SCOTUS
SCOTUS
The Supreme Court of the United States.
Monday 1 April 2019
On Monday, Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, writing for the majority, said the Missouri inmate, Russell Bucklew, had waited too long to object to the way the state planned to execute him.
The justices declined to hear an appeal by the activists of a lower court’s refusal to toss out fraud, invasion of privacy and other claims
Monday 25 March 2019
An unnamed foreign government-owned corporation will have to turn over information that was related to the special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation to federal prosecutors or continue to accrue escalating fines
Wednesday 20 March 2019
Brett Kavanaugh showed a surprising liberal streak on a racial issue presented to the Supreme Court
Tuesday 19 March 2019
The 5-4 majority ruled that the government can detain non-citizens indefinitely, even years after they went to jail.
The court confirms ICE can bar immigrants from bond based on years-old crimes. Liberal justices worry detainees’ basic rights are under attack.
Monday 18 March 2019
A series of White House hopefuls are expressing new interest in remaking the courts — payback for Republican aggression during the Obama presidency.
Wednesday 13 March 2019
The justices strike a blow against policing for profit.
Wednesday 20 February 2019
“This system — where police can seize property with limited judicial oversight and retain it for their own use — has led to egregious and well-chronicled abuses”
Tuesday 19 February 2019
The company -- which, in more recent court filings, considers itself interchangeable with the unnamed country that owns it -- lost its challenge before the trial court and a federal court of appeals in Washington to avoid turning over the information.
Friday 8 February 2019
Kavanaugh’s opinion demonstrates that he is open to the strategy of subjecting abortion rights to death by a thousand cuts.
Thursday 7 February 2019
Chief Justice John Roberts joined with the court's more liberal justices to continue blocking implementation of the law.
Friday 1 February 2019
Alito said in a brief order that the justices needed more time to review the filings in the case. As such he put the law on hold until February 7.
Monday 28 January 2019
Because, according to the court, the law was intended to serve “the broad dominant purpose of preserving the purity and integrity of the white race.”
It promised to create a ‘robust’ waiver process for visa applicants from countries affected by the travel ban. The process is a sham.
Tuesday 22 January 2019
Government Shutdown Day 32
...the committee could move to impeach the newly-appointed justice if their findings prove he knowingly lied to lawmakers during his confirmation process.
...a challenge to New York City’s prohibition on carrying a licensed, locked and unloaded handgun outside the city limits.
...leaving protections for nearly 700,000 undocumented immigrants who came to the US as children in place for at least the next several months.
...as the justices put on hold lower court rulings blocking the plan on constitutional grounds.
Monday 14 January 2019
Government Shutdown Day 24
Opponents of his appointment said he was not qualified for the position because he was not subject to Senate confirmation.
Thursday 10 January 2019
Government Shutdown Day 20
...but will miss oral arguments at the court next week to rest
Tuesday 8 January 2019
Government Shutdown Day 18
The court’s order Tuesday offered no explanation for its decision and no justice publicly signaled any dissent.
Monday 7 January 2019
Government Shutdown Day 17
...the first time in her career as a justice that she has missed a session.
Tuesday 1 January 2019
Government Shutdown Day 11
John Roberts highlighted recommendations, including revising codes of conduct for judges and employees, in year-end report
Sunday 30 December 2018
Government Shutdown Day 9
It appears that federal judges can indeed make inappropriately partisan statements, so long as they are important judges with powerful partisan friends.
How could someone like Kennedy, who provided the pivotal vote and wrote so eloquently in support of the most important LGBTQ rights decisions, trust those rights to Trump?
Saturday 29 December 2018
Government Shutdown Day 8
...the chief justice blocked the District Court’s order requiring the foreign corporation to comply with the grand jury subpoena, until the government’s lawyers could respond to the Corporation’s briefings.
Friday 28 December 2018
Government Shutdown Day 7
...three days ahead of the Monday deadline set by the court.
Sunday 23 December 2018
Government Shutdown Day 2
The pause lasts until the court has time to review a response from the government due on or before December 31.
Saturday 22 December 2018
Government Shutdown Day 1
An unnamed, foreign government-owned company in a mystery court case is asking the Supreme Court to pause a grand jury subpoena it received related to special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation.
Friday 21 December 2018
“Last week the Supreme Court reversed a century of law that I believe will open the floodgates for special interests, including foreign corporations, to spend without limits in our elections. I don’t think American elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities.”
Unfortunately, Kavanaugh sees things differently. The newest justice appears to have suspended his judgment and reading skills to run interference for the Trump administration
The 83 ethics claims filed against Brett Kavanaugh that cannot be processed underscore what SCOTUS lost this year.
We cannot indict a sitting president; we cannot discipline a sitting justice. If you are untruthful for a long enough period of time, you can find your way into a job where there are no consequences for being untruthful.
The nodules were discovered during tests to treat rib fractures she sustained in a fall last month
Tuesday 18 December 2018
...the council said that the complaints [...] could not be acted on because Kavanaugh, as a justice, is no longer covered by the judiciary's misconduct rules.
Monday 10 December 2018
Kavanaugh joined the majority to allow the lower court’s decision to stand, leading some to speculate that he and others on the Court want to avoid cases related to abortion rights or Planned Parenthood for now after his bruising confirmation fight.
The result is that people can continue to use Medicaid money for pregnancy-related Planned Parenthood services. Now, this is not for abortion-related services. Federal law prohibits people to use Medicaid money for abortion.
Friday 7 December 2018
The court has never established a standard to resolve extreme partisan gerrymanders, and if it chooses to do so, it could revolutionize the way congressional and state legislative maps are drawn.
Thursday 6 December 2018
“Your argument” is “one note,” Justice Kagan tells Chaiten in an unusually candid exchange. Yes, there are members of the Court who think that originalism is the “alpha and omega” of constitutional interpretation, but most of them do not.
Wednesday 28 November 2018
Although Gorsuch led the charge, no justice seemed to think that the Constitution permits states to impose excessive fines.
Conservatives criticized the decision on where the story was housed.
Saturday 24 November 2018
Solicitor General Noel Francisco filed petitions asking the justices to take up the issue in three separate cases that are still in lower courts so it could be decided definitively this term.
Friday 23 November 2018
As they are often used, such laws are incentives for abusive governments, because the entity that seizes the property frequently is allowed to profit by keeping or selling it.
Thursday 22 November 2018
Wednesday 21 November 2018
"We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges. What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them."
Thursday 8 November 2018
It is not the first time that Ginsburg has fractured her ribs while on the court. In June 2012, Ginsburg fractured two ribs in a fall and did not disclose the injury to the public until months later.
Wednesday 7 November 2018
On Tuesday, they joined four other states whose “trigger bans” take effect if Roe v. Wade falls.
Tuesday 6 November 2018
"So you're saying that even if the method imposes gruesome, brutal pain, you can still go forward?" Kavanaugh asked. "Is there any limit on that?"
Monday 5 November 2018
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused a request by the Trump administration and the telecommunications industry to wipe away a lower court decision that had upheld Obama-era net neutrality rules aimed at ensuring a free and open internet
Saturday 3 November 2018
Wednesday 31 October 2018
Now it emerges that NBC News was aware that there might be other serious problems with her story — but waited until Thursday last week to inform the public.
Thursday 25 October 2018
...alleging that they made “materially false” statements to Grassley’s committee as it investigated the allegations.
Tuesday 23 October 2018
It’s the second time the high court has paused a climate change-related case.
Monday 22 October 2018
The court’s action makes it unlikely that Ross will have to give a deposition in the case but allows the suit to go forward, at least temporarily.
Sunday 21 October 2018
The majority leader's comments on entitlements allow Democrats to change the conversation from Brett Kavanaugh.
Sunday 14 October 2018
“It doesn’t matter,” Trump told Lesley Stahl. “We won.”
Friday 12 October 2018
Judicial Crisis Network is a 501(c)(4) advocacy organization — a “dark money” group that is not required to disclose the sources of its funding
Thursday 11 October 2018
Wednesday 10 October 2018
The case’s outcome could hinge on the two justices who Trump has appointed to the court: conservatives Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch.
Tuesday 9 October 2018
A dispute over a court-ordered deposition of Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross headed back to the Supreme Court on Tuesday night
Monday 8 October 2018
Trump’s instinct was right. A loyal FBI is worth a purge or two.
Sunday 7 October 2018
McConnell said Saturday he was not concerned that the bitter confirmation process for Judge Brett Kavanaugh would affect future Supreme Court nominations or how women view the Republican Party.
Saturday 6 October 2018
Kavanaugh heads to the Supreme Court significantly scarred from the confirmation fight, which had the echoes of the 1991 battle over now-Justice Clarence Thomas
That judge, Karen LeCraft Henderson, had dismissed other complaints against Kavanaugh as frivolous, but she concluded that some were substantive enough that they should not be handled by Kavanaugh’s fellow judges in the D.C. Circuit.
How Republicans pushed through a damaged nominee with a relentless focus on three undecided senators.
The Senate vote was 50 to 48, almost entirely along party lines.
If the chief judge is disqualified, the complaint falls to the next most senior judge of the court, in this case Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson
Kavanaugh would join Justice Neil Gorsuch [...] as well as President George W. Bush’s picks of Justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito
'I believe Democrats need to be afraid to do what they are doing right now and weak Republicans that do not vote for him need to pay with their lives'
Friday 5 October 2018
The donation page [...] went down briefly on [...] Friday afternoon because of "overwhelming" traffic to the page,
But in her speech announcing that she’d vote to confirm Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, she ended up sounding like Trump.
It works just like impeaching a president.
The White House could not legally order the F.B.I. to rummage indiscriminately through someone’s life, Mr. McGahn told the president.
Demonstrations have swamped Capitol Hill throughout the Kavanaugh confirmation process.
...it’s revisiting its evaluation based on “new information of a material nature regarding temperament.”
It's unclear if Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has the votes to push President Donald Trump's Supreme Court nominee through a final confirmation.
The special background investigation of Brett Kavanaugh involved nine witnesses and bypassed dozens of others named by accusers Christine Blasey Ford and Deborah Ramirez.
He also blamed his emotional state on the “unfairness” of being asked to account for his alleged conduct before being confirmed to a lifetime position.
Thursday 4 October 2018
...conceding he "might have been too emotional" in his testimony in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee last week.
"Yes, I was emotional last Thursday. I hope everyone can understand I was there as a son, husband and dad."
“I’ve changed my views for reasons that have no relationship to his intellectual ability. . . . I feel his performance in the hearings ultimately changed my mind.”
Republicans moved forward with plans for a key procedural vote on Friday and a final vote on Saturday
Graham said he has no plans to personally read the FBI report on Supreme Court justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh, but he’s confident the supplemental background check found no evidence to corroborate allegations of sexual misconduct.
NPR has confirmed the identities of six people whom the FBI interviewed as part of its investigation
Wednesday 3 October 2018
I do not know if Brett attacked Christine Blasey Ford in high school or if he sexually humiliated Debbie in front of a group of people she thought were her friends. But I can say that he lied under oath.
"Oh, good. How did you get home? 'I don't remember.' How did you get there? 'I don't remember.' Where is the place? 'I don't remember.' How many years ago was it? 'I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.' "
...including sending only a single copy to Capitol Hill that will be housed in a safe.
And it wasn’t clear why the FBI hasn’t yet talked to other people who have been recommended by lawyers or who have voluntarily come forward -- or if the bureau would need explicit approval to talk with them as well.
Tuesday 2 October 2018
It was highly unusual for a congressional committee to release a statement that included such explicit and unconfirmed details about a member of the public.
...a document that as of Tuesday evening has yet to arrive on Capitol Hill.
This is an article I never imagined myself writing, that I never wanted to write, that I wish I could not write.
Of them all, Judge was like a real brat to me. He taught me to cover the mouths of the pretty bits of sharp so when they creetch in fear, no one can hear them. That way, no one believes them later. It’s a dobby bit of fun.
The Arizona senator called Brett Kavanaugh’s interactions with lawmakers at a hearing last week “sharp and partisan.”
It wouldn’t be a big deal if he didn’t keep lying about drinking.
Monday 1 October 2018
McConnell’s focus right now is entirely on the triumvirate of GOP Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Jeff Flake of Arizona. McConnell needs two out of the three to back Kavanaugh
"Today, Judge Kavanaugh indicated that he can no longer commit to teaching his course in January Term 2019, so the course will not be offered"
Mr. Kavanaugh cursed, he said, and then “threw his beer at the guy.”
Justice Kennedy did more than any living American to undermine democracy. Now he’s mad about it.
He’s said he and his friends are committed to hiding their bad behavior. Take him at his word.
From Boing Boing, the free encyclopedia
"It would be surprising, and it would certainly be highly imprudent, if at any point Judge Kavanaugh directly contacted an individual believed to have information about allegations like this."
Sunday 30 September 2018
1. The game requires three players: the Dealer, the Kavanaugh, and the Public.
The graphic image [...] shows Justice blindfolded and pinned down, her scales cast aside as a man’s hand covers her mouth
...saying that he often saw Judge Kavanaugh “staggering from alcohol consumption.”
Trump said that the FBI will have “free rein” in their Kavanaugh investigation, but this isn’t true
“DO NOT ADD the hoax about a ‘drinking game’, especially as related by Brett Kavanaugh. We do not dignify such hoaxes with mention.”
But if we expect steely resolve from a police officer confronting a knife-wielding assailant, or disciplined courage from a firefighter rushing into a burning house, we should expect stoic self-control and calm from a conservative judge, even if his heart is being eaten out.
While none of this necessarily means that Kavanaugh got into Yale unfairly, or that he did not have the required qualifications to attend or succeed, his statement about lacking “connections” is untrue.
“The Senate is dictating the terms,” she said
Saturday 29 September 2018
Four witnesses will be questioned in coming days
The four witnesses were Mr. Judge; Leland Keyser, a high school friend of Dr. Blasey’s [...]; P.J. Smyth, another party guest; and Ms. Ramirez, the Yale accuser.
Trump is said to have privately made clear that he will hold Senate Republicans accountable if Judge Kavanaugh does not get through
“Had [Kavanaugh] simply told the Judiciary Committee that he partied in high school/college, sometimes to excess – but still denied the assault – these commentaries would be net neutral. Now they contradict his sworn testimony, thereby undermining his other denials and bolstering Dr. Ford.”
"They can do whatever they have to do, whatever it is that they do. They'll be doing things we have never even thought of," Trump said. "And hopefully, at the conclusion, everything will be fine."
The conditions under which the FBI's reopened background check are occurring appears to differ from the one envisioned by Flake
As a matter of organizational policy, the ACLU does not support or oppose candidates for political or judicial office. In this instance, the national board held an extraordinary meeting, and has chosen to make an exception to that policy.
Thursday’s hearings do not reflect a Senate in decline. They reflect a Senate in crisis. That’s entirely different.
Kavanaugh’s choice to lie about things that are easily disproved speaks to a kind of hubris, or entitlement, that befits someone of his pedigree.
Friday 28 September 2018
Former prosecutors said that because it is not a criminal investigation, F.B.I. agents will not be able to get search warrants or grand jury subpoenas compelling witnesses to testify or hand over documents.
“Don’t look away from me,” she said, her voice ripped with emotion. “Look at me and tell me that it doesn’t matter what happened to me, that you will let people like that go into the highest court of the land and tell everyone what they can do to their bodies.”
Like a president or any other federal official, a Supreme Court justice can be impeached under the Constitution. As it says in Article II, Section 4
The president agreed in short order.
But only Ford made an effort to answer every single question.
“The amazing thing they’re saying is human activities are going to lead to this rise of carbon dioxide that is disastrous for the environment and society. And then they’re saying they’re not going to do anything about it”
“I was sexually assaulted and nobody believed me,” she said. “I didn’t tell anyone, and you’re telling all women that they don’t matter.”
The vote to recommend whether Kavanaugh should be the nominee, which would send the nomination to the full Senate, was set for 1:30. The vote to do so was approved, with all Republicans voting aye and eight votes, all Democrats, voting no.
“The basic principles that underscore the Senate’s constitutional duty of advice and consent on federal judicial nominees require nothing less than a careful examination of the accusations and facts by the FBI”
Thursday 27 September 2018
While a Devil’s Triangle is defined as a sex act involving two men and a woman in a decade-old posting on urbandictionary.com, Kavanaugh insisted under oath that it was a drinking game involving three glasses.
Kavanaugh has said too many things that strain credulity for all them to be plausibly true.
The threat it delivered: Imagine how you’d feel if — or when — you were in my position.
“We are not being paid. We have no expectation of being paid.”
“What you want to do is destroy this guy’s life, hold this seat open, and hope you win in 2020”
Presumably they thought a professional prosecutor might help cast doubt on Ford’s testimony.
As TV cameras zoom in on Ford and those questioning her, remember that they are cropping out much of the room — and the true scope of what Ford is facing.
Four Republican governors have called for the Senate to take its time with or even forgo a vote on the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh
Wednesday 26 September 2018
“People want fame. They want money. They want whatever. So when I see it, I view it differently then somebody sitting home watching television, where they say, ‘Oh, Judge Kavanaugh this or that.’ It’s happened to me many times.”
According to the unnamed author of the letter, Kavanaugh drunkenly slammed a woman against a wall outside a bar in Washington D.C. in 1998.
“My motivation in coming forward was to provide the facts about how Mr. Kavanaugh’s actions have damaged my life.”
“Whoa, hang on—when I nominated him, I thought it was pretty clear where he stood with the opposite sex, but now he’s on TV going on and on about how all women are entitled to dignity and respect,”
Swetnick alleges that Kavanaugh and his friend Mark Judge were present when she was "gang-raped" in the early 1980s.
The documents, first reported by USA Today, are likely to figure prominently in Thursday's high-stakes hearing
Tuesday 25 September 2018
The situation, of course, could change quickly after Thursday's blockbuster hearing
Critics of the Supreme Court nominee say that he has offered different accounts of his youth that put his honesty in question.
Trump paused before his bilateral meeting with the Colombian President Tuesday to deliver a broadside against Deborah Ramirez
He’s the one named witness to Kavanaugh’s alleged misconduct in high school, making his version of events particularly important. But instead of preparing for Thursday, he’s holed up at a beach house
The Republicans’ position on Supreme Court nominations is now: We will do whatever we can get away with.
Here's the problem with McConnell's righteous rage: It conveniently overlooks how he -- and Senate Republicans -- managed the nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court.
By offering an interview, Kavanaugh shed the public reticence normally expected of a senior member of the judiciary in order to slug it out in the political trenches.
"...with an array of False Acquisitions the likes of which have never been seen before!"
Monday 24 September 2018
...about what they say is an incident involving Kavanaugh when he was a teenager.
...at least one senator should ask him why he thought it was so necessary to ask Clinton such graphic questions about Lewinsky.
Smearing Anita Hill as “nutty and slutty” worked wonders in the ’90s, so conservatives are doing it all over again
Confirming Kavanaugh could lead to a collapse in faith for the Court — with dire consequences for American democracy.
Sunday 23 September 2018
Kavanaugh flatly denied the allegation, calling it a last-minute smear. But his confirmation now appears to be in serious doubt.
Whelan will be taking a leave of absence from the Ethics and Public Policy Center
...a Supreme Court nomination that was once seen as a political winner in many conservative-leaning states could, instead, rouse female voters and independents who otherwise may have cared little about the confirmation fight.
Decades later—even after #MeToo—we are seeing again why it’s so hard for women to come forward.
“What am I supposed to do? Go ahead and ruin this guy’s life based on an accusation?”
The calendars do not disprove Dr. Blasey’s allegations, Judge Kavanaugh’s team acknowledged.
Saturday 22 September 2018
Ford’s representatives and Senate negotiators zeroed in on an arrangement for her to tell her story in a Thursday hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee
Friday 21 September 2018
The coordinated effort was a testament to the far-reaching but frenzied attempt among conservatives to save Kavanaugh
The president's previous restraint this week, even as he repeatedly defended Kavanaugh and criticized Democrats, surprised many Republicans determined to salvage the nomination.
Whelan ended up apologizing for it, seeming to acknowledge how problematic his tweets were.
Trump directly questioned for the first time on Friday the veracity of the accusations
Thursday 20 September 2018
Binge drinking was a routine part of the social scene, with minimal adult supervision.
Ford "would be prepared to testify next week" if the senators offer her "terms that are fair and which ensure her safety."
Feinstein is the second woman senator whose office is reporting such threats. The White House said Thursday Kavanaugh and his wife have also received threats.
The office of Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, has also been also receiving ugly calls and emails.
Amy Chua said she would advise students on their physical looks to help win post in Kavanaugh’s chambers
Indeed, why wouldn’t Ford or her attorneys trust this gentleman to fairly investigate her allegation, aside from him having announced its outcome in advance, in public?
"Unfazed and determined. We will confirm Judge Kavanaugh."
The political fury surrounding Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation process could prompt the Supreme Court to hold off on tackling high-profile cases on issues like abortion and affirmative action in its upcoming term
Wednesday 19 September 2018
Republicans are daring a woman alleging sexual assault against a nominee for the country's highest court to either put up or shut up.
If support for his nomination remains this weak, Trump’s pick would rank among the lowest-supported Supreme Court nominees to later be confirmed,
Tuesday 18 September 2018
The Senate Judiciary Committee has a chance to do better by the country than it did nearly three decades ago.
It makes the argument for less transparency, less disclosure, less light. We can't know who is telling the truth here, so we can't possibly try,
If Ford ultimately opts out of the opportunity to testify, however, Republicans suggested that they plan to move forward with a Kavanaugh-only hearing.
Monday 17 September 2018
The offer prompted a growing number of calls from senators [...] to hold another hearing at which both Ford and Kavanaugh could testify publicly.
Sunday 16 September 2018
Ford has decided that if her story is going to be told, she wants to be the one to tell it.
Flake said he is uncomfortable voting to advance Kavanaugh's nomination later this week after the nominee's sexual assault accuser went public.
Saturday 15 September 2018
Roberts stepped in Saturday to halt a federal judge’s order that a conservative political group said threatened to discourage so-called independent expenditures by broadening the circumstances in which anonymous donors could be exposed.
Friday 14 September 2018
A secretive letter [...] charges that a teenage Brett M. Kavanaugh and a male friend trapped a teenage girl in a bedroom during a party and tried to assault her
The woman, who has asked not to be identified, first approached Democratic lawmakers in July, shortly after Trump nominated Kavanaugh.
...lawmakers in both parties claimed to be blindsided by an anonymous allegation that Kavanaugh forced himself on a woman in a locked room at a high school party decades ago.
Thursday 13 September 2018
...but the senator declined to make public what the matter involved.
Wednesday 12 September 2018
Kavanaugh ran up tens of thousands of dollars in credit card debt in order to buy baseball tickets for his friends and himself.
A conservative judicial group Wednesday referred his earlier disclosures to the Senate Ethics Committee.
Monday 10 September 2018
Sen. Susan Collins may not have an opponent or a race until 2020, but that’s not stopping one group from creating a war chest just in case she votes to confirm Brett Kavanaugh.
Sunday 9 September 2018
Merrick Garland may play a role in the vacant Supreme Court seat after all.
Saturday 8 September 2018
The nomination process has been polluted by lies for decades, it’s time to scrub the process
Friday 7 September 2018
In 2017, all of Kavanaugh’s debt besides his home mortgage was gone [...] The administration wouldn’t provide any more details.
He should be impeached, not elevated.
Kavanaugh was not a dispassionate finder of fact but rather an engineer of a political smear campaign. And after decades of that, he expects people to believe he's changed his stripes.
Even if Kavanaugh’s 2018 hedge protects him against perjury, his flat denial in 2006—only three years after the Pryor nomination itself—is clearly a false statement given under oath.
Thursday 6 September 2018
During today’s confirmation hearings, Brett Kavanaugh was shown to have perjured himself before Congress in 2006.
Much of what we know of as “the law” is held up by norms, not constitutional rules. Republicans appear hellbent on shattering those norms.
New documents and lines of questioning from Democratic senators have the nominee stumbling. It won't matter.
Booker said he was ready to risk expulsion from the Senate for making public documents pertinent Kavanaugh's time as a top White House aide to President George W. Bush
“I am not sure that all legal scholars refer to Roe as the settled law of the land at the Supreme Court level since Court can always overrule its precedent, and three current Justices on the Court would do so.”
Wednesday 5 September 2018
“I think you’re thinking of someone and you don’t want to tell us.”
“How can you not remember whether you’ve had a conversation about Robert Mueller or his investigation with anyone at that law firm?”
Tuesday 4 September 2018
“In the old days, we used to throw them out. Today, I guess they just keep screaming.”
It’s expected to be the most contentious Supreme Court nominee hearing in decades
In his opening statement, Kavanaugh outlined his approach to hearing cases, saying that judges should be an "umpire, a neutral and impartial arbiter" and deal in real cases, not abstract theories.
...with loud objections from Democratic senators, the arrests of dozens of protesters and questions even from some Republicans about how Kavanaugh would separate himself from President Trump, the man who chose him.
Democrats have made Brett Kavanaugh’s Senate confirmation hearing about process.
“What are we trying to hide? Why are we rushing?”
A historically divisive Supreme Court nomination, explained in 8 polls.
Monday 3 September 2018
“Not a single senator will be able to review these records before tomorrow”
The Supreme Court nominee opposes even the most basic campaign finance limits.
Sunday 2 September 2018
If confirmed as a Supreme Court justice, Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh would swing the court sharply to the right.
Saturday 1 September 2018
The Trump administration will hold back more than 100,000 pages of documents related to Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's service because the White House and the Department of Justice have determined they are protected by constitutional privilege
Wednesday 29 August 2018
Thursday 23 August 2018
But he added that forcing out Sessions before November “would create havoc” with efforts to confirm Trump’s Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, as well as with the midterm elections on Nov. 6
Wednesday 22 August 2018
The effort began when Sen. Mazie Hirono canceled her meeting with Kavanaugh and called the president 'an unindicted co-conspirator.'
Monday 20 August 2018
Kavanaugh told her he agrees that the court’s landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion is “settled law” during a key meeting ahead of confirmation hearings early next month.
“After reflecting this evening, I am strongly opposed to giving the President any ‘break’ in the questioning [...] He has lied to his aides. He has lied to the American people. He has tried to disgrace you and the Office with a sustained propaganda campaign that would make Nixon blush.”
Conservatives are vastly outspending liberals and targeting vulnerable senators in the fight to confirm Brett Kavanaugh.
Monday 13 August 2018
Kavanaugh accrued as much as $200,000 in debt buying tickets to Washington Nationals baseball games.
Monday 6 August 2018
Saturday 4 August 2018
Republicans have been working for decades to get to where they are now — on the cusp of cementing a conservative majority on the Supreme Court for a generation.
Friday 3 August 2018
Ferriero said that the National Archives and Records Administration has traditionally responded only to “special access” requests from committee chairmen, not from the senior member of the minority party on the panel.
Sunday 29 July 2018
"I'm now 85. My senior colleague, Justice John Paul Stevens, he stepped down when he was 90, so think I have about at least five more years."
Monday 23 July 2018
Friday 20 July 2018
Kavanaugh suggested several years ago that the unanimous high court ruling in 1974 that forced President Richard Nixon to turn over the Watergate tapes, leading to the end of his presidency, may have been wrongly decided.
The Senate GOP leader is vowing to squeeze Democrats with a vote on Brett Kavanaugh right before the midterms if they don’t back down on their demand for documents.
Friday 13 July 2018
"...it’s critical to recognize that the very first thing he did as a Supreme Court nominee was to parrot a false, partisan talking point."
Thursday 12 July 2018
How did the nominee for the Supreme Court spend $60,000 to $200,000 on Washington Nationals seats—and how did he pay it off so quickly?
...he and the broader conservative legal movement have the very scrutable idea that the Constitution should be read primarily as a property owners’ charter, whose purpose is to stymie economic regulation.
Tuesday 10 July 2018
NARA notified Fix the Court that they had roughly 20,000 such documents in their possession but claimed that reproducing such documents would take anywhere from “approximately 22 months” to five years or more.
His legal philosophy was clear: In the absence of explicit instructions from Congress, any far-reaching effort by the E.P.A. to tackle environmental problems should be met with deep skepticism by the courts.
Monday 9 July 2018
Allies of Judge Thomas Hardiman told to prepare for rollout of his candidacy; unclear what other candidate’s advocates have been told
Sunday 8 July 2018
Saturday 7 July 2018
The right has demonstrated that winning this kind of institutional fight takes years, even decades, and requires a ruthless disposition.
"A President under investigation for colluding with a foreign nation to interfere with an election should not be allowed to appoint someone to the Supreme Court"
Tuesday 3 July 2018
...just as conservatives see a fresh opening to end affirmative action through a changing Supreme Court.
Monday 2 July 2018
...they were the federal appeals court judges Amy Coney Barrett of the Seventh Circuit; Brett M. Kavanaugh of the District of Columbia Circuit; and Raymond M. Kethledge and Amul R. Thapar of the Sixth Circuit.
Trump doubled down on his past rhetoric about sending the issue of abortion to the states, which is another way of saying overturning Roe.
There’s a tangled web linking the Trump and Kennedy families. But financial corruption isn’t the whole story
Sunday 1 July 2018
“A candidate for this important position who would overturn Roe v. Wade would not be acceptable to me”
Saturday 30 June 2018
Thursday 28 June 2018
Kennedy's retirement from the Supreme Court has put the Senate on the cusp of an all-out war over his replacement
Trump dearly wanted a second vacancy, one that could transform the court for a generation or more. So he used the first opening to help create the second one. He picked Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, who had served as a law clerk to Justice Kennedy, to fill Justice Scalia’s seat.
Wednesday 27 June 2018
For much of his tenure, Justice Kennedy has been the median justice, falling in the court’s ideological center
...setting in motion a furious fight over the future of the Supreme Court and giving President Trump the chance to put a conservative stamp on the American legal system for generations.
Their answer, in a 5-4 decision upholding his ban on people from seven countries entering the US, was a definite no.
Biased comments by officials shaped the outcome of one key court decision, but were ruled of little importance in another.
Roberts wanted to make clear that the majority was not ignoring Trump's anti-Muslim remarks, but concluded that they lacked legal significance.
One of the most dramatic moments in the courtroom came as Sotomayor paused after reading aloud a litany of Trump remarks, including "Islam hates us" and "we're having trouble with Muslims coming into the country,"
The justices said in a 5-4 opinion that state government workers who choose not to join a union cannot be compelled to pay a share of union dues for covering the cost of negotiating contracts.
Tuesday 26 June 2018
But the decision’s most important takeaway is the one articulated between the lines of a short concurrence by Justice Anthony Kennedy: When a real threat to the American constitutional order comes — when a president decides to act contrary to fundamental constitutional values — we cannot count on the courts to save us.
The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that California's crisis pregnancy centers do not have to post notices or talk to patients about state services regarding abortions.
Liberal justices suggest a whitewash as conservatives repudiate the decision upholding internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII.
The country will be dealing with the consequences of his outrageous stunt for decades to come.
Writing in dissent, Justice Sotomayor ... exposes the hypocrisy of the majority’s position to devastating effect. Sotomayor writes that, just weeks ago, in a 7-2 decision, the court ruled in favor of a baker who refused to make a cake for a same-sex couple because the Colorado Civil Rights Commission expressed animus toward the baker’s religious beliefs.
Monday 25 June 2018
In other words, the Supreme Court is a key component of the GOP election-rigging project.
Now, in Perez, Gorsuch has joined Justice Clarence Thomas’ crusade to hobble the law even further by holding that it does not prohibit racial gerrymandering.
Thomas and Gorsuch added they do not believe the Voting Rights Act applies to redistricting.
Friday 22 June 2018
“We decline to grant the state unrestricted access to a wireless carrier’s database of physical location information,”
Monday 18 June 2018
The court instead kicked the can down the road.
Monday 11 June 2018
The law allows the state to strike voters from the registration rolls if they fail to return a mailed address confirmation form, and don't vote for another four years, or two federal election cycles.
Tuesday 15 May 2018
Originalism is one thing, but limiting the Constitution to property rights cognizable in the days of the horse and carriage is another. As in many other areas of Justice Thomas’ jurisprudence—civil rights chief among them—his principles would create a majoritarian republic that looks nothing like American democracy today.
Wednesday 25 April 2018
...with its five-member conservative majority signaling it was ready to approve a revised version of the president’s plan.
In a case that presents a major test of presidential power, several justices questioned Solicitor General Noel J. Francisco about the government’s national security justifications for the travel ban
Tuesday 17 April 2018
It's a blow to the Trump Justice Department, and came at the hands, ironically of conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch, who sided with the court's liberals in a 5-4 decision.
Tuesday 27 March 2018
Stevens, who retired from the high court in 2010 as one of the longest-serving justices in history, argued the Second Amendment had been warped by gun lobbyists at the National Rifle Association to extend beyond its original intent.
Monday 19 March 2018
The Supreme Court on Monday turned down a request from Republican legislative leaders in Pennsylvania to block a redrawn congressional map that creates more parity between the political parties in the state.
Tuesday 27 February 2018
The court did not rule ... that ICE may do so; it's a much more specific ruling that a particular argument the 9th Circuit used to resolve this quickly in Rodriguez's (the prisoner's) favor is complete nonsense, and that the 9C should deal with the core Constitutional issue directly
The Supreme Court on Tuesday said immigrants held by the government and facing deportation are not entitled to a bond hearing even after months or years of detention.
Monday 26 February 2018
The Supreme Court’s decision not to hear the administration’s appeal was expected, as no appeals court has yet ruled on the issue.
The Supreme Court’s move will, as a practical matter, temporarily shield the young immigrants who already had signed up for the DACA program from immediate deportation
...the court’s action is likely to lessen the urgency on Capitol Hill over the issue, making it even more probable that Congress will take no action as the legal process plays out.
Saturday 24 February 2018
Tuesday 20 February 2018
The Supreme Court on Tuesday turned down a request from gun rights activists to examine California’s 10-day waiting period for firearm sales, prompting Justice Clarence Thomas to say his colleagues are turning the Second Amendment into a “disfavored right.”
Thursday 15 February 2018
The decision, from the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, in Richmond, Va., will have no immediate practical impact. The Supreme Court agreed last month to hear an appeal from a broadly similar decision from the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco.
Monday 5 February 2018
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday let a court-ordered redrawing of congressional districts in Pennsylvania proceed, raising Democratic hopes that a revamped map might yield them several more seats this fall.
Monday 22 January 2018
Government Shutdown Day 3
In a hit to the Trump administration, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled Monday that cases litigating the Clean Water Act should be heard by federal district courts.
Friday 19 January 2017
The High Court announced that its justices would hear Trump v. Hawaii on Friday afternoon after vacating a lower court’s decision to stay the current version of Trump’s travel ban.
Sunday 31 December 2017
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. announced an initiative Sunday to ensure there are proper procedures in place to protect law clerks and other court employees from sexual harassment, saying it is clear that the federal judiciary “is not immune” from a widespread problem.
The case has taken on added importance because the parties have squared off over ballot access across the country. Democrats have accused Republicans of trying to suppress votes from minorities and poorer people who tend to vote for Democrats. Republicans have argued that they are trying to promote ballot integrity and prevent voter fraud.
Monday 18 December 2017
The president worried that Gorsuch would not be “loyal,” one of the people said, and told aides that he was tempted to pull Gorsuch’s nomination — and that he knew plenty of other judges who would want the job.
Friday 8 December 2017
All the Republican-appointed justices backed the stay, while all the high court’s Democratic appointees joined a 10-page dissent authored by Justice Stephen Breyer.
Monday 4 December 2017
The Supreme Court on Monday allowed the third version of the Trump administration’s travel ban to go into effect while legal challenges against it continue.
Monday 20 November 2017
The Justice Department asked the Supreme Court on Monday evening to allow officials to implement the entirety of the revised policy Trump issued in September via a presidential proclamation.
Friday 3 November 2017
On Friday, the Department of Justice filed an astonishing appeal with the Supreme Court, urging the justices to intervene in the Jane Doe case that seemed to have ended last week.
Wednesday 1 November 2017
Supreme Court justices are the only federal judges who are not bound by a formal code of conduct. The reason ... is that the Supreme Court is the only court created under Article III of the Constitution, while the lower courts are created by Congress.
Friday 20 October 2017
Kagan is cool-headed and pragmatic, but she does not suffer fools gladly. She does enjoy sparring with Justice Samuel Alito, but Alito is a brilliant intellect with a misanthropic wit. Gorsuch, by comparison, is a Fox News anchor’s idea of a first-rate justice: an insipid ideologue peddling warmed-over dogmas.
Tuesday 17 October 2017
The justices, the most powerful jurists in the land, seem to have a reluctance — even an allergy — to taking math and statistics seriously.
Thursday 12 October 2017
“In an era when facts are often dismissed as ‘fake news,’ we are particularly concerned about a person of your stature suggesting to the public that scientific measurement is not valid or reliable and that expertise should not be trusted,” Bonilla-Silva wrote. “What you call ‘gobbledygook’ is rigorous and empirical.”
Tuesday 3 October 2017
“The American people do not like gerrymandering. It leaves them feeling powerless and discouraged; that their votes are wasted and voices silenced," they said Tuesday. "They see it rigging our political system to favor special interests."
Sunday 1 October 2017
The new term is studded with major cases likely to provoke sharp conflicts. One of them, on political gerrymandering, has the potential to reshape American politics. Another may settle the question of whether businesses can turn away patrons like gay couples in the name of religious freedom.
Monday 11 September 2017
U.S. officials can at least temporarily continue to block refugees ... from entering the United States after the Supreme Court intervened again Monday to save a piece of President Trump’s travel ban.
Tuesday 5 September 2017
The court is scheduled to hear a case in October, Gill v. Whitford, that could abolish partisan gerrymandering.
Thursday 17 August 2017
“At this highly divisive political moment, especially as many Trump decisions are likely soon to reach the court’s docket, one just days later, a healthy respect for public confidence in the court should have led Justice Gorsuch to demur”
Wednesday 2 August 2017
The Supreme Court allowed parts of the travel ban to go forward, in a victory that would not have happened without Neil Gorsuch on the court
Pruitt’s EPA “has moved to undo, delay or otherwise block more than 30 environmental rules, a regulatory rollback larger in scope than any other over so short a time in the agency’s 47-year history.”
Sessions ... strengthened the federal government’s power of civil-asset forfeiture
Thursday 6 July 2017
A federal judge in Hawaii declined on Thursday to clarify who should be allowed to bypass President Trump’s recently reinstated travel ban — a small victory for the administration in the ongoing legal battle
Thursday 29 June 2017
...lawyers for the state and for a Hawaii imam say guidance the Trump administration issued Thursday takes too narrow a view of what family relationships qualify to exempt a foreigner from the travel ban
Monday 26 June 2017
...the ban “may not be enforced against foreign nationals who have a credible claim of a bona fide relationship with a person or entity in the United States.”
Saturday 24 June 2017
Kennedy ... will turn 81 next month and is the longest-serving current justice, named to the high court almost 30 years ago.
Monday 19 June 2017
The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case from Wisconsin that could clarify whether redistricting plans can be unconstitutional because they're too partisan.
Friday 16 June 2017
...dropping its previous support for workers to throw its weight behind management.
Monday 12 June 2017
...the Supreme Court is being asked to uphold a lower court’s finding that the Wisconsin redistricting effort was more than just extraordinary — it was unconstitutional.
Monday 5 June 2017
...they will rule on whether a search warrant should be required before authorities obtain information from mobile-phone companies that can reflect a user's approximate movements in the past.
Thursday 1 June 2017
The government’s filing late Thursday asks the justices to set aside the 4th Circuit ruling and accept the case for oral arguments. It also asks the high court to lift a nationwide injunction issued by a federal judge in a separate Hawaii case.
Monday 22 May 2017
Justices Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor joined Justice Kagan’s majority opinion.
Monday 15 May 2017
...refusing to reinstate North Carolina ballot restrictions that a lower court said target blacks “with almost surgical precision.”
Wednesday 26 April 2017
Friday 21 April 2017
Now the Wisconsin case is headed to a Supreme Court that has repeatedly said that extreme partisan gerrymanders are unconstitutional, but has never found a way to decide which ones cross the line.
Tuesday 18 April 2017
Gorsuch was an active, aggressive and somewhat long-winded questioner in his debut Monday at the Supreme Court
Monday 10 April 2017
Gorsuch will be put to work immediately. The court meets privately Thursday to consider cases for next term.
Saturday 8 April 2017
Friday 7 April 2017
After McConnell justified his filibuster-ending “nuclear option” by saying it would be beneficial for the Senate, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said this: “Whoever says that is a stupid idiot.”
The final vote was 54-45, mostly along party lines.
Thursday 6 April 2017
...majority Republicans changed Senate precedent so that a high court nominee can advance to a final vote with a simple majority of 51 senators, as opposed to 60.
Senate Democrats have cast enough votes to filibuster Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch
The so-called “nuclear option,” expected later Thursday, would ensure that all future Supreme Court nominees would no longer need 60 votes to advance in the Senate
One back channel is the fact that Kennedy’s son, Justin, knows Donald Trump Jr. through New York real estate circles.
Wednesday 5 April 2017
In effect, the minority party now gets to decide when a bill should require 60 votes instead of 51.
Tuesday 4 April 2017
“Each of the individual incidents constitutes a violation of academic ethics. I've never seen a college plagiarism code that this would not be in violation of”
Monday 3 April 2017
Republicans have vowed to confirm Gorsuch by Friday, when a two-week recess is set to begin
Should that be the policy going forward? ... “No Supreme Court nominations will be considered in any even-numbered year.” Is that where we’re headed?
Sunday 2 April 2017
...the Senate is hurtling toward the use later this week of the so-called nuclear option — changing the chamber’s rules with a simple majority so that Supreme Court filibusters can be cut off with just 51 votes
Friday 31 March 2017
The Trump administration has sent the American Bar Association into exile, ending the group’s semiofficial role in evaluating candidates for the federal bench.
Thursday 23 March 2017
If Democrats band together, the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky, has threatened to pursue the so-called nuclear option eliminating the filibuster for Supreme Court selections.
Tuesday 21 March 2017
“Somebody said I should not criticize judges. O.K. I’ll criticize judges,” Mr. Trump said on Tuesday night at a fund-raising dinner
"Wrong and Misleading: he spoke broadly and never mentioned any person," Spicer tweeted
“When anyone criticizes the honesty or the integrity or the motives of a federal judge, I find that disheartening. I find that demoralizing — because I know the truth”
Monday 20 March 2017
Gorsuch presented himself on Monday as a creature of consensus during a sharply partisan Supreme Court confirmation hearing
Gorsuch ... was promoted by conservative legal activists because of his sterling credentials, a decade of right-of-center rulings and his allegiance to the same brand of constitutional interpretation employed by the late justice he would replace, Antonin Scalia.
Sunday 19 March 2017
Gorsuch “is going to have to establish very much that he’d be independent of any president and that he’s going to uphold the rights of all Americans”
Friday 17 March 2017
Gorsuch’s 10-year record is unwieldy and, at the same time, incomplete. He has never issued on-point rulings on the kinds of issues that traditionally cause controversy in Supreme Court nominations
Monday 6 March 2017
“Because as many of you have pointed out, with this president, it’s going to be important to have an independent judiciary that will say: ‘No, you can’t do that.’”
The U.S. Supreme Court avoided a ruling on transgender rights by sending a closely watched case ... back to a lower court on Monday after President Donald Trump rolled back protections for transgender students.
Thursday 2 March 2017
Today’s ruling clarifies ... that when there is other evidence of racial motivation, the process does not escape Equal Protection scrutiny just because the shape of districts appears normal and they do not visibly violate other sound principles of districting.
Saturday 18 February 2017
The Supreme Court nominee resides on the right, listens intently to the left and often finds a homespun truth somewhere in between
Friday 17 February 2017
The most pertinent of the three cases in terms of Republican Trump administration priorities involves whether immigrants in custody for deportation proceedings have the right to a hearing to request their release when their cases are not promptly adjudicated.
Wednesday 15 February 2017
...the email could be grounds for lawyers challenging Trump’s travel ban to ask Justice Thomas to recuse himself from the case—a move that could doom the executive order.
Wednesday 8 February 2017
A Gorsuch spokesman confirmed the comments were made in the Wednesday afternoon meeting, when he was asked about the "so-called judge" line.
Wednesday 1 February 2017
Democrats intend to repeatedly remind the public about the Republicans’ treatment of Merrick B. Garland, President Barack Obama’s nominee to fill the vacant seat last year, who was blocked from even receiving a hearing.
Tuesday 31 January 2017
Gorsuch sided in favor of "religious freedom" claims made by the Little Sisters of the Poor and the owners of the craft company Hobby Lobby, who challenged language in the Affordable Care Act that required them to pay for contraceptive coverage for employees.
Like Scalia, he is an originalist who believes judges should follow the text and original meaning of the Constitution.
