The sex case in the Supreme Court this week is about protecting children, the Republican AG said

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is fighting to uphold a Texas law that he says prevents the pornography industry from targeting children with harmful content.

Passed in 2023 and signed into law by Texas Governor Greg Abbott, the law requires sex sites to verify users' age with official documents such as a driver's license or government-issued ID. Under the law, failure to use this age verification results in fines.

Meanwhile, a group of porn sites calling themselves the Free Speech Coalition says the Texas law restricts their First Amendment rights and places an undue burden on Texas adults in accessing their content.

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Pornhub, the most popular adult content website in the country, even blocked access to their website to all users in Texas after the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled to uphold the law.

The two sides finally faced each other on Wednesday to present their case to the High Court.

For its part, the state's highest court appeared united in agreeing with Paxton's argument that states have an interest in limiting children's access to pornography. Some justices, however, appear to still have concerns about whether the Texas law's ban is too broad and could affect other areas of free speech.

The question before the court now is whether the Texas law should be subject to “reasonable” review or “strict scrutiny,” the latter of which would require Texas to meet minimum standards to maintain the age verification requirement.

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The US Supreme Court appears, Nov. 15, 2023, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib)

Whatever the court decides will affect not only the Texas law but also other age-verification laws in more than a dozen states across the country.

In an interview with Fox News Digital after the hearing, Paxton said he feels confident the Supreme Court will rule in Texas' favor.

“Hearing the questions and seeing the opinions of the judges, I feel very hopeful, I think we will win this,” he said. “I feel good about it. I think most of the judges will come down on the right side.”

“Even the other side that presents their arguments has admitted that we are interested in protecting children,” he continued. “They just said that the way we were doing it was a heavy burden on the elderly, and then they gave other suggestions, those suggestions of the workers and that's why they volunteered, they don't want age verification. because it really works, and it hits their bottom line.”

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The exterior of the Texas State Capitol is seen on September 05, 2023 in Austin, Texas. The trial of former Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton begins today as Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick presided over the proceedings. Paxton is facing multiple charges including bribery, making false statements and breach of public trust. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

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Responding to criticism about the law's potential violation of freedom of speech, Paxton said: “Look, I'm a libertarian. I see there are few limits to free speech. However, we've seen that we need to protect children from all kinds of freedoms. We don't let them sign contracts, we don't let them get married until they're of age. 18, we don't allow them to be served alcohol, we don't allow them to smoke, we have protected children, that's it [throughout] our entire history.”

“If you look anywhere in the developed world or anywhere [else]children are protected,” he added. “It's my job to enforce Texas law. This time I feel free to protect our children from having this put in front of them.”