TCPA Mid-Year Review 2026: What Changed for Businesses

The first half of 2026 gave businesses that call and text one delay, one favorable appellate ruling, and two Ninth Circuit decisions that cut both ways. The FCC pushed its revoke-all rule back to January 2027. The Seventh Circuit held that texts can’t support a Do Not Call claim under one section. The Ninth Circuit treated texts as calls under another and revived a case against a defendant that argued its messages weren’t marketing.

What happened to the revoke-all rule?

It was delayed again. The FCC’s 2024 revocation rule includes a requirement that a revocation made in response to one type of message applies to all future robocalls and robotexts from that caller on unrelated matters. A bureau order in April 2025 delayed that piece to April 11, 2026. On January 6, 2026, the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau issued DA 26-12, finding that “good cause exists to extend the effective date for this requirement until January 31, 2027,” to allow time to review the record compiled in response to a rulemaking notice.

The rest of the revocation rule, including the ten-business-day deadline and the recognition of reasonable methods, has been in effect since April 2025. The delay applies only to the cross-category piece. A company that treats the delay as a reason to ignore revocation altogether is misreading it, because the order extends only the one requirement it names and leaves every other revocation obligation, including the deadline for honoring a request, exactly where the rule put it.

Are texts “calls”? The Ninth and Seventh Circuits answer different questions

In January, the Ninth Circuit decided Howard v. Republican National Committee, a case about texts that contained video files. The court held that a text message is a call for purposes of the TCPA’s prohibition on prerecorded-voice calls, reasoning that “an auto-dialed text message to a phone number thus frequently entails an immediate intrusion on privacy comparable to that associated with the ring of an incoming auto-dialed phone call.” It also held that the video text at issue was not a prerecorded-voice call. The plaintiff lost.

In July, the Seventh Circuit reached a different result on a different section. In Steidinger v. Blackstone Medical Services, the court said it considered “whether § 227(c)(5)’s reference to unwanted telephone calls extends to text messages.” It answered in the same decision: “Because we conclude that § 227(c)(5) does not permit plaintiffs to sue for the receipt of unwanted texts, we affirm.”

The two rulings are not in conflict. Howard concerns the autodialer and prerecorded-voice provision. Steidinger concerns the private right of action for Do Not Call claims. I haven’t found a Ninth Circuit ruling on the second question as of this date, so a California business can’t assume Steidinger applies, but it can raise it.

What did the Fifth Circuit say about consent?

In February, in Bradford v. Sovereign Pest Control of TX, Inc., the court held that “prior express consent” covers oral consent for telemarketing calls with a prerecorded voice, writing that “The statute provides no basis for concluding that telemarketing calls require prior express written consent but not oral consent.” It binds only the Fifth Circuit, and a plaintiff in California can be expected to cite the FCC’s written-consent rule, which the Fifth Circuit disagreed with, as the standard a court in this circuit may still apply. Elsewhere, the FCC’s written-consent rule remains the standard to meet, and a California business should keep collecting written consent.

What did the Ninth Circuit say about marketing purpose?

In June, in Coffey v. Fast Easy Offer, LLC, the court revived a putative TCPA class action. The court said that, taking the plaintiff’s allegations as true, “one purpose for which Defendants initiated these messages was to encourage the purchase of real estate brokerage services. That is enough to satisfy the statutory definition.” A message with a mixed purpose can still be telemarketing if one purpose is to encourage a purchase.

For a business, that is the cautionary half of the year’s story. A friendly check-in text that has a sales purpose in the background can count as a solicitation. I’d review message templates for the sales purpose behind them, not only for how they read.

What does Steidinger leave open?

A good deal. The court addressed one section, § 227(c)(5), and it left the agency’s other tools alone. In the court’s words, spam messages “may be curbed through agency action pursuant to other provisions of § 227.” The decision doesn’t touch the autodialer and prerecorded-voice provision, where Howard treated texts as calls, and it doesn’t stop the FCC or a state attorney general from acting. Many states also have their own text-message statutes, which a federal court’s reading of § 227(c)(5) doesn’t control.

So a defendant who wins on Steidinger in a text-only Do Not Call case has won one claim. If the complaint also pleads a state-law count, an autodialer count, or a quiet-hours count, each needs its own answer. I’d plan the motion around that, with the Steidinger argument as the lead point for the Do Not Call count and the other counts handled separately.

What does Coffey change for check-in and nurture texts?

It makes the test one of purpose, and it looks at the purpose behind the initiation of the message. A text that says only that a listing is still available looks informational. If the sender’s business model is to turn recipients into clients, the court may treat sales as a purpose even though the message doesn’t ask for a purchase. That puts weight on internal documents such as campaign briefs and scripts, and on the sender’s own description of what the messages are for.

For a company running nurture sequences, the practical step is to decide in advance which messages are marketing and to run them under the marketing rules, including the consent record and the quiet-hours window along with the opt-out process. It’s cheaper to treat a doubtful message as marketing than to argue about it after a demand letter arrives.

What should a business do in the second half of 2026?

Four things. Keep building to the written-consent rule and the ten-day opt-out handling, because the delay doesn’t change either. Review text templates for sales purpose, now that Coffey is the law in the Ninth Circuit. Prepare the Steidinger argument for text-only Do Not Call claims, with the caveat that it isn’t binding in California. And use the extra time on the revoke-all piece to map your systems, since a delay is a deadline that hasn’t arrived.

I’d also treat the cases as a reason to separate claims in your risk analysis, because a company that lumps a text-only Do Not Call theory, a prerecorded-voice theory, and an autodialer theory into one exposure number will overstate some risks and miss the ones where the law has actually moved against it. A text-only Do Not Call claim, a prerecorded-voice claim, and an autodialer claim now face different law. A demand letter that lumps them together deserves an answer that separates them.

What to gather when a demand letter cites these cases

1. Identify which statutory provision each claim relies on, and which circuit’s law governs.
2. Pull the message templates and note the sales purpose behind each.
3. Pull the consent records and the opt-out log, with the ten-business-day timing.
4. Collect the vendor and platform records for the campaign.
5. Wait to respond to the letter or contact the sender until a lawyer has reviewed the claims.

The firm’s TCPA litigation defense page describes how these claims move through court. For related reading, see the earlier posts on McLaughlin and deference to the FCC and on the Fifth Circuit’s oral-consent ruling.

Questions businesses ask about the 2026 developments

Does the Seventh Circuit decision end Do Not Call text claims in California?

No. It binds the Seventh Circuit, and its reasoning may persuade other courts. California federal courts sit in the Ninth Circuit, which I haven’t found to have decided the question under § 227(c)(5).

Is the revoke-all rule canceled?

No. The effective date of that piece was extended to January 31, 2027. The remainder of the revocation rule is in effect.

Do the Ninth Circuit decisions help or hurt?

Both. Howard went against the plaintiff on video texts, and Coffey revived a Do Not Call claim. Read each for its own holding.

How should a demand letter that cites only one of these cases be read?

With the cases side by side. A letter that relies on Howard to argue that texts are calls may be right about the prerecorded-voice provision and still wrong about the Do Not Call count, and a letter that ignores Steidinger may be ignoring the strongest argument available to a defendant, even though that argument isn’t binding in California and the answer depends on which court will hear the case and which section the plaintiff invokes.

Should we stop using conversational check-in texts?

Not necessarily. Review them for sales purpose, and treat any message with a purpose to encourage a purchase as marketing for compliance.

Defending TCPA claims in the current law

If your company has been sued or received a demand letter, the date of the claim, the statutory provision, and the court it will be heard in decide which of these cases matters. Rosenberger + Kawabata represents businesses defending TCPA lawsuits and class actions through its business litigation practice, including claims involving calls and texts under current appellate decisions. Contact Rosenberger + Kawabata online for a free and confidential consultation, or call (310) 894-6921.

Sources

The FCC order is DA 26-12 (Jan. 6, 2026).

The court decisions are Howard v. Republican National Committee, No. 23-3826 (9th Cir. Jan. 13, 2026); Bradford v. Sovereign Pest Control of TX, Inc., No. 24-20379 (5th Cir. Feb. 25, 2026); Coffey v. Fast Easy Offer, LLC, No. 25-4066 (9th Cir. June 4, 2026); and Steidinger v. Blackstone Medical Services, No. 25-2398 (7th Cir. July 14, 2026).

This post is general information about the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and related laws as of July 22, 2026. It is not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Courts and the FCC change the rules in this area often, and the outcome of any claim depends on its facts. Past results do not guarantee future outcomes.