Tag: U.S. Supreme Court

Five big Supreme Court decisions to watch

The Supreme Court is set to go back into session on Monday to begin issuing some of its biggest decisions of the year.

From high-stakes rulings for the Trump administration to revisiting battles over the separation of church and state, here are five big decisions to watch for.

Census citizenship question

The Trump administration’s efforts to add a question about citizenship landed in front of the justices last month, just weeks before the deadline to get the query added to the census.

View the complete May 13 article by Jacqueline Thomsen on The Hill website here.

There’s a reason Trump believes the Supreme Court will save his presidency from accountability

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Tuesday in a case that should have been a slam dunk against the Trump administration. Secretary Wilbur Ross wants to modify the 2020 census form in a way that will depress responses from immigrant communities — effectively shifting congressional representation away from Latinos and towards white voters who are more likely to favor Republicans. In doing so, Ross broke numerous laws, ignored the Census Bureau’s own experts, and openly lied about his motives.

And yet, at Tuesday’s oral argument, the Supreme Court appeared likely to vote along party lines to endorse Ross’ lawbreaking.

So it’s probably not a coincidence that President Trump claimed less than a day after arguments in Department of Commerce v. New York that the highest court in the land is his personal team of fixers.

View the complete article by Ian Millhiser on the ThinkProgress website here.

Supreme Court to consider workplace discrimination of LGBTQ community

The Supreme Court on Monday said it would hear three cases determining whether federal law protects LGBTQ individuals from discrimination in the workplace.

The court, in an unsigned order, said it would review all three cases on the matter, but ordered that two of the cases be combined into one argument.

The two merged cases asked whether discrimination over sexual orientation falls under Title VII of the Civil Rights act. The statue blocks discrimination in the workplace because of sex.

View the complete April 22 article by Jacqueline Thomsen on The Hill website here.

House gets its say as Supreme Court takes up census citizenship question

Stakes are high as decision could affect how many House seats each state gets

The House gets a relatively rare chance to directly address the Supreme Court on Tuesday in a legal showdown about whether the Trump administration can add a citizenship question to the 2020 census.

The case is one of the most significant for members of Congress during the current Supreme Court term. The census results determine how many House seats each state gets and affect how states redraw congressional districts. The results are also used to distribute billions of dollars from federal programs that are based on population count to state and local governments.

The House cited those reasons when it asked for time during oral argument. The lawmakers plan to argue that it is up to Congress to ensure an accurate count, and a federal law called the Census Act limits the discretion of Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to add a question about whether each person being counted is a citizen.

View the complete April 22 article by Todd Ruger on The Roll Call website here.

Gorsuch just handed down the most bloodthirsty and cruel death penalty opinion of the modern era

The Supreme Court just tossed decades worth of Eighth Amendment law into the wastebasket.

The Supreme Court’s opinion in Bucklew v. Precythe, which it handed down Monday on a party-line vote, is at once the most significant Eighth Amendment decision of the last several decades and the cruelest in at least as much time.

Neil Gorsuch’s majority opinion tosses out a basic assumption that animated the Court’s understanding of what constitutes a “cruel and unusual” punishment for more than half a century. In the process, he writes that the state of Missouri may effectively torture a man to death — so long as it does not gratuitously inflict pain for the sheer purpose of inflicting pain.

And, on top of all of that, Gorsuch would conscript death penalty defense attorneys — men and women who often gave up lucrative legal careers to protect the lives of their clients — into the ghoulish task of laying out the method that will be used to kill those clients.

View the complete April 1 article by Ian Millhiser on the ThinkProgress website here.

Justices Display Divisions in New Cases on Voting Maps Warped by Politics Last year, the Supreme Court sidestepped the question of whether partisan gerrymandering ever violate the Constitution. Credit J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press Image

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court returned to the subject of partisan gerrymandering on Tuesday, appearing largely divided along ideological lines as it considered for a second time in two years whether drawing election maps to help the party in power ever violates the Constitution.

Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, the court’s newest member and the one who may possess the decisive vote, expressed uneasiness about the practice.

“Extreme partisan gerrymandering is a real problem for our democracy,” he said. “I’m not going to dispute that.”

View the complete March 26 article by Adam Liptak on The New York Times website here.

Supreme Court allows transgender military ban to be enforced

The Supreme Court handed President Trump a partial win on Tuesday, allowing the administration to temporarily enforce its restrictions on transgender people serving in the military.

The court ruled 5-4 to stay two district court orders that blocked the new policy, with the court’s liberal wing dissenting. The justices said they are waiting for the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to weigh in.

“The department is pleased with the orders issued by the Supreme Court today,” Pentagon spokeswoman Lt. Col. Carla Gleason said in a statement. “We will continue to work with the Department of Justice regarding next steps in the pending lawsuits. As always, we treat all transgender persons with respect and dignity.”

View the complete January 22 article by Lydia Wheeler and Rebecca Kheel on The Hill website here.

BREAKING: Trump Administration Pushes to Advance Wardlow’s Discrimination Case to U.S. Supreme Court

The Trump Administration is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold a case Doug Wardlow originally argued, to allow LGBTQ people to be fired for who they are

MINNESOTA – Yesterday, the Trump Administration asked the United States Supreme Court to take up a case and rule that businesses can discriminate against workers based on their gender identity without violating federal law. The case the Trump Administration is asking the Court to consider was originally argued by Doug Wardlow on behalf of the Alliance Defending Freedom, an anti-LGBTQ hate group, to uphold the discriminatory firing of a funeral home employee in Michigan.

The following is a statement from Sam Fettig, Communications Director for Keith Ellison for Attorney General: Continue reading “BREAKING: Trump Administration Pushes to Advance Wardlow’s Discrimination Case to U.S. Supreme Court”

Want to Know More About: Justice Brett Kavanaugh

Willie Geist: “If You Thought He Was Partisan In His Testimony Which A Lot Did When He Talked About A Clinton Conspiracy, That Wasn’t Helped By Yesterday’s Event Whatsoever. He Looked Even More Partisan.” SCARBOROUGH: “Wasn’t it Brett Kavanaugh himself that was going down the list, thanking Republican senators, not mentioning anybody else, making it clear that his political allegiance were on one side of the aisle.” GEIST: “If you thought he was partisan in his testimony which a lot did when he talked about a Clinton conspiracy, that wasn’t helped by yesterday’s event whatsoever. He looked even more partisan” [Morning Joe, MSNBC, 10/9/18; VIDEO]

Kristen Welker: “President Trump Was Anything But Unifying. He Further Stoked The Partisan Battle In His Remarks.” WELKER: “Brett Kavanaugh vowed to be a justice for all Americans after that fierce confirmation fight. But president trump was anything but unifying. He further stoked the partisan battle in his remarks. For the president, it was all aimed at energizing Republicans with four weeks until election day.” [Morning Joe, MSNBC, 10/9/18; VIDEO]

Joe Scarborough: “It Was A President Who Once Again Had An Opportunity […] Instead It Ended Up Being A Political Pep Rally.” SCARBOROUGH: “It was a president who once again had an opportunity, not to be the great uniter, not to be Abraham Lincoln after the civil war talking about with malice toward none, but to do a small thing or two, send an olive branch, but he had all the members of the Supreme Court there, including the liberal members of the supreme court, and instead it ended up being a political pep rally.” [Morning Joe, MSNBC, 10/9/18; VIDEO] Continue reading “Want to Know More About: Justice Brett Kavanaugh”

With Kavanaugh confirmation, GOP officially becomes the party of rape

Nearly two years after electing an admitted sexual predator, Republicans voted nearly unanimously to confirm an accused sexual predator to the Supreme Court.

Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh Credit: Saul Loeb, Pool

All but one Senate Republican voted Saturday to confirm credibly accused sexual predator Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, marking the GOP’s embrace of sexual assault and victim shaming.

The vote to install Kavanaugh comes nearly two years after the election of admitted sexual predator Donald Trump, who was accused of sexual assault by more than a dozen women and heard on tape bragging about it.

Since then, Republicans have gone all in on pedophilia, defended the alleged widespread cover-up of sexual assault by a member of their own party, and dropped any pretense of caring about the fact that their party is led by a man who not only admitted to sexually assaulting women, but actually touted it.

View the October 6 article by Caroline Orr on the ShareBlue.com website here.