illuminate the issues under consideration.

SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT

The National Voter Registration Act (“NVRA”) expressly requires that state elections officials disclose the

voter list maintenance records that Petitioner requested

here. The panel deepened a circuit split by deciding that

the informational injury Petitioner suffered when Penn-

1

All parties were timely informed of Amicus’ intent to file this brief,

which is filed earlier than 10 days before the due date. No counsel for

any party authored this brief in whole or in part, and no entity or person, aside from Amicus curiae, its members, and its counsel, made any

monetary contribution toward its preparation or submission. See Sup.

Ct. R. 37.6.

2

sylvania refused to make the required disclosure was insufficiently “concrete” to confer standing. The panel

wrongly concluded that TransUnion v. Ramirez, 594 U.S.

413, 441–42 (2021), applied to this case and therefore

something more—additional “downstream” injury—was

required to support standing. The petition correctly argues that this approach to standing would not just nullify

the NVRA’s transparency requirements; it would also

nullify the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”), a centerpiece of congressional efforts to promote public disclosure and accountability within the federal government.

To the extent the Court agrees that something more

must be shown beyond simply a denial of public records

under the NVRA or FOIA, Amicus offers this brief to suggest that the “something more” is the denial of opportunities for speech and petitioning based on the wrongly withheld information. Inherent in sunshine statutes like FOIA

and NVRA is the assumption that persons obtaining information from the government will thereafter communicate about it; that is typically the entire point of asking for

government information. And when the information is denied, the speech and petitioning about it becomes impossible. That is a concrete injury.

Section I below describes how the NVRA’s information-sharing requirements, like FOIA, are designed to

hold government actors accountable for a variety of purposes. One such express objective is “ensur[ing] that accurate and current voter registration rolls are maintained.” 52 U.S.C. § 20501(b). That purpose cannot be

achieved by mere disclosure of information, however. To

accomplish anything, the information must be communicated through speech and petitioning activities. Election

advocacy groups from across the political spectrum seek

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this data, publicize it, and petition State governments to

take corrective action in light of what the mandatory disclosures reveal.

In the event the Court decides “informational injuries” from violating NVRA or FOIA are insufficiently concrete themselves to confer standing, Section II describes

how injuries to speech and petitioning rights inherent in

those violations fill the void. The seminal authorities on

which the panel relied—Public Citizen v. U.S. Department of Justice, 491 U.S. 440 (1989), and Federal Election

Commission v. Akins, 524 U.S. 11 (1998)—both confirm

that citizens seek information under sunshine laws to further their speech goals, and they are injured when they

cannot achieve those goals. The Petitioner asserted precisely that injury, and that was more than enough to confer standing.

Even more troubling than requiring yet more for

standing, the panel appeared to conclude that only speech

about one of the NVRA’s goals (expanding access to voting) might confer standing, but speech about other NVRA

goals (such as promoting electoral integrity) cannot confer standing. The First Amendment does not permit this

sort of viewpoint discrimination, and standing doctrine is

not the place to sneak it in.

The Court should grant the petition and reaffirm that

the denial of information under a public-disclosure statute

like the NVRA is a sufficiently concrete harm to constitute injury in fact. At a minimum, the Court should affirm

that a plaintiff need not allege anything more than that

the statutory violation has impaired its speech to establish

standing.

4

ARGUMENT

I. The NVRA’s Public Disclosure Provision Promotes

Electoral Integrity By Ensuring Public Oversight

Over State Election Officials’ Voter-Roll Maintenance.

In 1993, Congress enacted the National Voter Registration Act (“NVRA”) “to protect the integrity of the electoral process,” “increase the number of eligible citizens

who register to vote in elections for Federal office,” and

to “ensure that accurate and current voter registration

rolls are maintained.” 52 U.S.C. § 20501(b). In doing so,

Congress recognized that liberalizing voter registration

procedures carried with it the risk of voting fraud:

[T]he Committee and other participants are well

aware of the need for the States to maintain accurate voting rolls. An important goal of this bill, to

open the registration process, must be balanced

with the need to maintain the integrity of the election process by updating the voting rolls on a continual basis. The maintenance of accurate and upto-date voter registration lists is the hallmark of a

national system seeking to prevent voter fraud.

S. Rep. No. 103-6, p. 18 (1993).

To further these goals, Congress prioritized transparency. The NVRA requires that state election officials

maintain records of their voter-roll-maintenance programs and activities for “at least 2 years” and make these

records available to the public: officials “shall make available for public inspection and, where available, photocop-

5

ying at a reasonable cost, all records concerning the implementation of programs and activities conducted for the

purpose of ensuring the accuracy and currency of official

lists of eligible voters.” 52 U.S.C. § 20507(i)(1).2 The legislative history confirms that this use of “shall” was not by

accident: “The records must be made available for public

inspection and, where available, photocopying at reasonable costs.” S. Rep. No. 103-6, p. 35 (emphasis added); see

also H.R. Rep. 103-9, p. 19 (1993) (same).

The natural conclusion from this broad, mandatory

public inspection provision—state voting officials “shall

make available” “all records”—is that Congress decided

that its objectives of promoting electoral integrity and ensuring voter rolls are “accurate and current” were served

by public oversight of state election officials’ efforts to

maintain their voter rolls. See Pub. Interest Legal Found.

v. Bellows, 92 F.4th 36, 54 (1st Cir. 2024) (The public access provision of Section 8(i) “evinces Congress’s belief

that public inspection … is necessary to accomplish the

objectives behind the NVRA.”). Notably absent is any requirement that records be sought for a particular purpose

or any limitation as to whom may request records. Under

the NVRA, all records must be made available to the public at large.

2

The NVRA’s public disclosure provision exempts “records [that] relate to a declination to register to vote or to the identity of a voter

registration agency through which any particular voter is registered.” 52 U.S.C. § 20507(i)(1); see also id., subd. (a)(6) (providing that

States shall “ensure that the identity of the voter registration agency

through which any particular voter is registered is not disclosed to

the public”).

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The NVRA’s mandatory public disclosure scheme is in

that respect analogous to that of the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”). See 5 U.S.C. § 552 (providing repeatedly that agencies “shall make” specified information

available “to the public” or “for public inspection”). The

“basic purpose” of FOIA is to “open agency action to the

light of public scrutiny,” regardless of the “particular purpose for which the document is being requested.” U.S.

Dep’t of Just. v. Reps. Comm. For Freedom of Press, 489

U.S. 749, 772 (1989) (internal quotation marks omitted).

In FOIA, “Congress did not differentiate between the

purposes for which information was requested,” F.B.I. v.

Abramson, 456 U.S. 615, 631 (1982), and “clearly intended

to give any member of the public as much right to disclosure as one with a special interest therein,” N. L. R. B. v.

Sears, Roebuck & Co., 421 U.S. 132, 149 (1975). As Judge

Silberman memorably emphasized, “Congress granted

the scholar and the scoundrel equal rights of access to

agency records.” Durns v. Bureau of Prisons, 804 F.2d

701, 706 (D.C. Cir. 1986). So too here.

To be sure, reported decisions confirm that many organizations from across the political spectrum have relied

on the NVRA’s public inspection mandate to seek records

for a variety of purposes. Political and advocacy organizations need access to NVRA list information for a wide

range of speech activities. These include activities such as

voter registration and get-out-the-vote projects, confirming the accuracy of voter lists purchased from states, holding state offices accountable for electoral integrity, and informing the public about their elections. See, e.g., Bellitto

v. Snipes, 302 F. Supp. 3d 1335 (S.D. Fla. 2017) (American

Civil Rights Union); Campaign Legal Ctr. v. Scott, 49

7

F.4th 931 (5th Cir. 2022); Greater Birmingham Ministries

v. Sec’y of State for Alabama, 105 F.4th 1324 (11th Cir.

2024); Judicial Watch, Inc. v. Lamone, 399 F. Supp. 3d 425

(D. Md. 2019); Project Vote/Voting for America, Inc. v.

Long, 682 F.3d 331 (4th Cir. 2012); Republican Nat’l

Comm. v. Benson, No. 24-1985, 2025 WL 2731704 (6th Cir.

Sept. 25, 2025); Virginia Coalition for Immigrant Rights

v. Beals, No. 1:24-cv-1778, 2025 WL 2345822 (E.D. Va.

Aug. 12, 2025); Voter Reference Found., LLC v. Balderas,

616 F. Supp. 3d 1132 (D.N.M. 2022). When necessary, organizations also use this information in litigation to

achieve their goals. Cf. NAACP v. Button, 371 U.S. 415,

439 (1963) (“[L]itigation … is a means for achieving the

lawful objectives of equality of treatment and is thus a

form of political expression.”).

In short, recipients of the disclosure help achieve the

NVRA’s ultimate public oversight goal through speech

and petitioning about the information in the disclosures.

Advocacy groups like Petitioner evaluate the data, publicize it, inform their members or readers, and petition

States to improve their procedures. For example, in 2025

alone Petitioner has used State election roll data to publicize findings and urge election officials to update their

voter rolls in six States. Public Interest Legal Foundation, Research, https://publicinterestlegal.org/research/.

As discussed below, this Court has long recognized

that parties denied access to information under mandatory public-disclosure regimes suffer speech injuries and

have standing to enforce their inspection rights.

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II. Lower Courts Have Improperly Ignored That

Organizations Like Petitioner Suffer Significant

First Amendment Harms When They Are Denied

Records Under Public Disclosure “Sunshine” Laws

Like NVRA And FOIA.

The Third Circuit panel held that Petitioner Public Interest Legal Foundation (“PILF”) lacked standing to enforce the NVRA’s public-disclosure provision despite the

Commonwealth’s denial of its inspection demand, reasoning that PILF had failed to establish “downstream consequences” or “adverse effects” flowing from that denial.

Pub. Interest Legal Found. v. Sec’y Commonwealth of

Pennsylvania, 136 F.4th 456, 461–66 (3d Cir. 2025) (relying on TransUnion, 594 U.S. at 441–42). Under this novel

standard that is unfortunately spreading,3 a plaintiff asserting an injury from denial of information “must establish a nexus among a downstream consequence, his alleged harm, and the interest Congress sought to protect”

when providing for disclosure. Id. at 465.

The panel acknowledged the significant ways that, according to PILF, denial had impaired its First Amendment protected activities. In particular, PILF alleged in

its complaint that the Commonwealth’s refusal to provide

information thwarted its ability to “‘study and analyze the

[Secretary’s] voter list maintenance activities’” and “hamper[ed] its ‘activity … to promote election integrity and

compliance with federal and state statutes.’” Id. at 467.

Set aside for the moment that these effects and consequences have a strong nexus to an interest Congress

E.g., Scott, 49 F.4th at 936–39; Pub. Interest Legal Found. v. Benson, 136 F.4th 613, 630–32 (6th Cir. 2025).

3

9

sought to promote in the NVRA—protecting electoral integrity. Both activities that PILF was denied as a result

of Pennsylvania’s statutory violation involve speech aimed

at alerting the public about electoral integrity issues and

exhorting further action to address the issues.

But the panel did not just rely on TransUnion as support for its conclusion that this Court has supposedly required something more than simply being denied information to establish standing. It also joined the Sixth and

Fifth Circuits in deviating from the Court’s “informational injury” precedents, which hold that that plaintiffs

suffer concrete injuries when they are denied information

that they are entitled to under a public-disclosure law.

This principle is laid out in two seminal decisions: Public

Citizen v. U.S. Department of Justice, 491 U.S. 440 (1989),

and Federal Election Commission v. Akins, 524 U.S. 11

(1998).

To be sure, Amicus urges the Court to reaffirm that

informational injuries accompanying a refusal to provide

information under NVRA and FOIA are themselves sufficient to confer standing. See Public Citizen, 491 U.S. at

449–50; Akins, 524 U.S. at 21; see also Campaign Legal

Ctr. v. FEC, 952 F.3d 352, 356 (D.C. Cir. 2020) (“The law

is settled that a denial of access to information qualifies as

an injury in fact where a statute (on the claimants’ reading) requires that the information be publicly disclosed

and there is no reason to doubt their claim that the information would help them.”). But Public Citizen and Akins

also illustrate that, to the extent something more than

merely being denied the information is required to establish standing, being denied the opportunity to speak about

the information is more than enough.

10

Indeed, the assumption that persons denied information under a sunshine law have suffered speech injuries

is sufficiently strong that it could rise to the level of a presumption. In any event, simply alleging that the violation

prevented a plaintiff from speaking about the information

they were denied, as PILF did here, is more than enough

to establish standing. “[T]he Constitution protects the

right to receive information and ideas,” Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U.S. 557, 564 (1969), which “is a necessary predicate to the recipient’s meaningful exercise of his own

rights of speech, press, and political freedom,” Bd. Of

Educ., Island Trees Union Free Sch. Dist. No. 26 v. Pico,

457 U.S. 853, 867 (1982).

This is not to suggest that any mere denial of information under NVRA or FOIA transforms a statutory violation into a violation of the First Amendment. Rather, if

the Court decides that the statutory violation alone is insufficient to confer standing, the lost opportunity to engage in speech and petitioning about the information

wrongly withheld surely suffices as an injury in fact, and

this injury is distinct from the merits of the statutory

claim. See, e.g., Whitmore v. Arkansas, 495 U.S. 149, 155

(1990) (standing is a “threshold” question that bears on

jurisdiction, which “‘in no way depends on the merits’” of

a plaintiff’s case) (quoting Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490,

500 (1975)). This harm strikes at the heart of “[t]he right

of citizens to inquire, to hear, to speak, and to use information to reach consensus” that “is a precondition to enlightened self-government and a necessary means to protect it.” Citizens United v. Fed. Election Comm’n, 558

U.S. 310, 339 (2010).

11

A. Public Citizen And Akins Confirm That A Plaintiff Suffers A Concrete Injury-In-Fact When

They Are Denied Information Under A PublicDisclosure Statute.

In Public Citizen, two public interest organizations

sought records concerning the President’s consultation

with the American Bar Association over potential judicial

nominees pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee

Act (“FACA”). 491 U.S. at 443, 447–48. The Court held

that under FACA’s public-disclosure provision—as with

FOIA—the denial of a request for information “constitutes a sufficiently distinct injury to provide standing to

sue.” Id. at 449. It explained that the Court’s “decisions

interpreting [FOIA] have never suggested that those requesting information under it need show more than that

they sought and were denied specific agency records,”

and “[t]here is no reason for a different rule here.” Id.

The Public Citizen Court characterized the justification for the request in speech-based terms: the appellant

public interest organizations sought records under FACA

“in order to monitor its workings and participate more effectively in the judicial selection process.” 491 U.S. at 449.

And it said that plaintiffs have standing when the denial

of information hampers those speech interests: “As when

an agency denies requests for information under the

Freedom of Information Act, refusal to permit appellants

to scrutinize the ABA Committee’s activities to the extent

FACA allows constitutes a sufficiently distinct injury to

provide standing to sue.” Id. The harm to the citizens

groups was tied to the impact of the denial on their speech

rights; indeed, it is hard to fathom how those organiza-

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tions could have “participat[ed]” in the federal judicial selection process in any way other than through engaging in

speech. Notably, the Court did not require a “nexus” between the organizations’ harm and Congress’ interest

when enacting FACA—and the organizations doubtless

could not have proven as much, since the statute had nothing to do with judicial nominations.

In Akins, the Court relied on Public Citizen in holding

that a group of voters established a “concrete and particular” injury when they were unable to obtain campaignfinance information under the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971. 524 U.S. at 21. The Akins plaintiffs

sought access to information about AIPAC’s spending on

political activities; they argued that the FEC should have

treated AIPAC as a “political committee” under FECA,

and that it thus should have been disclosing its contributions and expenditures to the FEC, which would have

made the information public. Id. at 14–18. In this sense,

Akins did not involve the government directly denying

plaintiffs access to public information; rather, plaintiffs

argued that the government would have gathered the information if it had properly treated AIPAC as a political

committee.4 Nevertheless, the Court viewed the standing

The Akins plaintiffs first filed an FEC complaint pursuant to a provision of FECA that allowed “[a]ny person who believe[d]” a violation

of the Act had occurred—there, the FEC’s failure to treat AIPAC as

a regulated political committee—could file a complaint; it then sued

based on FECA’s statutory right of action permitting judicial review

of the FEC’s dismissal of a complaint. 524 U.S. at 19. All of which is

to say, the injury in Akins is multiple abstract statutory steps removed from the direct informational injury suffered here.

4

13

issue as akin to Public Citizen, i.e., being denied information that the law required to be public: “[A] plaintiff

suffers an ‘injury in fact’ when the plaintiff fails to obtain

information which must be publicly disclosed pursuant to

a statute.” Id. at 21; see also id. at 22 (emphasizing that

plaintiffs had standing because “there is a statute which

… seek[s] to protect individuals such as [plaintiffs] from

the kind of harm they say they have suffered, i.e., failing

to receive particular information about campaign-related

activities”).

As in Public Citizen, the Akins Court highlighted that

plaintiffs’ inability to obtain information impacted their

First Amendment activities. The Court acknowledged up

front that the plaintiffs were “a group of voters with views

often opposed to those of AIPAC.” 524 U.S. at 15. Plaintiffs suffered a concrete injury-in-fact because the denial

of the information they sought impeded their ability to

participate in and influence the political process:

The “injury in fact” that respondents have suffered

consists of their inability to obtain information—

lists of AIPAC donors (who are, according to

AIPAC, its members), and campaign-related contributions and expenditures—that, on respondents’ view of the law, the statute requires that

AIPAC make public. There is no reason to doubt

their claim that the information would help them

(and others to whom they would communicate it)

to evaluate candidates for public office, especially

candidates who received assistance from AIPAC,

and to evaluate the role that AIPAC’s financial assistance might play in a specific election.

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Id. at 21 (emphasis added). In other words, the Akins

plaintiffs’ minds were already made up about how they

would vote; they wanted information to use to educate

others about those views. And Akins obviously accepted

that being denied the opportunity to “evaluate” information and “communicate it” to “others” is an injury that

gives rise to standing.

This case fits comfortably within the Public Citizen

and Akins framework. PILF proposes to engage in exactly the same sort of evaluation and advocacy here after

being denied information allegedly in violation of mandatory public disclosure statute.

Yet the panel rejected PILF’s injury as lacking a sufficient “nexus” to the NVRA’s purpose. Setting aside that

this “nexus” requirement is inconsistent with this Court’s

precedents, Public Citizen and Akins teach that, once

Congress declares that certain public records must be

made publicly available, individuals suffer concrete harm

when the government refuses to comply with the law without regard to the proximity of the harm to the statute’s

specific purpose. This is particularly true where, as the

D.C. Circuit has stated, there is “no reason to doubt that

the disclosures [the plaintiffs] seek would further their efforts to defend and implement” their policy and advocacy

objectives. Campaign Legal Ctr. v. FEC, 952 F.3d at 356

(quotation of Akins, 524 U.S. at 21, omitted in original).

Just as the Public Citizen plaintiffs sought public records

to “monitor [the ABA’s] workings and participate more

effectively in the judicial selection process,” 491 U.S. at

449, PILF sought records to “monitor” Pennsylvania’s

work maintaining its voter rolls and “participate more effectively” in broader efforts to protect the integrity of the

15

electoral process. That PILF has been denied access to

these public records, which supply information essential

to PILF’s public advocacy objectives, is a distinct injury

to those ends.

Indeed, the whole point of sunshine provisions like the

NVRA’s public disclosure requirement is to allow public

scrutiny of potential government misfeasance through follow-on speech and petitioning activities. Nothing is served

by a government disclosure of records that are simply put

on the requestor’s shelf. In other words, the “disinfecting”

that is supposed to result from “sunlight” cannot be accomplished without speech about what has been kept in

the dark.

What about TransUnion? For one thing, this Court

carved out public-disclosure cases and expressly distinguished Public Citizen and Akins. 594 U.S. at 441. And for

good reason: TransUnion involved a statutory right to

control how private companies handled personal information—the private stakes in that case are far afield from

the patently public interests presented here. (No government records were involved; the benefits to the requester

were personal; and individuals seeking their credit information are far less likely to be seeking the information to

add to the public discourse.) Yet the panel’s mischief here

was invited by the TransUnion Court’s reference to

“downstream consequences” and “adverse effects.” Id. at

442 (citations omitted). But these matters are already

built into the public-disclosure calculus: under such a statute—FOIA, FACA, FECA, NVRA, etc.—where Congress has decided that the public is entitled to certain gov-

16

ernment information, the denial of access to that information suffices to meet Article III’s concreteness requirement.

In reaching a contrary conclusion, the panel faulted

PILF for “submitt[ing] no evidence of any specific plans

for the records it sought relating to the purpose of the

NVRA.” 136 F. 4th at 468. The Fifth Circuit followed a

similar line of reasoning in Scott. 49 F.4th at 938 (asserting that plaintiffs lacked standing in part because “[t]hey

do not allege that identification of voter names and identification numbers will directly lead to action relevant to

the NVRA or any other statute, nor that their direct participation in the electoral process will be hindered”). As

did the Sixth Circuit in Benson, 136 F.4th at 631 (“Neither

the complaint nor PILF’s briefs identify, for example,

specific projects, research papers, or educational outreach efforts that were directly impacted by Secretary

Benson’s failure to produce relevant records.”).

This reasoning is circular and too clever by half: how

can a requester be expected to know what is in the records

being kept secret? No one knows exactly what the information will show until it gets it. PILF has articulated what

it expects the information will show, and how it will use

the information for its speech purposes if that pans out,

and that is plenty under Public Citizen and Akins.5

5

By faulting Petitioner for not guaranteeing it would speak about the

data once it arrives, the panel imports redressability concepts into

what it claimed was an “injury in fact” analysis. Yet the Court has

repeatedly confirmed that a plaintiff need not show that relief will

certainly redress its injury. Cf. Massachusetts v. EPA, 549 U.S. 497,

17

In addition, the decisions of these circuits place their

standing analyses in stark opposition to those of the First

and Fourth Circuits. These Circuits have elected to assess

alleged informational injuries not under the narrow

standard articulated in TransUnion but rather under the

generally applicable principles of standing this Court has

long endorsed. See Bellows, 92 F.4th at 50–51 (not assessing the plaintiff’s standing under TransUnion); Laufer v. Naranda Hotels, LLC, 60 F.4th 156, 170–71, 172 (4th

Cir. 2023) (“[W]e are satisfied that TransUnion most assuredly did not overrule … Public Citizen[] and Akins. As

such, those precedents must continue to be followed

where they are applicable, unless and until the Supreme

Court decides otherwise.”; “Public Citizen[] and Akins are

clear that a plaintiff need not show a use for the information being sought in order to establish an injury in

fact”).

And beyond Public Citizen and Akins, this Court has

confirmed that, even in the absence of a common-law analogue, plaintiffs have standing to sue to enforce their

rights that exist solely by virtue of a federal statute.

Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, 578 U.S. 330, 342 (2016) (when the

government has an obligation to provide information and

518 (2007) (a litigant vested with a procedural right “has standing if

there is some possibility that the requested relief will prompt the injury-causing party to reconsider the decision”); Duke Power Co. v.

Envtl. Study Grp., 438 U.S. 59, 75 n.20 (1978) (Article III standing

“require[s] no more than a showing that there is a substantial likelihood” of redressability); see also Nat’l Wildlife Fed’n v. Hodel, 839

F.2d 694, 705–06 (D.C. Cir.1988) (“[A] party seeking judicial relief

need not show to a certainty that a favorable decision will redress [its]

injury. A mere likelihood will do.”).

18

refuses to do so, “the violation of a procedural right

granted by statute [is] sufficient … to constitute injury in

fact,” and “a plaintiff … need not allege any additional

harm beyond the one Congress has identified.”) (citing

Public Citizen and Akins)); see also Havens Realty Corp.

v. Coleman, 455 U.S. 363, 373 (1982) (“The actual or

threatened injury required by Art. III may exist solely by

virtue of statutes creating legal rights, the invasion of

which creates standing.” (cleaned up; emphasis added)).

In short, this case provides an important opportunity

for the Court to clarify the appropriate method for conducting standing analyses under federal statutes that include public disclosure provisions and to halt the trend of

lower courts using overly aggressive standing theories to

frustrate congressional objectives and to circumvent this

Court’s holdings. Under Public Citizen and Akins, plaintiffs denied access to information under mandatory disclosure regimes suffer a concrete harm from the denial itself.

To the extent the Court thinks something more is required, plaintiffs can readily plead that denial of the information harms their speech and petitioning interests to

provide the “more.”

B. The Panel’s Approach Further Imperils Speech

Rights By Engaging In Viewpoint Discrimination.

Even more troubling than requiring more than simply

the denial of protected speech for standing, the panel appeared to conclude that only speech about one of the

NVRA’s goals (expanding access to voting) might confer

standing, but speech about other NVRA goals (such as

promoting electoral integrity) cannot confer standing.

19

The First Amendment does not permit this sort of viewpoint discrimination anywhere, and standing doctrine is

not the place to sneak it in.

Rather than consider each of the NVRA’s stated purposes on equal footing, the panel elevated one goal (what

it termed “the expansion of voter participation in federal

elections,” 136 F.4th at 463, 467, 469) while ignoring Congress’ explicit intent both to “protect the integrity of the

electoral process” and to “ensure that accurate and current voter registration rolls are maintained.” 52 U.S.C. §

20501(b)(3), (4). PILF asserted that Pennsylvania’s

NVRA data would help it “produc[e] and disseminat[e]”

educational materials “to promote the integrity of elections nationwide,” which the panel tersely dismissed as

not being “essential to a concrete interest protected by”

the NVRA. Id. at 467. The panel was equally dismissive of

PILF’s claim that the records would help it “effectively

evaluate the accuracy of [Pennsylvania’s] voter rolls” or

analyze Pennsylvania’s “compliance with state and voter

list maintenance laws”—to the court, this was a mere “desire to have such records” that “does not entitle [PILF] to

sue.” Id. at 467–68.6

6

Although the Fifth Circuit was more circumspect, it appears to have

followed a similar course in Scott. 49 F.4th at 938 (concluding that

plaintiffs had failed to allege that the denial of information “will directly lead to action relevant to the NVRA or any other statute, [or]

that their direct participation in the electoral process will be hindered”). Moreover, the court below, just like the Sixth Circuit, expressed modest outrage that an out-of-state public interest organization would deign to request public information under the NVRA. 136

F.4th 469 (characterizing PILF—scare quotes included—as “an out-

20

The panel’s scrutiny of (and hostility toward) PILF’s

intentions constitutes improper and unconstitutional

viewpoint discrimination. A straightforward hypothetical

illustrates the point. Suppose that the theoretical Voter

Expansion Advancement League (“VEAL”) requests

NVRA information from the Pennsylvania Secretary of

State, asserting that the Commonwealth’s voter-registration records are useful to its study and analysis of methods to increase the number of eligible citizens who register to vote. VEAL wants to monitor and analyze Pennsylvania’s voter list maintenance activities to further the organization’s efforts to expand voter participation in federal elections by communicating about voter registration

(as by publishing educational materials). The Secretary

refuses to comply with the request because VEAL is a

California-based public interest organization with no direct ties to Pennsylvania or its voters. On the panel’s reasoning, VEAL would have standing because its inability

to obtain NVRA records has a “nexus” to “advanc[ing] the

expansion of voter registration and participation in federal elections.” 136 F.4th at 467. And yet PILF—which

sought the same records but for a different statutory purpose (protecting the integrity of the electoral process)—

is shut out of court.

of-state ‘public interest organization’” that “does not represent any

Pennsylvania citizens” and “has no direct ties to Pennsylvania voters”); Benson, 136 F.4th at 631 & n.12 (“PILF is not a registered

voter, nor has it claimed organizational standing on behalf of registered voters, in the voting jurisdiction at issue,” and observing that

“PILF is not located in Michigan,” but is instead headquartered in

Indianapolis).

21

That can’t be right. Courts must not be allowed to prioritize certain viewpoints in any protected speech, let

alone speech concerning only certain of NVRA’s statutory

purposes when deciding who has suffered a sufficient

speech injury. Courts have no license to engage in viewpoint discrimination in any context, and certainly not

when considering alleged violations of a statutory scheme

that gives the public the unqualified right to inspect government records. (Recall that the NVRA provides that

“all records” “shall” be made available for “public inspection.” 52 U.S.C. § 20507(i)(1).) The practical (and inevitable) effect of the panel’s approach is to favor speech on one

subject concerning voting (expansion of access) while disfavoring speech on another related subject concerning

voting (electoral integrity).

This incongruity is odd enough given the competing

push-and-pull—between opening voter registration, on

the one hand, and preventing voter fraud, on the other—

that Congress recognized in the NVRA’s legislative history. But the problems don’t stop there. The panel’s rationale crashes at startling speed into the First Amendment. “[T]he First Amendment means that government

has no power to restrict expression because of its message, its ideas, its subject matter, or its content.” Police

Dept. of Chicago v. Mosley, 408 U.S. 92, 95 (1972). “Government discrimination among viewpoints—or the regulation of speech based on ‘the specific motivating ideology

or the opinion or perspective of the speaker’—is a ‘more

blatant’ and ‘egregious form of content discrimination.’”

Reed v. Town of Gilbert, Ariz., 576 U.S. 155, 168–69 (2015)

(citation omitted). Accordingly, “the First Amendment is

plainly offended” when the government “attempt[s] to

22

give one side of a debatable public question an advantage

in expressing its views to the people.” First Nat’l Bank of

Boston v. Bellotti, 435 U.S. 765, 785–86 (1978). This means

that the government is not permitted to advance its policy

goals “through the indirect means of restraining certain

speech by certain speakers,” and “may not burden the

speech of others in order to tilt public debate in a preferred direction.” Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc., 564 U.S. 552,

577, 578–79 (2011).

The viewpoint discrimination concerns here are

heightened given the inherently political nature of the

speech that organizations like PILF (and Amicus) engage

in concerning electoral integrity. By restricting access to

NVRA information to only certain groups who promise to

use it for the government-approved reasons, the panel’s

approach invites—indeed ensures—that public debate is

tilted entirely in one direction. This type of meddling is

constitutionally intolerable. The Court’s intervention is

therefore necessary to head off the First Amendment

harm countenanced by the approach endorsed below and

by the Fifth and Sixth Circuits.

23

CONCLUSION

For the reasons set forth above and by petitioner, the

Court should grant the petition for a writ of certiorari and

reverse.

Respectfully submitted,

BRADLEY A. BENBROOK

Counsel of Record

STEPHEN M. DUVERNAY

Benbrook Law Group, PC

701 University Ave., Ste. 106

Sacramento, California 95825

brad@benbrooklawgroup.com

October 30, 2025

Counsel for Amicus Curiae