Nick Robinson

We need a more sober approach. Congress should have investigatory powers, but without more restraint it’s too easy to use this tool to harass or intimidate. At the very least Congressional committees should require majority votes before issuing subpoenas.

But there are impacts. They distract groups from their missions. Narratives get created. And if each Congress takes the approach of just targeting those they disagree with it will make everyone worse off.

Most of these investigations don’t escalate – no subpoenas, federal law enforcement doesn’t investigate, no follow up letters. In fact, for many Congressional queries it doesn’t seem like even if the accusations were true that anyone did anything unlawful.

I think folks can both over-play and under-play the effect of these investigations.

Just three committees – House Oversight, Judiciary, and Education and Workforce issued over half the investigatory actions.

Foreign influence was by far the most common legal hook (29% of investigations). I still don’t think the sector in the U.S. has really internalized how frequent this line of attack has become (its long been a strategy in other countries to delegitimize those you disagree with).

The most common legal bases for investigations were potential violations of: (1) foreign influence laws, (2) tax laws, (3) laws regulating fraud, (4) anti-discrimination laws, and (5) campaign finance laws.

The top five types of nonprofits targeted in order are: (1) universities; (2) environmental groups; (3) voting rights organizations, (4) Palestinian rights groups, and (5) foundations.

Interesting new data from @USCNL_org on the spike in Congressional investigations targeting nonprofits. There have been over 150 investigatory actions this Congress affecting hundreds of organizations. No previous Congress – at least recently - comes close.

Judges and the public should be skeptical of the growing number of fraud claims being made against nonprofits in political contexts. Given the sweep of these statutes, it’s all too easy for the government to exercise censorship by other means through fraud allegations. (12/12)

The AGs claimed “false statements” were being used by Media Matters in the report to help their fundraising. A federal judge though found the report was protected speech under the First Amendment and stopped the state investigations. (11/12) deadline.com/wp-content/uplo…

A federal judge found as much in 2024. After the urging of Stephen Miller, the TX and MO AGs issued demands under their consumer anti-fraud statutes against Media Matters for their report that alleged advertisements were being placed on X next to antisemitic content. (10/12)

These types of sweeping fraud claims by the government allow for targeting organizations the government simply doesn’t like. This could be used as easily to target conservatives as liberals. It also raises clear constitutional issues. (9/12)

Or there was a case filed against ActBlue this week by the Texas AG under its consumer fraud statute. The claim is essentially that ActBlue misrepresented that they had strong systems in place to protect against foreign donations, but didn’t. (8/12) texasattorneygeneral.gov/new…

As 23 Republican state AGs wrote in August 2025: “State consumer protection laws prohibit deceptive and misleading statements to market a product. ELI is representing its training as objective when reality shows that it is not.” (7/12) ago.wv.gov/media/37549/downl…

The subpoena is light on details, but the AG seems to argue that ELI’s training was pitched as “neutral” even though ELI (unsurprisingly) has connections to climate litigation. As such, judges – “consumers” – were being defrauded by this training that isn't "neutral". (6/12)

It’s already started at the state level. Last week, the Florida attorney general subpoenaed the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) over a judicial training program they run. The FL AG claimed it violated a state consumer protection anti-fraud law. (5/12) myfloridalegal.com/newsrelea…

This type of fraud charge should concern everyone. The government is arguing that if a nonprofit states something that can be interpreted as a misrepresentation they can be targeted for fraud. This is a dangerous political weapon. (4/12)

DoJ claims this misrepresentation is the basis for its six wire fraud charges against SPLC - punishable by 20 years in jail each. To be clear, according to SPLC, paid informants helped save lives and was part of its work to dismantle these groups. (3/12)

Some background: SPLC’s website stated donations would be used to “dismantle” hate groups. SPLC had a program that paid informants at hate groups. DoJ argues this somehow shows donations were used not to dismantle, but support hate groups. (2/12) justice.gov/opa/pr/federal-g…