• Treasury and IRS announce new guidance narrowing the Johnson Amendment's application to internal religious communications, potentially restoring speech rights for churches, synagogues, mosques, and other houses of worship.
  • The Johnson Amendment (1954) has prohibited tax-exempt organizations from political campaign intervention for over 70 years, creating a chilling effect on clergy speech from the pulpit.
  • The new interpretation would protect bona fide internal communications connected to religious services delivered through customary channels.
  • Part of a broader executive agenda including rescinding VA chaplain speech codes, restoring disaster relief eligibility for faith-based organizations, and establishing Faith Offices across federal agencies.
  • Legislative action still needed — the guidance narrows enforcement but only Congress can repeal or permanently reform the Johnson Amendment.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service announced plans to develop and issue new guidance on how the Johnson Amendment applies to religious organizations — a move that could significantly expand the speech rights of churches, synagogues, mosques, and other houses of worship across the country.

The announcement follows National Religious Broadcasters v. Bessent, in which the IRS sought to resolve the case by articulating a position that many religious liberty advocates have argued for decades: that communications internal to a house of worship should not be treated as prohibited political campaign intervention.

What the Johnson Amendment Does

The Johnson Amendment, enacted in 1954, prohibits tax-exempt organizations — including churches and religious institutions — from participating in or intervening in political campaigns on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office. Violations can result in the loss of tax-exempt status, which for most religious organizations would be financially devastating.

For over seventy years, the amendment has created a chilling effect on religious speech. Pastors, rabbis, and imams have been told that addressing the moral dimensions of political issues from the pulpit could put their congregation's tax status at risk. The result has been a system where the government effectively regulates what religious leaders can say to their own congregations — a restriction that sits uncomfortably with the First Amendment's protections of both religious exercise and free speech.

The New Guidance

The government's emerging position represents a meaningful narrowing of the Johnson Amendment's reach. Under the proposed interpretation, bona fide communications internal to a house of worship — including communications between the house of worship and its congregation in connection with religious services, delivered through customary channels and concerning matters of faith — would not constitute the type of political campaign intervention that the law prohibits.

In practical terms, this means a pastor discussing the moral implications of a policy position during a Sunday sermon, or a rabbi addressing an issue of concern during Shabbat services, would be protected activity rather than a potential tax code violation. The key limiting factors are that the communication must be internal, connected to religious services, and delivered through the congregation's customary channels.

A Broader Religious Liberty Agenda

The Johnson Amendment guidance is part of a wider series of executive actions on religious liberty. The administration has ordered the repeal of all regulations conflicting with Supreme Court precedents on religious freedom. Federal agencies have been directed to support and protect religious expression in the workplace.

Specific actions have already been taken across the government. The Department of Veterans Affairs rescinded speech codes that censored military chaplains' sermons — a restriction that had forced chaplains to sanitize their religious messages to avoid institutional discipline. The Small Business Administration eliminated a Biden-era prohibition on disaster relief for faith-based organizations, which had effectively punished religious institutions for being religious when they needed help most.

The White House has also established institutional infrastructure for religious engagement, including a Faith Office housed in the West Wing and Centers for Faith with dedicated Faith Directors or Liaisons in every federal department and agency.

Why This Matters

Religious liberty is not a niche concern — it is a core constitutional right that protects every American, regardless of faith tradition. When the government can dictate what a religious leader says to a willing congregation, it has crossed a line that the Founders drew clearly in the First Amendment.

The Johnson Amendment has always been constitutionally suspect. It was introduced by then-Senator Lyndon Johnson not as a principled stand for the separation of church and state, but as a tactical move to silence nonprofit organizations that opposed his reelection. That a political maneuver from 1954 has been used for seven decades to regulate religious speech is itself an indictment of how slowly constitutional principles are vindicated in practice.

The Treasury and IRS guidance does not repeal the Johnson Amendment — that would require an act of Congress. But it narrows the amendment's application in the context where it has always been most constitutionally problematic: the internal religious communications of houses of worship. This is a step toward restoring the speech rights that religious organizations should never have lost.

Congress should finish the job. The Johnson Amendment should be legislatively narrowed or repealed to ensure that no future administration can reverse this guidance and return to a regime where the IRS serves as the speech police for America's congregations.