Federal courts have recently started ruling that drawn or animated child pornography is just as illegal as photographic child pornography and that the people who posses, watch or trade in non photographic child pornography are criminals and subject to punishment just as much as those involved with photographic child pornography.
https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdtx/pr/league-city-man-gets-35-years-exploiting-child-kik>FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE>Wednesday, July 20, 2022>League City man gets 35 years for exploiting child on Kik>GALVESTON, Texas – A 38-year-old man has been ordered to federal prison following his conviction of production and possession of child pornography, announced U.S. Attorney Jennifer B. Lowery.>Scott Jacob McGuire pleaded guilty Aug. 8, 2021.>Today, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey V. Brown sentenced McGuire to 360 and 60 months for the production and possession convictions, respectively. They will run consecutively for a total 420-month-term of imprisonment. >At the hearing, the court an impact statement from one of the identified victims in the images McGuire possessed. >Additionally, he will serve the rest of his life on supervised release following completion of his prison term. >During that time, he will have to comply with numerous requirements designed to restrict his access to children and the internet. >McGuire will also be ordered to register as a sex offender.>Law enforcement was able to locate McGuire in League City and executed a search warrant at his residence. >At that time, they seized numerous devices and discovered 721 images of child pornography, a large amount of child erotica and CGI animation child pornography.Cases like the one above, where the anime porn is included in the list of evidence of guilt and in the calculation of the severity of the penalty, have been dropping like mad from the justice department over the past couple months. It is very good odds that they are specifically hoping to use this new policy as a means to target the "nazis" who post on 4chan.
In past politically motivated persecutions of imageboard posters, the courts have had no problem at all about accepting anime as evidence of child pornography.