Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-842_6kg7.pdf
Page Number: 30

Cite as:  602 U. S. ____ (2024) 

5 

JACKSON, J., concurring 

speech that ‘would not have been taken absent the retalia-
tory motive.’ ”  Wilson, 595 U. S., at 477 (quoting Nieves, 587 
U. S., at 399).  Although our analysis has varied by context, 
see  Lozman  v.  Riviera  Beach,  585  U. S.  87,  96–99  (2018), 
we  have  generally  required  plaintiffs  claiming  First 
Amendment  retaliation  to  “establish  a  ‘causal  connection’ 
between  the  government  defendant’s  ‘retaliatory  animus’ 
and the plaintiff’s ‘subsequent injury,’ ” Nieves, 587 U. S., at 
398 (quoting Hartman v. Moore, 547 U. S. 250, 259 (2006)).
Requiring that causal connection to a retaliatory motive
is important, because “[s]ome official actions adverse to . . .
a speaker might well be unexceptionable if taken on other 
grounds.”  Id., at 256.  In this case, for example, analyzing 
causation matters because much of Vullo’s alleged conduct,
if not done for retaliatory reasons, might otherwise be legit-
imate enforcement of New York’s insurance regulations.  

How  a  retaliation  analysis  should  proceed  in  this  case
was not addressed below, so the Court rightly leaves that 
question  unanswered  today.    But,  importantly,  any  such
analysis requires more than asking simply whether the gov-
ernment’s  actions  crossed  the  threshold  from  permissible
persuasion to  impermissible  coercion.   The  NRA  concedes 
that, at the very least, our burden-shifting framework from 
Mt. Healthy City Bd. of Ed. v. Doyle, 429 U. S. 274 (1977), 
likely applies.  See Reply Brief 16–17.  Should that test gov-
ern, the NRA would have to plausibly allege that a retalia-
tory motive was a “ ‘substantial’ ” or “ ‘motivating factor’ ” in 
Vullo’s  targeting  of  the  regulated  entities  doing  business 
with  the  NRA.  Mt.  Healthy,  429  U. S.,  at  287.    Vullo,  in 
turn, could rebut that allegation by showing that she would
have  taken  the  same  action  “even  in  the  absence  of  the 
[NRA’s] protected conduct.”  Ibid.; see Lozman, 585 U. S., 
at 96 (“[E]ven if retaliation might have been a substantial 
motive for the board’s action, still there was no liability un-
less the alleged constitutional violation was a but-for cause 
of the employment termination”).