Washington – A U.S. District Court judge has issued a final judgment today stating that a key part of Maryland’s Digital Tax law violates the First Amendment. The State of Maryland is now barred from attempting to enforce that portion of the law against any member of CCIA or of its fellow plaintiffs, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and NetChoice.
The order comes after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit issued a decision in August 2025 that the “pass-through prohibition” in the law, which prohibited companies that pay the Digital Tax from telling their customers how the tax will affect them, violates the First Amendment “in all of its applications.”
The Maryland law imposes a substantial tax, up to 10 percent of global revenue, on the nation’s most popular digital services. The “pass-through prohibition” is the issue that CCIA and its co-plaintiffs challenged as a violation of the tax payors’ right to free speech.
The following can be attributed to Stephanie Joyce, CCIA Senior Vice President and Director of the CCIA Litigation Center for the Connected Economy:
“This final judgment means that companies now can exercise their right to speak freely with clients and customers about the financial impact of this tax. CCIA is proud to have assisted in securing this result and will continue to protect the First Amendment rights of all American consumers, businesses, and internet users to post, display, and access lawful content and communications of their choice.”
