Bloomberg Law, Justice Department Sides With Churches in Political Speech Case:

The Justice Department told an appeals court it largely agrees with the religious groups suing it over how far churches can wade into politics and still keep their tax-exempt status.

The DOJ said a lower court judge was wrong to throw out an agreement the government reached with these religious groups in July 2025 that would have significantly weakened the Johnson Amendment, a 1950s law that conditions religious organizations’ tax-exempt statuses on steering clear of political campaigns. The DOJ filed its brief in the case in the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on Sept. 21.

In the 2025 agreement, the DOJ agreed to not enforce the Johnson Amendment when a church communicates about politics “to its congregation, in connection with religious services through its customary channels of communication on matters of faith,” it said in the brief.

This agreement was invalid because it would have violated the Anti-Injunction Act, which prohibits legal rulings that interfere with tax collection, according to a 2025 ruling from Judge J. Campbell Barker of the US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas.

But the DOJ said Barker missed that an exception to the AIA applies when “the Government has no likelihood of prevailing on the merits, and equity jurisdiction otherwise exists.”

The agreement only stops the IRS from doing something it already can’t do because enforcing Johnson Amendment in that way would violate the church autonomy doctrine, which “prevents civil courts from adjudicating ecclesiastical matters,” the DOJ said.

• Christian Post, DOJ Sides With Christian Groups, IRS in Johnson Amendment Appeal
• Christianity Daily, DOJ Defends IRS Agreement Limiting Johnson Amendment Enforcement for Churches
• Religion News Service, DOJ Asks Appeals Court to Allow Churches to Endorse Political Candidates

Prior TaxProf Blog coverage:

• New York Times, Judge Dismisses Lawsuit That Challenged Ban on Endorsements by Churches (Apr. 5, 2025)
• Wall Street Journal, Judge Blocks Deal Allowing Churches to Endorse Political Candidates (Apr. 5, 2026)
• Astrid Obadia (J.D. 2027, Columbia), Note, Solving One Problem, Creating Another: Religious Preference in the Johnson Amendment’s Latest Exception, 17 Colum. J. Tax L. 177 (2026)
• New York Times Op-Ed (Benjamin Leff (American)), The IRS Is Upholding A Core Liberal Principle In Permitting Churches To Endorse Political Candidates From The Pulpit (Aug. 19, 2025)
• New York Times, How Conservative Christians Cracked 70-Year-Old Law Prohibiting Endorsement Of Political Candidates From The Pulpit (Aug. 3, 2025)
• Sam. Brunson (Loyola-Chicago), A New Johnson Amendment: Subsidy, Core Political Speech, and Tax-Exempt Organizations, 43 Yale L. & Pol’y Rev. 354 (2025)
• Ellen P. Aprill (Loyola-L.A.), Misunderstanding National Religious Broadcasters, 188 Tax Notes Fed. 581 (July 28, 2025)
• Benjamin Leff (American), Challenging the Johnson Amendment: What SAFE SPACE Gets Right—and Wrong, 185 Tax Notes Fed. 51 (Oct. 7, 2024)
• Benjamin Leff (American), Fixing the Johnson Amendment without Totally Destroying It, 6 U. Pa. J. L. & Pub. Affs. 115 (2020)
• Erik Stanley (Alliance Defense Fund), LBJ, the IRS, and Churches: The Unconstitutionality of the Johnson Amendment in Light of Recent Supreme Court Precedent, 24 Regent U. L. Rev. 237 (2012)

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