In a major ruling Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a Texas law requiring pornography websites to verify the age of users before granting them access to explicit content. The decision, split 6–3 along ideological lines, affirms states’ power to regulate online access to sexually explicit material in the interest of protecting minors — even if it places a burden on adult users.
The case, Free Speech Coalition, Inc. v. Paxton, challenged the constitutionality of House Bill 1181, a 2023 Texas statute mandating that websites with more than one-third of their content deemed “harmful to minors” implement strict age-verification measures. Industry trade group Free Speech Coalition sued Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, arguing the law violated the First Amendment rights of adults by placing barriers to lawful expression and access.
But writing for the majority, Justice Clarence Thomas concluded that the law was a permissible exercise of state power. “The power to require age verification is within a State’s authority to prevent children from accessing sexually explicit content,” Thomas wrote. “H.B. 1181 is a constitutionally permissible exercise of that authority.”
The ruling represents a significant victory for states seeking to tighten online safeguards for minors. It also marks a defeat for adult content creators and platforms that have argued these laws chill free speech by effectively deterring lawful adult access.
Legal Standards at the Core
At the heart of the dispute was a complex question about how courts should weigh the constitutionality of laws that impact adult access to protected speech while trying to shield minors from harmful content.
The Free Speech Coalition argued that any restriction on adult access to constitutionally protected materials — even in the name of protecting children — must pass strict scrutiny, the most demanding level of judicial review. Under strict scrutiny, a law must further a compelling government interest and use the least restrictive means possible.
But the Court disagreed, applying instead intermediate scrutiny — a more flexible standard often used in First Amendment cases. Under that standard, the law must serve an important government interest in a way that is substantially related to achieving that goal.
“H.B. 1181 has only an incidental effect on protected speech,” Justice Thomas wrote, “and is therefore subject to intermediate scrutiny.” He added that the First Amendment “leaves undisturbed States’ traditional power to prevent minors from accessing speech that is obscene from their perspective,” including requiring age verification before accessing it.
The dissent, led by Justice Elena Kagan and joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, warned that the ruling could create a dangerous precedent allowing states to impose burdens on adult speech in the name of child protection.
Broader Industry Fallout
The ruling also cements a growing trend of online adult content providers withdrawing from states with similar laws. Pornhub, one of the most-visited adult websites globally, left the Texas market in 2024 following a lower court’s decision to uphold the law. The company has now pulled its services from 17 states due to age-verification requirements it says are invasive and impractical.
Critics of the law say that requiring users to upload personal identification not only deters adult users but poses privacy and security risks. Advocates, however, argue that such measures are necessary to limit exposure of harmful material to children and teens, who often have unrestricted internet access.
The Road Ahead
Friday’s decision may open the door for more states to pass similar laws with confidence that they can survive constitutional challenges. Several legislatures have already considered or enacted age-verification mandates, inspired in part by the same Texas model.
Legal experts say the ruling underscores a broader shift in the Court’s interpretation of digital free speech rights — particularly in contexts where states assert traditional interests like protecting minors or regulating obscenity.
For now, the Supreme Court has made it clear: while adults have the right to access explicit content, that right does not extend to doing so anonymously when a state’s interest in shielding minors is on the line.
