Tag: Supreme Court

How The Supreme Court May Enable Trump To Reshape Government

An obscure case before the Supreme Court has the potential to reshape the federal government in a fundamental way. If conservative activists get their wish, President Donald Trump — and any president that comes after him — will have even more power to bend federal agencies to his will.

The case is Seila Law LLC v. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the agency that was the brainchild of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA). As part of her desire to free the mandate of consumer protection from the political winds, winds that are frequently at the backs of powerful business interests, Warren ensured that the director of the bureau couldn’t be removed by the president from the post except under extraordinary circumstances. Unlike the members of the Cabinet, then, the directorship wouldn’t be expected to change hands with every new president, and a business-friendly president couldn’t remove an aggressive director without good cause.

It’s this feature of the bureau’s structure that Seila Law, a firm being investigated by the CFPB, sought to challenge in arguments before the court on Tuesday. The firm argues that the independence of the bureau from the presidency violates the Constitution. This argument relies on an idea common in conservative legal thought: that the president has sole and unmediated authority over executive branch agencies. Inherent in this authority, they say, is the power to fire executive branch officers. Continue reading.

Supreme Court to hear ObamaCare appeal

The Hill logoThe Supreme Court on Monday announced it will take up a case seeking to overturn the Affordable Care Act, returning the health care law’s fate to the high court.

The major announcement means that the case will loom over the November elections and could make the Affordable Care Act an even bigger issue in the presidential race.

The case will be heard during the court’s next term, which starts in October, meaning that a decision is not expected until after the elections. It is unclear when the court will hear arguments, but those could come in October, before the election. Continue reading.

Here’s the real reason Trump is lashing out at Supreme Court justices as his cronies try to ‘short circuit’ the judicial process

AlterNet logoYou might be wondering why Trump decided to go on the attack against Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor this week.

Donald J. Trump

✔@realDonaldTrump

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“Sotomayor accuses GOP appointed Justices of being biased in favor of Trump.” @IngrahamAngle @FoxNews This is a terrible thing to say. Trying to “shame” some into voting her way? She never criticized Justice Ginsberg when she called me a “faker”. Both should recuse themselves..

Donald J. Trump

✔@realDonaldTrump

….on all Trump, or Trump related, matters! While “elections have consequences”, I only ask for fairness, especially when it comes to decisions made by the United States Supreme Court!

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To understand why Sotomayor has suddenly become a target, it is helpful to talk about the way that this administration is changing how presidential policies are being handled in the courts.

One of the reasons Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is so committed to stacking the courts with extremist conservative judges is that, as I pointed out last week, the Trump administration’s incompetence has led to an abysmal record in the courts. Whereas previous administrations prevailed in the courts 80 percent of the time, this president has failed in over 90 percent of the cases his administration has argued. Continue reading.

Supreme Court throws out challenge to Michigan electoral map

The Hill logoThe Supreme Court, in another defeat for gerrymandering reformers, overturned a lower court’s ruling that Michigan’s electoral districts are overly partisan and need to be redrawn.

Monday’s order follows a June decision from the nation’s top court that found that questions related to partisan gerrymandering are not under the jurisdiction of federal courts.

The new order returns the case to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan. A three-judge panel in that court had ruled that 34 state legislative and congressional districts needed to be redrawn because they were designed to favor Republicans.

View the complete October 21 article by Harper Neidig on The Hill website here.

Supreme Court agrees to hear challenge to consumer agency

The Hill logoThe Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear a legal challenge to the structure of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) in a major victory for critics of the powerful financial regulator.

The court on Friday announced it would take up the lawsuit Seila Law vs. CFPB. The case involves a law firm, Seila Law, that refused to comply with a CFPB request for documents.

The firm challenged the agency’s structure as unconstitutional, arguing that the bureau’s director enjoys an illegal amount of independence from the president’s executive branch authority.

View the complete October 18 article by Sylvan Lane and Harper Neidig on The Hill website here.

Are LGBTQ Employees Safe From Discrimination? A New Supreme Court Case Will Decide

It’s a hectic morning at the home of Kathleen O’Donnell and her wife, Casey. Kathleen is getting their 4-year-old foster daughter ready for the park. She got placed with them overnight. Casey is wrangling the four dogs. They’ve already got their 11-year-old son off to school.

They live on a tree-lined street in Billings, Mont. It’s a place they’ve called home since 2014.

“All of my family lives in Billings, so with a kid we wanted to be near them,” Kathleen said.

View the complete October 7 article by Leila Fadel on the National Public Radio website here.

Supreme Court upholds Indiana law on fetal remains, avoids major

The Supreme Court on Tuesday reversed a lower court’s decision invalidating part of Indiana’s abortion law on the disposal of fetal remains, allowing it to go into effect.
But the court declined to take up a challenge to a provision blocking abortions on the basis of sex, race or disability, avoiding a major ruling on abortion for the time being.
The fetal remains law — signed by then-Gov. Mike Pence (R) — required that the remains from abortions or miscarriages be buried or cremated. The court reversed a ruling from the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals that found the law unconstitutional.

View the complete May 28 article by Jacqueline Thomsen on The Hill website here.

Trump administration asks Supreme Court to quickly take up census citizenship question

The Justice Department’s request to add a citizenship question on the 2020 U.S. Census was granted. Here’s how that could affect voting districts. (Joyce Koh, Daron Taylor/The Washington Post)

The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Tuesday to bypass its normal procedures and decide quickly whether a question on citizenship can be placed on the 2020 Census.

Last week, U.S. District Judge Jesse M. Furman of New York ordered the administration to stop its plans to add the question to the survey. Furman said Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross broke a “veritable smorgasbord” of federal rules by ordering the citizenship question added against the advice of career officials who said it was likely to cut down the response rate and make the census less accurate.

Normally, the Justice Department would appeal the decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit. But Solicitor General Noel J. Francisco said that would not leave enough time for a final ruling from the Supreme Court.

View the complete January 22 article by Robert Barnes on The Washington Post website here.

Supreme Court rules against mystery corporation from ‘Country A’ fighting subpoena in Mueller investigation

Credit:  Carlos Barria, Reuters

The Supreme Court on Tuesday left in place a lower-court order requiring an unnamed foreign-owned corporation to comply with a subpoena said to be part of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election.

The court dissolved a temporary stay that had been put in place by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. In a short order, it did not give a reason for the decision or note any dissents.

The entity that is the subject of the cloaked legal battle — known in court papers simply as a “Corporation” from “Country A” — is a foreign financial institution that was issued a subpoena by a grand jury hearing evidence in the special counsel investigation, according to two people familiar with the case.

View the complete January 8 article by Robert Barnes, Devlin Barrett and Carol D. Leonnig on The Washington Post website here.

Debate over term limits for Supreme Court gains new life

A bruising battle over the court’s latest appointee and a recent health scare involving the oldest justice has renewed interest in the age-old debate over whether there should be term limits for the Supreme Court.

It’s an idea that’s been floated before, but senators on both sides of the aisle now say it’s one that’s worth discussing in public.

“I would sure love to have the debate,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), 67, told The Hill last week. “I don’t know exactly how I would come down, but it’s certainly worth talking about.”

View the complete December 6 article by Lydia Wheeler on The Hill website here.