The new SCOTUS term is almost upon us
The new SCOTUS term is almost upon us
Although the court has agreed to hear fewer than two dozen cases so far, some of what could become the biggest cases of the term are just making their way to the justices now.
Believe it or not, we are less than 20 days until the start of the new Supreme Court term.
The justices will be back on the bench and hearing arguments in a First Step Act-related case on Oct. 2, and we’ll be back at it (as if things slowed down much, if at all, this summer).
The biggest two cases already on the docket include the case over whether the Supreme Court’s gun rights decisions mean the government can’t bar gun possession by people against whom domestic-violence restraining orders have been issued and whether the court is going to take a sledgehammer to the modern administrative state.
And though there are other important cases already on the docket, the reality over the past several terms has been that oftentimes the biggest cases of the term aren’t even granted until months after the justices return from their summer vacations (some of which are sometimes paid for by billionaires (and that won’t be disclosed until next year)).
In fact, right now, the justices only have 22 cases on the docket to be argued thus far for the upcoming term.
Already this coming term, though, there are — for better or worse — several important issues at or quickly on their way to the high court, including the mifepristone case out of Texas and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, cases over gender-affirming medical care for minors out of several states and circuits (including, most notably for now, Alabama, Kentucky, and Tennessee), and Alabama’s voting-rights refusal.
I’ll obviously have much more on these and other cases in the coming weeks and months, but I wanted to highlight this, in part, to give you all a heads-up that I’m going to be talking about this upcoming term with Rhiannon Hamam, Peter Shamshiri and Michael Liroff on the one and only 5-4 podcast!
I’ll highlight the episode when it posts, but if you think SCOTUS is a shitshow, you should probably just subscribe to the podcast now — if you don’t already.
Social media case reaches SCOTUS
Justice Sam Alito temporarily put on hold the injunction that was going to be limiting whether and under what circumstances many members of the Biden administration could talk with social media companies. It’s a wild case, shockingly not out of Texas (but nonetheless within the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit) — and it, too, could end up becoming a significant case in the upcoming term.
After the appeals court ruled against administration on several key points last week, the Justice Department went to the Supreme Court on Thursday, asking for a stay of the injunction.
Alito didn’t do that, but he did issue an administrative stay so, presumably, the full court can consider the request.
Responses to the administration’s stay request from the challengers are due by 4 p.m. ET Wednesday, Sept. 20, and the administrative stay issued by Alito is (as of now) set to last until 11:59 p.m. ET Friday, Sept. 22.
Read more here: