Federal law defines child pornography as including CGI images that depict children engaging in sex, so realistic sex dolls are likely also covered.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2256
“Federal law defines child pornography as including CGI images that depict children engaging in sex, so realistic sex dolls are likely also covered.”
hmmm. Images of children are pornographic?
Yet "teen porn" is perhaps the most popular genre of pornography. There's no shortage or porn sites featuring barely 18 adult models wearing babydoll dresses and pigtails.
Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition, case in which, on April 16, 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a lower court’s decision that provisions of the Child Pornography Prevention Act (CPPA) of 1996 were vague and overly broad and thus violated the free-speech protection contained in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The act specifically proscribed computer-generated or -altered depictions of minors engaging in explicit sexual conduct (so-called “virtual” child pornography) and images of explicit sexual conduct by adults who resemble minors. The court ruled that the law’s expanded definition of child pornography as including any image that “appears to be” of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct or that is “presented…in such a manner that conveys the impression” that it is of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct would criminalize images that are not obscene and images that were not produced with any real children.
https://www.britannica.com/event/Ashcroft-v-Free-Speech-Coalition
There was a case recently in Tennessee or Kentucky where police arrested a man who had got one of these child sex dolls. The police claimed it was equivalent to child porn. A judge dismissed the case outright.