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  • Affirmative Action Fast Facts | CNN

    Affirmative Action Fast Facts | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Here is some background information about affirmative action as well as a few notable court cases.

    Affirmative action policies focus on improving opportunities for groups of people, like women and minorities, who have been historically excluded in United States’ society. The initial emphasis was on education and employment. President John F. Kennedy was the first president to use the term in an executive order.

    Supporters argue that affirmative action is necessary to ensure racial and gender diversity in education and employment. Critics state that it is unfair and causes reverse discrimination.

    Racial quotas are considered unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court.

    The state of Texas replaced its affirmative action plan with a percentage plan that guarantees the top 10% of high-school graduates a spot in any state university in Texas. California and Florida have similar programs.

    1954 – The US Supreme Court, in Brown v. Board of Education, rules that the “separate but equal” doctrine violates the Constitution.

    1961 – President Kennedy creates the Council on Equal Opportunity in an executive order. This ensures that federal contractors hire people regardless of race, creed, color or national origin.

    1964 – The Civil Rights Act renders discrimination illegal in the workplace.

    1978 – In Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, a notable reverse discrimination case, the Supreme Court rules that colleges cannot use racial quotas because it violates the Equal Protection Clause. As one factor for admission, however, race can be used.

    1995 – The University of Michigan rejects the college application of Jennifer Gratz, a top high school student in suburban Detroit who is white.

    October 14, 1997 – Gratz v. Bollinger, et al., is filed in federal court in the Eastern District of Michigan. The University of Michigan is sued by white students, including Gratz and Patrick Hamacher, who claim the undergraduate and law school affirmative action policies using race and/or gender as a factor in admissions is a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment or Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

    December 3, 1997 – A similar case, Grutter v. Bollinger, is filed in federal court in the Eastern District of Michigan. Barbara Grutter, denied admission to the University of Michigan Law School, claims that other applicants, with lower test scores and grades, were given an unfair advantage due to race.

    December 2000 – The judge in the Gratz v. Bollinger case rules that the University of Michigan’s undergraduate admissions policy does not violate the standards set by the Supreme Court.

    March 2001 – The judge in the Grutter v. Bollinger case rules the University of Michigan Law School’s admissions policy is unconstitutional.

    December 2001 – The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals hears appeals in both University of Michigan cases.

    May 14, 2002 – The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals reverses the district court’s decision in Grutter v. Bollinger.

    January 17, 2003 – The administration of President George W. Bush files a friend-of-the-court brief with the Supreme Court, opposing the University of Michigan’s affirmative action program.

    April 1, 2003 – The US Supreme Court hears oral arguments on the two cases. US Solicitor General Theodore Olson offers arguments in support of the plaintiffs.

    June 23, 2003 – The Supreme Court rules on Grutter v. Bollinger that the University of Michigan Law School may give preferential treatment to minorities during the admissions process. The Court upholds the law school policy by a vote of five to four.

    June 23, 2003 – In Gratz v. Bollinger, the undergraduate policy in which a point system gave specific “weight” to minority applicants is overturned six to three.

    December 22, 2003 – The Supreme Court rules that race can be a factor in universities’ admission programs but it cannot be an overriding factor. This decision affects the Grutter and Gratz cases.

    November 7, 2006 – The Michigan electorate strikes down affirmative action by approving a proposition barring affirmative action in public education, employment, or contracting.

    January 31, 2007 – After the Supreme Court sends the case back to district court; the case is dismissed. Gratz and Hamacher settle for $10,000 in administrative costs, but do not receive damages.

    2008 – Abigail Noel Fisher, a white woman, sues the University of Texas. She argues that the university should not use race as a factor in admission policies that favor African-American and Hispanic applicants over whites and Asian-Americans.

    July 1, 2011 – An appeals court overturns Michigan’s 2006 ban on the use of race and/or gender as a factor in admissions or hiring practices.

    November 15, 2012 – The US Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals throws out Michigan’s 2006 ban on affirmative action in college admissions and public hiring, declaring it unconstitutional.

    June 24, 2013 – The Supreme Court sends the University of Texas case back to the lower court for further review without ruling.

    October 15, 2013 – The US Supreme Court hears oral arguments in a case concerning Michigan’s 2006 law on affirmative action.

    April 22, 2014 – In a six to two ruling, the Supreme Court upholds Michigan’s ban of using racial criteria in college admissions.

    July 15, 2014 – The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upholds the use of race by the University of Texas as a factor in undergraduate admissions to promote diversity on campus. The vote is two to one.

    November 17, 2014 – Students for Fair Admissions sues Harvard University, alleging Harvard intentionally discriminates against Asian-Americans. Students for Fair Admissions is run by Edward Blum, a conservative advocate, who sought Asian-Americans rejected by Harvard.

    December 9, 2015 – The US Supreme Court hears oral arguments in the University of Texas case regarding race as a factor in admissions policies.

    June 23, 2016 – The US Supreme Court upholds the Affirmative Action program by a vote of four to three with Justice Elena Kagan taking no part in the consideration. The ruling allows the limited use of affirmative action policies by schools.

    October 15, 2018 – The lawsuit against Harvard filed in 2014 by Students for Fair Admissions goes to trial.

    February 2019 – Texas Tech University enters an agreement with the Department of Education to stop considering race and/or national origin as a factor in its admissions process, concluding a 14-year-long investigation into the school’s use of affirmative action.

    October 1, 2019 – US District Court Judge Allison Burroughs upholds Harvard’s admissions process in the Students for Fair Admissions case, ruling that while Harvard’s admissions process is “not perfect,” she would not “dismantle a very fine admissions program that passes constitutional muster, solely because it could do better.”

    November 12, 2020 – A Boston-based US appeals court rejects an appeal brought by the Students for Fair Admissions group.

    January 24, 2022 – The US Supreme Court announces it will reconsider race-based affirmative action in college admissions. The justices will hear challenges to policies at Harvard and the University of North Carolina that use students’ race among many criteria to decide who should gain a coveted place in an entering class. On June 29, 2023, the US Supreme Court says colleges and universities can no longer take race into consideration as a specific basis for granting admission.

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  • Roe v. Wade Fast Facts | CNN

    Roe v. Wade Fast Facts | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Here’s a look at the US Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade.

    1971 – The case is filed by Norma McCorvey, known in court documents as Jane Roe, against Henry Wade, the district attorney of Dallas County, who enforced a Texas law that prohibited abortion, except to save a woman’s life.

    January 22, 1973 – The US Supreme Court, in a 7-2 decision, affirms the legality of a woman’s right to have an abortion under the Fourteenth amendment to the Constitution. The court held that a woman’s right to an abortion fell within the right to privacy (recognized in Griswold v. Connecticut) protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. The decision gave a woman the right to an abortion during the entirety of the pregnancy and defined different levels of state interest for regulating abortion in the second and third trimesters.

    The ruling affected laws in 46 states.

    Full-text opinions by the justices can be viewed here.

    1971 – The Supreme Court agrees to hear the case filed by Roe against Wade, who was enforcing the Texas abortion law that had been declared unconstitutional in an earlier federal district court case. Wade was ignoring the legal ruling and both sides appealed.

    December 13, 1971 – The case is argued before the US Supreme Court.

    October 11, 1972 – The case is reargued before the US Supreme Court.

    January 22, 1973 – The US Supreme Court, in a 7-2 decision, affirms the legality of a woman’s right to have an abortion under the Fourteenth amendment to the Constitution.

    June 17, 2003 – McCorvey (Roe) files a motion with the federal district court in Dallas to have the case overturned and asks the court to consider new evidence that abortion hurts women. Included are 1,000 affidavits from women who say they regret their abortions.

    September 14, 2004 – A three-judge panel of the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans dismisses McCorvey’s motion to have the case overturned, according to the Court’s clerk.

    May 2, 2022 – In a stunning breach of Supreme Court confidentiality and secrecy, Politico has obtained what it calls a draft of a majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito that would overturn Roe v. Wade’s holding of a federal constitutional right to an abortion. The opinion in the case is not expected to be published until late June. The court confirms the authenticity of the document on May 3, but stresses it is not the final decision.

    June 24, 2022 – The Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade with a 6-3 decision, holding that there is no longer a federal constitutional right to an abortion. 

    Norma McCorvey – Texas resident who sought to obtain an abortion. Texas law prohibited abortions except to save the pregnant mother’s life. McCorvey was pregnant when she became the lead plaintiff in the case. She gave up the baby for adoption.

    McCorvey has since come forward and spoken against abortion. In 1997, McCorvey started Roe No More, an anti-abortion outreach organization that was dissolved in 2008. McCorvey died on February 18, 2017. In the 2020 documentary “AKA Jane Roe,” prior to her death in 2017, McCorvey told the film’s director that she hadn’t changed her mind about abortion but became an anti-abortion activist because she was being paid.

    Henry Wade – district attorney of Dallas County from 1951 to 1987. McCorvey sued him because he enforced a law that prohibited abortion, except to save a woman’s life. He died on March 1, 2001.

    Sarah Weddington – Lawyer for McCorvey.

    Linda Coffee – Lawyer for McCorvey.

    Jay Floyd – Argued the case for Texas the first time.

    Robert C. Flowers – Reargued the case for Texas.

    Majority: Harry A. Blackmun (for The Court), William J. Brennan, Lewis F. Powell Jr., Thurgood Marshall

    Concurring: Warren Burger, William Orville Douglas, Potter Stewart

    Dissenting: William H. Rehnquist, Byron White

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  • Samuel Alito Fast Facts | CNN

    Samuel Alito Fast Facts | CNN

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    Here’s a look at the life of US Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito.

    Birth date: April 1, 1950

    Birth place: Trenton, New Jersey

    Birth name: Samuel Anthony Alito Jr.

    Father: Samuel Alito, a teacher

    Mother: Rose (Fradusco) Alito, a teacher

    Marriage: Martha-Ann (Bomgardner) Alito (1985-present)

    Children: Philip and Laura

    Education: Princeton University, A.B., 1972; Yale University, J.D., 1975

    Nicknamed “Scalito” as his views resemble those of the late conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

    Argued 12 cases before the Supreme Court, the first in 1982.

    1976-1977 – Law clerk to Leonard I. Garth, judge of the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

    1977-1981 – Assistant US attorney for the District of New Jersey.

    1981-1985 – Assistant to the US solicitor general.

    1985-1987 – Deputy assistant to the US attorney general.

    1987-1990 – Named by President Ronald Reagan as the US attorney for the District of New Jersey.

    February 20, 1990 – Nominated by President George H.W. Bush to the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

    April 27, 1990 – Confirmed unanimously by the Senate on a voice vote.

    April 30, 1990-2006 – Judge of the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in Newark, New Jersey.

    1991 – Is the only dissenting voice in a Third Circuit ruling striking down a Pennsylvania law that required women to notify their husbands if they planned to get an abortion.

    1993 – Agrees with the majority that an Iranian woman seeking asylum could establish eligibility by showing that she has an abhorrence with her country’s “gender specific laws and repressive social norms,” or because of a belief in feminism or membership in a feminist group.

    1999 – Writes the opinion in a case that says a Christmas display on city property does not violate separation of church and state doctrines because it included a large plastic Santa Claus as well as a Menorah and a banner hailing diversity.

    2001 – Agrees with the majority that strikes down a public school district’s anti-harassment policy, saying the policy – which included non-vulgar, non-school-sponsored speech – violated the First Amendment.

    October 31, 2005 – President George W. Bush nominates Alito to be Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s replacement on the Supreme Court.

    January 31, 2006 – Alito is confirmed as an associate justice to the Supreme Court. The US Senate votes 58-42. He is immediately sworn in by Chief Justice John Roberts.

    February 1, 2006 – Sworn in as a Supreme Court justice a second time in a ceremony at the White House.

    May 29, 2007 – In a 5-4 ruling, the court dismisses a pay discrimination lawsuit, with Alito writing for the majority. The original suit was filed by a female worker, Lilly Ledbetter against her employer, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. She claimed that she was underpaid due to gender discrimination. In the opinion, Alito writes that Ledbetter filed the claim after the federally-mandated 180-day time window, concluding that the “filing deadline protects employers from the burden of defending claims arising from employment decisions long past.”

    January 28, 2010 – During a State of the Union address by President Barack Obama, Alito is seen mouthing the words “not true” in response to the president’s criticism of the court’s 5-4 ruling on Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, which removed long-established legal limits on campaign spending by corporations and unions.

    March 2, 2011 – Alito is the sole dissenter in the free speech case involving Westboro Baptist Church. In an 8-1 decision, the court rules that the First Amendment allows the church to carry out anti-gay protests, even at military funerals. Westboro had been sued by the family of a fallen Marine whose funeral was disrupted by church protesters. In his dissent, Alito writes, “Our profound national commitment to free and open debate is not a license for the vicious verbal assault that occurred in this case.”

    June 25, 2013 – Writes the majority opinion in Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl where the question is, can an unwed non-custodial parent block an adoption using the Federal Indian Child Welfare Act. The court ruled, 5-4, in favor of the adoptive parents ruling that the ICWA did not apply when the parent had never had physical or legal custody of the child.

    June 30, 2014 – Writes the majority opinion in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, with the court ruling 5-4 that family-owned corporations can be exempt from a federal mandate requiring the inclusion of contraception coverage in employee health plans based on religious objections.

    June 27, 2018 – The court issues a 5-4 ruling striking down an Illinois law requiring non-union public sector workers to pay fees for collective bargaining. The opinion, written by Alito, reads, “It is hard to estimate how many billions of dollars have been taken from nonmembers and transferred to public sector unions in violation of the First Amendment. Those unconstitutional exactions cannot be allowed to continue indefinitely.”

    February 1, 2019 – Alito temporarily blocks a Louisiana abortion law from going into effect, filing an order that says the justices need more time to review the filings in the case against a measure restricting access to clinics.

    November 25, 2019 – Writes the sole dissent in the court’s denial of National Review’s defamation suit petition. Climate scientist Michael Mann sued the conservative magazine in 2012 after two columnists wrote about his work and the “Hockey Stick” curve graph illustrating the rise in average global temperatures, accusing him of “misconduct” and data “manipulation.” Alito writes that the case brings up First Amendment concerns “that go to the very heart of the constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech and freedom of the press: the protection afforded to journalists and others who use harsh language in criticizing opposing advocacy on one of the most important public issues of the day. If the Court is serious about protecting freedom of expression, we should grant review.”

    June 24, 2022 – The Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade, holding that there is no longer a federal constitutional right to an abortion. In his majority opinion, Alito says “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start.”

    November 28, 2022 – In a letter, the Supreme Court legal counsel says there is no evidence that Alito violated ethics standards, in response to questions from congressional Democrats about allegations that Alito revealed the outcome of a 2014 decision before it was released.

    July 28, 2023 – Alito agrees to temporarily freeze a lower court order that bars the US government from regulating so-called ghost guns – untraceable homemade weapons – as firearms under federal law.

    October 6, 2023 – Alito freezes a lower court ruling that blocked the Biden administration from regulating so-called ghost guns.

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  • Notable US Supreme Court Decisions Fast Facts | CNN

    Notable US Supreme Court Decisions Fast Facts | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Here’s a look at some of the most important cases decided by the US Supreme Court since 1789.

    1803 – Marbury v. Madison
    This decision established the system of checks and balances and the power of the Supreme Court within the federal government.

    Situation: Federalist William Marbury and many others were appointed to positions by outgoing President John Adams. The appointments were not finalized before the new Secretary of State James Madison took office, and Madison chose not to honor them. Marbury and the others invoked an Act of Congress and sued to get their appointed positions.

    The Court decided against Marbury 6-0.

    Historical significance: Chief Justice John Marshall wrote, “An act of the legislature repugnant to the constitution is void.” It was the first time the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional a law that had been passed by Congress.

    1857 – Dred Scott v. Sandford
    This decision established that slaves were not citizens of the United States and were not protected under the US Constitution.

    Situation: Dred Scott and his wife Harriet sued for their freedom in Missouri, a slave state, after having lived with their owner, an Army surgeon, in the free Territory of Wisconsin.

    The Court decided against Scott 7-2.

    Historical significance: The decision overturned the Missouri Compromise, where Congress had prohibited slavery in the territories. The Dred Scott decision was overturned later with the adoption of the 13th Amendment, abolishing slavery in 1865 and the 14th Amendment in 1868, granting citizenship to all born in the United States.

    1896 – Plessy v. Ferguson
    This decision established the rule of segregation, separate but equal.

    Situation: While attempting to test the constitutionality of the Separate Car Law in Louisiana, Homer Plessy, a man of 1/8 African descent, sat in the train car for whites instead of the blacks-only train car and was arrested.

    The Court decided against Plessy 7-1.

    Historical significance: Justice Henry Billings Brown wrote, “The argument also assumes that social prejudice may be overcome by legislation and that equal rights cannot be secured except by an enforced commingling of the two races… if the civil and political rights of both races be equal, one cannot be inferior to the other civilly or politically. If one race be inferior to the other socially, the Constitution of the United States cannot put them upon the same plane.” The Court gave merit to the “Jim Crow” system. Plessy was overturned by the Brown v. Board of Education decision. In January 2022 Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards granted a posthumous pardon to Homer Plessy. The pardon comes after the Louisiana Board of Pardons voted unanimously in November 2021 in favor of a pardon for Plessy, who died in his 60s in 1925.

    1954 – Brown v. Board of Education
    This decision overturned Plessy v. Ferguson and granted equal protection under the law.

    Situation: Segregation of the public school systems in the United States was addressed when cases in Kansas, South Carolina, Delaware and Virginia were all decided together under Brown v. Board of Education. Third-grader Linda Brown was denied admission to the white school a few blocks from her home and was forced to attend the blacks-only school a mile away.

    The Court decided in favor of Brown unanimously.

    Historical significance: Racial segregation violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.

    1963 – Gideon v. Wainwright
    This decision guarantees the right to counsel.

    Situation: Clarence Earl Gideon was forced to defend himself when he requested a lawyer from a Florida court and was refused. He was convicted and sentenced to five years for breaking and entering.

    The Court decided in favor of Gideon unanimously.

    Historical significance: Ensures the Sixth Amendment’s guarantee to counsel is applicable to the states through the 14th Amendment’s due process clause.

    1964 – New York Times v. Sullivan
    This decision upheld the First Amendment rights of freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

    Situation: The New York Times and four African-American ministers were sued for libel by Montgomery, Alabama, police commissioner L.B. Sullivan. Sullivan claimed a full-page ad in the Times discussing the arrest of Martin Luther King Jr., and his efforts toward voter registration and integration in Montgomery were defamatory against him. Alabama’s libel law did not require Sullivan to prove harm since the ad did contain factual errors. He was awarded $500,000.

    The Court decided against Sullivan unanimously.

    Historical significance: The First Amendment protects free speech and publication of all statements about public officials made without actual malice.

    1966 – Miranda v. Arizona
    The decision established the rights of suspects against self-incrimination.

    Situation: Ernesto Miranda was convicted of rape and kidnapping after he confessed, while in police custody, without benefit of counsel or knowledge of his constitutional right to remain silent.

    The court decided in favor of Miranda 5-4.

    Historical significance: Upon arrest and/or questioning, all suspects are given some form of their constitutional rights – “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you. Do you understand the rights I have just read to you? With these rights in mind, do you wish to speak to me?”

    1973 – Roe v. Wade
    This decision expanded privacy rights to include a woman’s right to choose pregnancy or abortion.

    Situation: “Jane Roe” (Norma McCorvey), single and living in Texas, did not want to continue her third pregnancy. Under Texas law, she could not legally obtain an abortion.

    The Court decided in favor of Roe 7-2.

    Historical significance: Abortion is legal in all 50 states. Women have the right to choose between pregnancy and abortion.

    1974 – United States v. Nixon
    This decision established that executive privilege is neither absolute nor unqualified.

    Situation: President Richard Nixon’s taped conversations from 1971 onward were the object of subpoenas by both the special prosecutor and those under indictment in the Watergate scandal. The president claimed immunity from subpoena under executive privilege.

    The Court decided against Nixon 8-0.

    Historical significance: The president is not above the law. After the Court ruled on July 24, 1974, Richard Nixon resigned on August 8.

    1978 – Regents of the U. of California v. Bakke
    This decision ruled that race cannot be the only factor in college admissions.

    Situation: Allan Bakke had twice applied for and was denied admission to the University of California Medical School at Davis. Bakke was white, male and 35 years old. He claimed under California’s affirmative action plan, minorities with lower grades and test scores were admitted to the medical school when he was not, therefore his denial of admission was based solely on race.

    The Court decided in Bakke’s favor, 5-4.

    Historical significance: Affirmative action is approved by the Court and schools may use race as an admissions factor. However, the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment works both ways in the case of affirmative action; race cannot be the only factor in the admissions process.

    2012 – National Federation of Independent Business et al v. Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services et al

    Situation: The constitutionality of the sweeping health care reform law championed by President Barack Obama.

    The Court voted 5-4 in favor of upholding the Affordable Care Act.

    Historical significance: The ruling upholds the law’s central provision – a requirement that all people have health insurance or pay a penalty.

    2013 – United States v. Windsor
    This decision ruled that the Defense of Marriage Act, which defined the term “marriage” under federal law as a “legal union between one man and one woman” deprived same-sex couples who are legally married under state laws of their Fifth Amendment rights to equal protection under federal law.

    Situation: Edith Windsor and Thea Spyer were married in Toronto in 2007. Their marriage was recognized by New York state, where they lived. Upon Spyer’s death in 2009, Windsor was forced to pay $363,000 in estate taxes, because their marriage was not recognized by federal law.

    The court voted 5-4 in favor of Windsor.

    Historical significance: The court strikes down section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act, ruling that legally married same-sex couples are entitled to federal benefits.

    2015 – King et al, v. Burwell, Secretary of Health and Human Services, et al

    Situation: This case was about determining whether or not the portion of the Affordable Care Act which says subsidies would be available only to those who purchase insurance on exchanges “established by the state” referred to the individual states.

    The Court ruled 6-3 in favor of upholding the Affordable Care Act subsidies.

    Historical significance: The court rules that the Affordable Care Act federal tax credits for eligible Americans are available in all 50 states, regardless of whether the states have their own health care exchanges.

    2015 – Obergefell et al, v. Hodges, Director, Ohio Department of Health, et al.

    Situation: Multiple lower courts had struck down state same-sex marriage bans. There were 37 states allowing gay marriage before the issue went to the Supreme Court.

    The Court ruled 5-4 in favor of Obergefell et al.

    Historical significance: The court rules that states cannot ban same-sex marriage and must recognize lawful marriages performed out of state.

    2016 – Fisher v. University of Texas

    Situation: Abigail Fisher sued the University of Texas after her admission application was rejected in 2008. She claimed it was because she is white and that she was being treated differently than some less-qualified minority students who were accepted. In 2013 the Supreme Court sent the case back to the lower courts for further review.

    The Court ruled 4-3 in favor of the University of Texas. Justice Elena Kagan recused herself from the case, presumably because she dealt with it in her previous job as solicitor general.

    Historical Significance: The court rules that taking race into consideration as one factor of admission is constitutional.

    2020 – Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia

    Situation: Gerald Bostock filed a lawsuit against Clayton County for discrimination based on his sexual orientation after he was terminated for “conduct unbecoming of its employees,” shortly after he began participating in a gay softball league. Two other consolidated cases were also argued on the same day.

    The 6-3 opinion in favor of the plaintiff, written by Justice Neil Gorsuch and joined by Chief Justice John Roberts, states that being fired “merely for being gay or transgender violates Title VII” of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

    Historical Significance: Federal anti-bias law now protects people who face job loss and/or discrimination based on their sexual orientation or gender identity.

    2022 – Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization

    Situation: Mississippi’s Gestational Age Act, passed in 2018 and which greatly restricts abortion after 15 weeks, is blocked by two federal courts, holding that it is in direct violation of Supreme Court precedent legalizing abortion nationwide prior to viability, which can occur at around 23-24 weeks of pregnancy, and that in an “unbroken line dating to Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court’s abortion cases have established (and affirmed and re-affirmed) a woman’s right to choose an abortion before viability.” The court said states may “regulate abortion procedures prior to viability” so long as they do not ban abortion. “The law at issue is a ban,” the court held. 

    Mississippi appeals the decision to the Supreme Court.

    The 6-3 opinion in favor of the plaintiff, written by Justice Samuel Alito states that “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start…Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences. And far from bringing about a national settlement of the abortion issue, Roe and Casey have enflamed debate and deepened division.”

    In a joint dissenting opinion, Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan heavily criticized the majority, closing: “With sorrow – for this Court, but more, for the many millions of American women who have today lost a fundamental constitutional protection – we dissent.”

    Historical Significance: The ruling overturns Roe v. Wade and there is no longer a federal constitutional right to an abortion, leaving abortion rights to be determined by states.

    1944 – Korematsu v. United States – The Court ruled Executive Order 9066, internment of Japanese citizens during World War II, is legal, 6-3 for the United States.

    1961 – Mapp v. Ohio – “Fruit of the poisonous tree,” evidence obtained through an illegal search, cannot be used at trial, 6-3 for Mapp.

    1967 – Loving v. Virginia – Prohibition against interracial marriage was ruled unconstitutional, 9-0 for Loving.

    1968 – Terry v. Ohio – Stop and frisk, under certain circumstances, does not violate the Constitution. The Court upholds Terry’s conviction and rules 8-1 that it is not unconstitutional for police to stop and frisk individuals without probable cause for an arrest if they have a reasonable suspicion that a crime has or is about to occur.

    2008 – District of Columbia v. Heller – The Second Amendment does protect the individual’s right to bear arms, 5-4 for Heller.

    2010 – Citizens United v. FEC – The Court rules corporations can contribute to PACs under the First Amendment’s right to free speech, 5-4 for Citizens United.

    2023 – Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard together with Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina – Colleges and universities can no longer take race into consideration as a specific basis in admissions. The majority opinion, written by Justice John Roberts, claims the court is not expressly overturning prior cases authorizing race-based affirmative action and suggests that how race has affected an applicant’s life can still be part of how their application is considered.

    2024 – Donald J. Trump v. Norma Anderson, et al – The Court rules former President Donald Trump should appear on the ballot in Colorado in a decision that follows months of debate over whether Trump violated the “insurrectionist clause” included in the 14th Amendment.

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  • 2023 In Review Fast Facts | CNN

    2023 In Review Fast Facts | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Here is a look back at the events of 2023.

    January 3 – Republican Kevin McCarthy fails to secure enough votes to be elected Speaker of the House in three rounds of voting. On January 7, McCarthy is elected House speaker after multiple days of negotiations and 15 rounds of voting. That same day, the newly elected 118th Congress is officially sworn in.

    January 7 – Tyre Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man, is pulled over for reckless driving. He is hospitalized following the arrest and dies three days later from injuries sustained during the traffic stop. Five officers from the Memphis Police Department are fired. On January 26, a grand jury indicts the five officers. They are each charged with second-degree murder, aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression. On September 12, the five officers are indicted by a federal grand jury on several charges including deprivation of rights.

    January 9 – The White House counsel’s office confirms that several classified documents from President Joe Biden’s time as vice president were discovered last fall in an office at the Penn Biden Center. On January 12, the White House counsel’s office confirms a small number of additional classified documents were located in President Biden’s Wilmington, Delaware, home.

    January 13 – The Trump Organization is fined $1.6 million – the maximum possible penalty – by a New York judge for running a decade-long tax fraud scheme.

    January 21 – Eleven people are killed in a mass shooting at a dance studio in Monterey Park, California, as the city’s Asian American community was celebrating Lunar New Year. The 72-year-old gunman is found dead the following day from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

    January 24 – CNN reports that a lawyer for former Vice President Mike Pence discovered about a dozen documents marked as classified at Pence’s Indiana home last week, and he has turned those classified records over to the FBI.

    January 25 – Facebook-parent company Meta announces it will restore former President Donald Trump’s accounts on Facebook and Instagram in the coming weeks, just over two years after suspending him in the wake of the January 6 Capitol attack.

    February 1 – Tom Brady announces his retirement after 23 seasons in the NFL.

    February 2 – Defense officials announce the United States is tracking a suspected Chinese high-altitude surveillance balloon over the continental United States. On February 4, a US military fighter jet shoots down the balloon over the Atlantic Ocean. On June 29, the Pentagon reveals the balloon did not collect intelligence while flying over the country.

    February 3 – A Norfolk Southern freight train carrying hazardous materials derails in East Palestine, Ohio. An evacuation order is issued for the area within a mile radius of the train crash. The order is lifted on February 8. After returning to their homes, some residents report they have developed a rash and nausea.

    February 7 – Lebron James breaks the NBA’s all-time scoring record, surpassing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

    February 15 – Payton Gendron, 19, who killed 10 people in a racist mass shooting at a grocery store in a predominantly Black area of Buffalo last May, is sentenced to life in prison.

    February 18 – In a statement, the Carter Center says that former President Jimmy Carter will begin receiving hospice care at his home in Georgia.

    February 20 – President Biden makes a surprise trip to Kyiv for the first time since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine almost a year ago.

    February 23 – Disgraced R&B singer R. Kelly is sentenced to 20 years in prison in a Chicago federal courtroom on charges of child pornography and enticement of a minor. Kelly is already serving a 30-year prison term for his 2021 conviction on racketeering and sex trafficking charges in a New York federal court. Nineteen years of the 20-year prison sentence will be served at the same time as his other sentence. One year will be served after that sentence is complete.

    February 23 – Harvey Weinstein, who is already serving a 23-year prison sentence in New York, is sentenced in Los Angeles to an additional 16 years in prison for charges of rape and sexual assault.

    March 2 – SpaceX and NASA launch a fresh crew of astronauts on a mission to the International Space Station, kicking off a roughly six-month stay in space. The mission — which is carrying two NASA astronauts, a Russian cosmonaut and an astronaut from the United Arab Emirates — took off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

    March 2 – The jury in the double murder trial of Alex Murdaugh finds him guilty of murdering his wife and son. Murdaugh, the 54-year-old scion of a prominent and powerful family of local lawyers and solicitors, is also found guilty of two counts of possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime in the killings of Margaret “Maggie” Murdaugh and Paul Murdaugh on June 7, 2021.

    March 3 – Four US citizens from South Carolina are kidnapped by gunmen in Matamoros, Mexico, in a case of mistaken identity. On March 7, two of the four Americans, Shaeed Woodard and Zindell Brown, are found dead and the other two, Latavia McGee and Eric Williams, are found alive. The cartel believed responsible for the armed kidnapping issues an apology letter and hands over five men to local authorities.

    March 10 – The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation announces that Silicon Valley Bank was shut down by California regulators. This is the second largest bank failure in US history, only to Washington Mutual’s collapse in 2008. SVB Financial Group, the former parent company of SVB, files for bankruptcy on March 17.

    March 27 – A 28-year-old Nashville resident shoots and kills three children and three adults at the Covenant School in Nashville. The shooter is fatally shot by responding officers.

    March 29 – Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich is detained by Russian authorities and accused of spying. On April 7, he is formally charged with espionage.

    March 30 – A grand jury in New York votes to indict Trump, the first time in American history that a current or former president has faced criminal charges. On April 4, Trump surrenders and is placed under arrest before pleading not guilty to 34 felony criminal charges of falsifying business records. Prosecutors allege that Trump sought to undermine the integrity of the 2016 election through a hush money scheme with payments made to women who claimed they had extramarital affairs with Trump. He has denied the affairs.

    April 6 – Two Democratic members of the Tennessee House of Representatives, Rep. Justin Jones and Rep. Justin Pearson, are expelled while a third member, Rep. Gloria Johnson, is spared in an ousting by Republican lawmakers that was decried by the trio as oppressive, vindictive and racially motivated. This comes after Jones, Pearson and Johnson staged a demonstration on the House floor calling for gun reform following the shooting at the Covenant School. On April 10, Rep. Jones is sworn back in following a unanimous vote by the Nashville Metropolitan Council to reappoint him as an interim representative. On April 12, the Shelby County Board of Commissioners vote to confirm the reappointment of Rep. Pearson.

    April 6-13 – ProPublica reports that Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife, conservative activist Ginni Thomas, have gone on several luxury trips involving travel subsidized by and stays at properties owned by Harlan Crow, a GOP megadonor. The hospitality was not disclosed on Thomas’ public financial filings with the Supreme Court. The following week ProPublica reports Thomas failed to disclose a 2014 real estate deal he made with Crow. On financial disclosure forms released on August 31, Thomas discloses the luxury trips and “inadvertently omitted” information including the real estate deal.

    April 7 – A federal judge in Texas issues a ruling on medication abortion drug mifepristone, saying he will suspend the US Food and Drug Administration’s two-decade-old approval of it but paused his ruling for seven days so the federal government can appeal. But in a dramatic turn of events, a federal judge in Washington state says in a new ruling shortly after that the FDA must keep medication abortion drugs available in more than a dozen Democratic-led states.

    April 13 – 21-year-old Jack Teixeira, a member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard is arrested by the FBI in connection with the leaking of classified documents that have been posted online.

    April 18 – Fox News reaches a last-second settlement with Dominion Voting Systems, paying more than $787 million to end a two-year legal battle that publicly shredded the network’s credibility. Fox News’ $787.5 million settlement with Dominion Voting Systems is the largest publicly known defamation settlement in US history involving a media company.

    April 25 – President Biden formally announces his bid for reelection.

    May 2 – More than 11,000 members of the Writers Guild of America (WGA) go on strike for the first time since 2007. On September 26, the WGA announces its leaders have unanimously voted to authorize its members to return to work following the tentative agreement reached on September 24 between union negotiators and Hollywood’s studios and streaming services, effectively ending the months-long strike.

    May 9 – A Manhattan federal jury finds Trump sexually abused former magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll in a luxury department store dressing room in the spring of 1996 and awards her $5 million for battery and defamation.

    June 8 – Trump is indicted on a total of 37 counts in the special counsel’s classified documents probe. In a superseding indictment filed on July 27, Trump is charged with one additional count of willful retention of national defense information and two additional obstruction counts, bringing the total to 40 counts.

    June 16 – Robert Bowers, the gunman who killed 11 worshippers at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue in 2018, is convicted by a federal jury on all 63 charges against him. He is sentenced to death on August 2.

    June 18 – A civilian submersible disappears with five people aboard while voyaging to the wreckage of the Titanic. On June 22, following a massive search for the submersible, US authorities announce the vessel suffered a “catastrophic implosion,” killing all five people aboard.

    June 20 – ProPublica reports that Justice Samuel Alito did not disclose a luxury 2008 trip he took in which a hedge fund billionaire flew him on a private jet, even though the businessman would later repeatedly ask the Supreme Court to intervene on his behalf. In a highly unusual move, Alito preemptively disputed the nature of the report before it was published, authoring an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal in which he acknowledged knowing billionaire Paul Singer but downplaying their relationship.

    June 29 – The Supreme Court says colleges and universities can no longer take race into consideration as a specific basis for granting admission, a landmark decision overturning long-standing precedent.

    July 13 – The FDA approves Opill to be available over-the-counter, the first nonprescription birth control pill in the United States.

    July 14 – SAG-AFTRA, a union representing about 160,000 Hollywood actors, goes on strike after talks with major studios and streaming services fail. It is the first time its members have stopped work on movie and television productions since 1980. On November 8, SAG-AFTRA and the studios reach a tentative agreement, officially ending the strike.

    July 14 – Rex Heuermann, a New York architect, is charged with six counts of murder in connection with the deaths of three of the four women known as the “Gilgo Four.”

    August 1 – Trump is indicted by a federal grand jury in Washington, DC, in the 2020 election probe. Trump is charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States; conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding; obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding; and conspiracy against rights.

    August 8 – Over 100 people are killed and hundreds of others unaccounted for after wildfires engulf parts of Maui. Nearly 3,000 homes and businesses are destroyed or damaged.

    August 14 – Trump and 18 others are indicted by an Atlanta-based grand jury on state charges stemming from their efforts to overturn the former president’s 2020 electoral defeat. Trump now faces a total of 91 charges in four criminal cases, in four different jurisdictions — two federal and two state cases. On August 24, Trump surrenders at the Fulton County jail where he is processed and released on bond.

    August 23 – Eight Republican presidential candidates face off in the first primary debate of the 2024 campaign in Milwaukee.

    September 12 – House Speaker McCarthy announces he is calling on his committees to open a formal impeachment inquiry into President Biden, even as they have yet to prove allegations he directly profited off his son’s foreign business deals.

    September 14 – Hunter Biden is indicted by special counsel David Weiss in connection with a gun he purchased in 2018, the first time in US history the Justice Department has charged the child of a sitting president. The three charges include making false statements on a federal firearms form and possession of a firearm as a prohibited person.

    September 22 – New Jersey Democratic Senator Bob Menendez is charged with corruption-related offenses for the second time in 10 years. Menendez and his wife, Nadine Arslanian Menendez, are accused of accepting “hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes” in exchange for the senator’s influence, according to the newly unsealed federal indictment.

    September 28 – Dianne Feinstein, the longest-serving female US senator in history, dies at the age of 90. On October 1, California Governor Gavin Newsom announces he will appoint Emily’s List president Laphonza Butler to replace her. Butler will become the first out Black lesbian to join Congress. She will also be the sole Black female senator serving in Congress and only the third in US history.

    September 29 – Las Vegas police confirm Duane Keith Davis, aka “Keffe D,” was arrested for the 1996 murder of rapper Tupac Shakur.

    October 3 – McCarthy is removed as House speaker following a 216-210 vote, with eight Republicans voting to remove McCarthy from the post.

    October 25 – After three weeks without a speaker, the House votes to elect Rep. Mike Johnson of Louisiana.

    October 25 – Robert Card, a US Army reservist, kills 18 people and injures 13 others in a shooting rampage in Lewiston, Maine. On October 27, after a two-day manhunt, he is found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot.

    November 13 – The Supreme Court announces a code of conduct in an attempt to bolster the public’s confidence in the court after months of news stories alleging that some of the justices have been skirting ethics regulations.

    November 19 – Former first lady Rosalynn Carter passes away at the age of 96.

    January 8 – Supporters of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro storm the country’s congressional building, Supreme Court and presidential palace. The breaches come about a week after the inauguration of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who defeated Bolsonaro in a runoff election on October 30.

    January 15 – At least 68 people are killed when an aircraft goes down near the city of Pokhara in central Nepal. This is the country’s deadliest plane crash in more than 30 years.

    January 19 – New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Arden announces she will not seek reelection in October.

    January 24 – President Volodymyr Zelensky fires a slew of senior Ukrainian officials amid a growing corruption scandal linked to the procurement of war-time supplies.

    February 6 – More than 15,000 people are killed and tens of thousands injured after a magnitude 7.8 earthquake strikes Turkey and Syria.

    February 28 – At least 57 people are killed after two trains collide in Greece.

    March 1 – Bola Ahmed Tinubu is declared the winner of Nigeria’s presidential election.

    March 10 – Xi Jinping is reappointed as president for another five years by China’s legislature in a ceremonial vote in Beijing, a highly choreographed exercise in political theater meant to demonstrate legitimacy and unity of the ruling elite.

    March 16 – The French government forces through controversial plans to raise the country’s retirement age from 62 to 64.

    April 4 – Finland becomes the 31st member of NATO.

    April 15 – Following months of tensions in Sudan between a paramilitary group and the country’s army, violence erupts.

    May 3 – A 13-year-old boy opens fire on his classmates at a school in Belgrade, Serbia, killing at least eight children along with a security guard. On May 4, a second mass shooting takes place when an attacker opens fire in the village of Dubona, about 37 miles southeast of Belgrade, killing eight people.

    May 5 – The World Health Organization announces Covid-19 is no longer a global health emergency.

    May 6 – King Charles’ coronation takes place at Westminster Abbey in London.

    August 4 – Alexey Navalny is sentenced to 19 years in prison on extremism charges, Russian media reports. Navalny is already serving sentences totaling 11-and-a-half years in a maximum-security facility on fraud and other charges that he says were trumped up.

    September 8 – Over 2,000 people are dead and thousands are injured after a 6.8-magnitude earthquake hits Morocco.

    October 8 – Israel formally declares war on the Palestinian militant group Hamas after it carried out an unprecedented attack by air, sea and land on October 7.

    November 8 – The Vatican publishes new guidelines opening the door to Catholic baptism for transgender people and babies of same-sex couples.

    November 24 – The first group of hostages is released after Israel and Hamas agree to a temporary truce. Dozens more hostages are released in the following days. On December 1, the seven-day truce ends after negotiations reach an impasse and Israel accuses Hamas of violating the agreement by firing at Israel.

    Awards and Winners

    January 9 – The College Football Playoff National Championship game takes place at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. The Georgia Bulldogs defeat Texas Christian University’s Horned Frogs 65-7 for their second national title in a row.

    January 10 – The 80th Annual Golden Globe Awards are presented live on NBC.

    January 16-29 – The 111th Australian Open takes place. Novak Djokovic defeats Stefanos Tsitsipas in straight sets to win a 10th Australian Open title and a record-equaling 22nd grand slam. Belarusian-born Aryna Sabalenka defeats Elena Rybakina in three sets, becoming the first player competing under a neutral flag to secure a grand slam.

    February 5 – The 65th Annual Grammy Awards ceremony takes place in Los Angeles at the Crypto.com Arena.

    February 12 – Super Bowl LVII takes place at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona. The Kansas City Chiefs defeat the Philadelphia Eagles 38-35. This is the first Super Bowl to feature two Black starting quarterbacks.

    February 19 – Ricky Stenhouse Jr. wins the 65th Annual Daytona 500 in double overtime. It is the longest Daytona 500 ever with a record of 212 laps raced.

    March 12 – The 95th Annual Academy Awards takes place, with Jimmy Kimmel hosting for the third time.

    March 14 – Ryan Redington wins his first Iditarod.

    April 2 – The Louisiana State University Tigers defeat the University of Iowa Hawkeyes 102-85 in Dallas, to win the program’s first NCAA women’s basketball national championship.

    April 3 – The University of Connecticut Huskies win its fifth men’s basketball national title with a 76-59 victory over the San Diego State University Aztecs in Houston.

    April 6-9 – The 87th Masters tournament takes place. Jon Rahm wins, claiming his first green jacket and second career major at Augusta National.

    April 17 – The 127th Boston Marathon takes place. The winners are Evans Chebet of Kenya in the men’s division and Hellen Obiri of Kenya in the women’s division.

    May 6 – Mage, a 3-year-old chestnut colt, wins the 149th Kentucky Derby.

    May 8-9 – The 147th Annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show takes place at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Queens, New York. Buddy Holly, a petit basset griffon Vendéen, wins Best in Show.

    May 20 – National Treasure wins the 148th running of the Preakness Stakes.

    May 21 – Brooks Koepka wins the 105th PGA Championship at Oak Hill County Club in Rochester, New York. This is his third PGA Championship and fifth major title of his career.

    May 22-June 11 – The French Open takes place at Roland Garros Stadium in Paris. Novak Djokovic wins a record-breaking 23rd Grand Slam title, defeating Casper Ruud 7-6 (7-1) 6-3 7-5 in the men’s final. Iga Świątek wins her third French Open in four years with a 6-2 5-7 6-4 victory against the unseeded Karolína Muchová in the women’s final.

    May 28 – Josef Newgarden wins the 107th running of the Indianapolis 500.

    June 10 – Arcangelo wins the 155th running of the Belmont Stakes.

    June 11 – The 76th Tony Awards takes place.

    June 12 – The Denver Nuggets defeat the Miami Heat 94-89 in Game 5, to win the series 4-1 and claim their first NBA title in franchise history.

    June 13 – The Vegas Golden Knights defeat the Florida Panthers in Game 5 to win the franchise’s first Stanley Cup.

    June 18 – American golfer Wyndham Clark wins the 123rd US Open at The Los Angeles Country Club.

    July 1-23 – The 110th Tour de France takes place. Danish cyclist Jonas Vingegaard wins his second consecutive Tour de France title.

    July 3-16 – Wimbledon takes place in London. Carlos Alcaraz defeats Novak Djokovic 1-6 7-6 (8-6) 6-1 3-6 6-4 in the men’s final, to win his first Wimbledon title. Markéta Vondroušová defeats Ons Jabeur 6-4 6-4 in the women’s final, to win her first Wimbledon title and become the first unseeded woman in the Open Era to win the tournament.

    July 16-23 – Brian Harman wins the 151st Open Championship at Royal Liverpool in Hoylake, Wirral, England, for his first major title.

    July 20-August 20 – The Women’s World Cup takes place in Australia and New Zealand. Spain defeats England 1-0 to win its first Women’s World Cup.

    August 28-September 10 – The US Open Tennis Tournament takes place. Coco Gauff defeats Aryna Sabalenka, and Novak Djokovic defeats Daniil Medvedev.

    October 2-9 – The Nobel Prizes are announced. The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to jailed Iranian activist Narges Mohammadi for “her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all,” according to the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

    November 1 – The Texas Rangers win the World Series for the first time in franchise history, defeating the Arizona Diamondbacks 5-0 in Game 5.

    November 5 – The New York City Marathon takes place. Ethiopia’s Tamirat Tola sets a course record and wins the men’s race. Kenya’s Hellen Obiri wins the women’s race.

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  • Sandra Day O'Connor Fast Facts | CNN

    Sandra Day O'Connor Fast Facts | CNN

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    Here is a look at the life of Sandra Day O’Connor, the first female justice on the United States Supreme Court.

    Birth date: March 26, 1930

    Death date: December 1, 2023

    Birth place: El Paso, Texas

    Birth name: Sandra Day

    Father: Harry A. Day, rancher

    Mother: Ada Mae (Wilkey) Day, rancher

    Marriage: John Jay O’Connor III (1952-2009, his death)

    Children: Scott, Brian and Jay

    Education: Stanford University, B.A. in Economics, 1950, graduated magna cum laude; Stanford Law School, LL.B, 1952

    In law school, she was on the Stanford Law Review and third in her class.

    Completed law school in two years.

    A proponent of judicial restraint. At her confirmation hearings, she said, “Judges are not only not authorized to engage in executive or legislative functions, they are also ill-equipped to do so.”

    In retirement, O’Connor has campaigned around the United States to abolish elections for judges, believing that a merit system leads to a more qualified and untainted judiciary.

    1952-1953 – County deputy attorney in San Mateo, California.

    1955-1957- Works as a civilian lawyer for the Quartermaster Corps in Germany, while her husband serves with the Army’s Judge Advocate General Corps.

    1959 – Opens a law firm in Maryvale, Arizona.

    1965-1969 – Assistant attorney general of Arizona.

    1969 – Appointed to fill a vacant seat in the Arizona Senate.

    1970 – Elected to the Arizona Senate.

    1972 – Reelected to the Arizona Senate and elected majority leader. She is the first woman to hold this office in any state.

    1975-1979 – Superior Court judge of Maricopa County.

    1979-1981 – Judge of the Arizona Court of Appeals.

    August 19, 1981 – Formally nominated to the Supreme Court by President Ronald Reagan, to fill the seat of retiring Justice Potter Stewart.

    September 21, 1981 – Confirmed by the US Senate.

    September 25, 1981 – Sworn in as the first female Supreme Court justice of the United States.

    1982 – Writes an opinion invalidating a women-only enrollment policy at a Mississippi State nursing school because it “tends to perpetuate the stereotyped view of nursing as an exclusively women’s job.” Mississippi University for Women, et al., v. Hogan

    October 21, 1988 – Has surgery for breast cancer after being diagnosed earlier in the year.

    1996 – Writes the majority opinion in a 5-4 decision to restrict affirmative action policies and voting districts that are created to boost the political power of minorities. Shaw v. Reno

    1999 – Writes the majority ruling opinion in a 5-4 decision that public school districts that receive federal funds can be held liable when they are “deliberately indifferent” to the sexual harassment of one student by another. Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education

    2000 – Votes with the majority in a 5-4 decision that strikes down state laws banning the medical procedure that critics call “partial-birth” abortion. Stenberg v. Carhart

    December 2000 – Votes in the majority to end the recount in Florida which leads to George W. Bush becoming president of the United States. O’Connor and Anthony M. Kennedy are the only justices who do not attach their names to either a concurring or dissenting opinion in the case. Bush v. Gore

    January 31, 2006 – Retires from the Supreme Court.

    2008 – Develops the website, OurCourts which later becomes iCivics, a free program for students to learn about civics.

    July 30, 2009 – Is awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama.

    February 25, 2014 – Her book “Out Of Order,” which is based on the history of the Supreme Court, is published.

    October 23, 2018 – Writes a letter revealing that she has been diagnosed with the “beginning stages of dementia, probably Alzheimer’s disease.”

    March 19, 2019 – The biography, “First: Sandra Day O’Connor,” is published.

    July 19, 2019 – O’Connor’s former home is listed by the National Park Service in the National Register of Historic Places. The adobe house built by O’Connor and her husband in 1958 in Paradise Valley, Arizona, was relocated to Tempe, Arizona, in 2009. It is the home of the Sandra Day O’Connor Institute.

    April 13, 2022 – President Joe Biden signs a bipartisan bill into law to erect statues of O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the grounds of the US Capitol. The legislation stipulates that the statues should be placed within two years of its enactment.

    December 1, 2023 – Dies at age 93 from complications related to dementia.

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  • Wilbur Ross Fast Facts | CNN Politics

    Wilbur Ross Fast Facts | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Here’s a look at the life of former Commerce Secretary Wilbur L. Ross Jr.

    Birth date: November 28, 1937

    Birth place: Weehawken, New Jersey

    Birth name: Wilbur Louis Ross Jr.

    Father: Wilbur Louis Ross Sr., a lawyer

    Mother: Agnes (O’Neill) Ross, a teacher

    Marriages: Hilary (Geary) Ross (October 9, 2004); Betsy (McCaughey) Ross (December 7, 1995-August 2000, divorced); Judith (Nodine) Ross (May 26, 1961-October 1995, divorced)

    Children: with Judith Nodine: Jessica and Amanda

    Education: Yale University, A.B., 1959, Harvard University, M.B.A., 1961

    He was called the “King of Bankruptcy,” as he built new companies from the assets of defaulted ones.

    Ross was known for investing in distressed companies in a wide range of industries including auto parts, steel, textiles and financial services.

    1976-2000 – Works for the investment bank Rothschild Inc. During his tenure, he becomes a top bankruptcy adviser.

    January 1998 – Pledges $2.25 million towards then-wife and Lt. Governor Betsy McCaughey Ross’ campaign for governor of New York. He withdraws the funding in September and files for divorce in November.

    2000 – Purchases a small fund he started at Rothschild and opens his own private equity firm, WL Ross & Co. LLC.

    2002 – Establishes the International Steel Group (ISG), with himself as chairman of the board, through a series of mergers and acquisitions starting with Bethlehem Steel Corp.

    December 2003 – ISG goes public.

    2004 – Forms the International Coal Group (ICG) after purchasing the assets of Horizon Natural Resources in a bankruptcy auction.

    October 2004 – Merges ISG with Mittal Steel for $4.5 billion.

    January 2, 2006 – Twelve miners are killed after an explosion at a West Virginia mine operated by an ICG subsidiary. Families of the dead and Randal McCloy, the lone survivor, sue ICG and WL Ross claiming negligence. All of the lawsuits are settled by November 2011.

    April 2010 – Purchases a 21% stake in Richard Branson’s Virgin Money. In November 2011, Ross helps Branson fund a successful bid for the British bank Northern Rock.

    August 2, 2010 – During an interview with Charlie Rose, Ross states that he’s fine with higher taxes on the wealthy as long as the government puts the money to good use.

    June 2011 – Arch Coal, Inc. acquires ICG for $3.4 billion.

    September 2011 – WL Ross is one of five US and Canadian companies that purchase a 34.9% stake in the Bank of Ireland. Ross’ share is reportedly 9.3%.

    March 21, 2016 – Nexeo Solutions, a chemical distribution company, announces their merger agreement with WL Ross Holding Corporation. The merger is valued at nearly $1.6 billion.

    August 24, 2016 – The Securities and Exchange Commission announces that WL Ross will pay a $2.3 million fine for failing to properly disclose fees it charged.

    November 30, 2016 – Ross announces in a CNBC interview that President-elect Donald Trump has asked him to serve as his commerce secretary.

    February 27, 2017 – The Senate confirms Ross as commerce secretary by a 72-27 vote. He is sworn in the next day.

    November 5, 2017 – The New York Times reports that Ross has financial ties to a shipping company whose clients include a Russian energy company co-owned by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s son-in-law. Another customer of the shipping company is Venezuela’s state-run oil company, which has been sanctioned by the US government. The information comes from the Paradise Papers, a release of 13.4 million leaked documents.

    November 7, 2017 – Two days after the Paradise Papers are released, Forbes reports that Ross inflated his net worth to be included in the magazine’s annual list of the world’s wealthiest individuals. His name is removed from the magazine’s website. An investigation by the magazine reveals that Ross has likely been providing inaccurate financial information since 2004. Ross claims that the magazine overlooked trusts for his family while tallying his fortune.

    March 2, 2018 – During an appearance on CNBC, Ross says the Trump administration’s steel and aluminum tariffs won’t hurt consumers. He holds up a can of Campbell’s soup as he explains that the price of soup will go up less than a penny due to the tariffs.

    March 26, 2018 – Ross announces that a citizenship question will be added to the 2020 census.

    July 12, 2018 – Ross admits to “errors” in failing to divest assets required by his government ethics agreement and says he will sell all his stock holdings. The admission comes after the Office of Government Ethics took Ross to task for what it said were inconsistencies in his financial disclosure forms.

    September 21, 2018 – A federal judge rules that Ross must sit for a deposition in a lawsuit regarding his department’s decision to include a question about citizenship in the 2020 census. The US Supreme Court later blocks the deposition.

    December 19, 2018 – The Center for Public Integrity reports that Ross failed to sell a bank stock holding within the required time frame after his 2017 confirmation and subsequently signed ethics documents indicating the holding had been sold.

    February 15, 2019 – Ross’ financial disclosure form is rejected by the Office of Government Ethics. Ross later releases a statement saying, “While I am disappointed that my report was not certified, I remain committed to complying with my ethics agreement and adhering to the guidance of Commerce ethics officials.”

    June 27, 2019 – The Supreme Court issues a 5-4 ruling that blocks the citizenship question from being added to the census.

    July 17, 2019 – The House votes to hold Ross in criminal contempt over a dispute related to the citizenship question on the census. Attorney General William Barr is also held in contempt. Ross releases a statement in which he dismisses the vote as a political stunt. “House Democrats never sought to have a productive relationship with the Trump Administration, and today’s PR stunt further demonstrates their unending quest to generate headlines instead of operating in good faith with our Department.”

    July 18, 2020 – A department spokesman says that Ross has been hospitalized for “minor, non-coronavirus related issues.” On July 27, the Commerce Department says Ross has been released from the hospital.

    September 28, 2020 – Ross announces that he intends to conclude the 2020 census on October 5. This is more than three weeks earlier than expected and against the October 31 court reinstated end date. Ross asks Census Bureau officials if the earlier date would effectively allow them to produce a final set of numbers during Trump’s current term in office, according to an internal email released the following day as part of a lawsuit.

    October 13, 2020 – The Supreme Court grants a request from the Trump administration to halt the census count while an appeal plays out over a lower court’s order that it continue. The Census Bureau announces that the count is ending on October 15.

    July 19, 2021 – According to a letter made public from Commerce Department Inspector General Peggy Gustafson to Democratic lawmakers, the Justice Department decides to decline prosecution of Ross for misrepresentations he made to Congress about the origins of the Trump administration’s failed push to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census.

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  • Merrick Garland Fast Facts | CNN

    Merrick Garland Fast Facts | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Here’s a look at the life of Attorney General Merrick Garland, former chief judge of the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.

    Birth date: November 13, 1952

    Birth place: Chicago, Illinois

    Birth name: Merrick Brian Garland

    Father: Cyril Garland, founder of an advertising agency

    Mother: Shirley (Horwitz) Garland, community volunteer

    Marriage: Lynn (Rosenman) Garland (1987-present)

    Children: Jessica and Rebecca

    Education: Harvard University, A.B., 1974, graduated summa cum laude; Harvard Law School, J.D., 1977, graduated magna cum laude

    Religion: Jewish

    Garland supervised the investigation of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and oversaw the prosecution of Timothy McVeigh. He also led the investigations of the 1996 Olympics bombing in Atlanta and the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski.

    He paid for law school by working in a shoe store, selling his comic books and tutoring undergraduates.

    He was a candidate for the Supreme Court twice before President Barack Obama nominated him, considered for seats ultimately filled by Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor.

    Tutors elementary school children in reading and math.

    1977-1978 – Clerks for Second Circuit Judge Henry Friendly.

    1978-1979 – Clerks for US Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan.

    1979-1981 – Special assistant to the attorney general.

    1981-1989 – Joins the law firm Arnold & Porter as an associate and is promoted to partner in 1985.

    1989-1992 – Assistant US attorney for the District of Columbia.

    1992-1993 – Returns to Arnold & Porter as partner.

    1993-1994 – Deputy assistant attorney general in the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice.

    1994-1997 – Principal associate deputy attorney general.

    1997-March 2021 – Appointed by President Bill Clinton, Garland serves on the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit. It took more than a year for Garland to be confirmed in the Senate, as lawmakers questioned whether the vacant seat on the court should be filled at all.

    2013 – Becomes chief judge of the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.

    March 16, 2016 – Obama nominates Garland to fill the seat of the late Justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court. For months, Senate Republicans refuse to hold confirmation hearings.

    January 3, 2017 – Garland’s nomination expires. He returns to his position as chief judge of the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.

    February 13, 2020 – Garland steps down as chief judge of the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit. Sri Srinivasan takes over.

    January 7, 2021 – President-elect Joe Biden announces Garland as his pick for US attorney general.

    March 10, 2021 – The Senate confirms Garland as US attorney general with a 70-30 vote.

    March 11, 2021 – Garland is officially sworn in as the 86th attorney general by Vice President Kamala Harris.

    July 1, 2021 – Garland orders a temporary halt to federal executions as Justice Department senior officials review the policies and procedures for the controversial punishment.

    June 30, 2022 – The Justice Department announces that Garland is scheduled to undergo a medical procedure for benign enlargement of the prostate on July 7. The deputy attorney general will assume the duties of the attorney general during the surgery.

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  • Supreme Court declines to revisit landmark libel ruling, though Clarence Thomas wants to reconsider the decision | CNN Politics

    Supreme Court declines to revisit landmark libel ruling, though Clarence Thomas wants to reconsider the decision | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    The Supreme Court declined on Tuesday to revisit the landmark First Amendment decision in New York Times v. Sullivan, rebuffing a request to take another look at decades-old precedent that created a higher bar for public figures to claim libel in civil suits.

    The media world has for years relied on the unanimous decision in the 1964 case to fend off costly defamation lawsuits brought by public figures. The ruling established the requirement that public figures show “actual malice” before they can succeed in a libel dispute.

    Despite being a mainstay in US media law, the Sullivan decision has increasingly come under fire by conservatives both inside and outside the court, including Justice Clarence Thomas, who said on Tuesday that he still wanted to revisit Sullivan at some point.

    “In an appropriate case, however, we should reconsider New York Times and our other decisions displacing state defamation law,” Thomas wrote in a brief concurrence to the court’s decision not to take up the case. He said that the case, Don Blankenship v. NBC Universal, LLC, was a poor vehicle to reconsider Sullivan.

    Just a few months ago, the conservative justice attacked the ruling in Sullivan in a fiery dissent in which he called it “flawed.” Thomas issued other public critiques of Sullivan in recent years, including in 2019, when he wrote that the ruling and “the Court’s decisions extending it were policy-driven decisions masquerading as constitutional law.”

    The case at hand concerns Don Blankenship, a former coal baron who was convicted of a federal conspiracy offense related to a deadly 2010 explosion at a mine he ran, in what was one of the worst US mine disasters in decades. His sentence of a year in prison was one day less than a felony sentence.

    “Blankenship himself admits this was a highly unusual sentence for a misdemeanor offense; he notes that he was the only inmate at his prison who was not serving a sentence for a felony conviction,” according to a lower-court opinion in the case.

    During his unsuccessful 2018 US Senate campaign in West Virginia, a number of media organizations erroneously reported that he was a convicted felon, even though his conspiracy offense was classified as a misdemeanor.

    Blankenship sued a slew of news outlets for the error, alleging defamation and false light invasion of privacy. Lower courts ruled against him, finding that the outlets did not make the statements with actual malice, the standard required by Sullivan.

    Attorneys for Blankenship told the justices in court papers that the “damage was irreparable” since no felon has ever been elected to the Senate, and urged them to overturn the Sullivan decision.

    “The actual malice standard poses a clear and present danger to our democracy,” they wrote. “New York Times Co. v. Sullivan and its progeny grant the press a license to publish defamatory falsehoods that misinform voters, manipulate elections, intensify polarization, and incite unrest.”

    Attorneys for the media outlets urged the justices not to take up the case, arguing that it’s “as poor a vehicle as one could imagine to consider” questions related to Sullivan’s holding because, they said, the reporting mistakes were honest ones.

    “There is good reason why the actual malice standard of New York Times has been embraced for so long and so often,” the media organizations told the justices. “At its essence, the standard protects ‘erroneous statements honestly made.’ While it permits recovery for falsehoods uttered with knowledge of falsity or with reckless disregard for the truth, it provides the ‘breathing space’ required for ‘free debate.’ A free people engaged in self-government deserves no less.”

    Just last year the court declined to revisit Sullivan in a case brought by a not-for-profit Christian ministry against the Southern Poverty Law Center.

    At the time, Thomas dissented from the court’s refusal to take up the case.

    “I would grant certiorari in this case to revisit the ‘actual malice’ standard,” he wrote. “This case is one of many showing how New York Times and its progeny have allowed media organizations and interest groups ‘to cast false aspersions on public figures with near impunity.’”

    In 2021, conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch also questioned the decision in Sullivan, writing in a dissent when the court decided not to take up a defamation case that the 1964 ruling should be revisited in part because it “has come to leave far more people without redress than anyone could have predicted.”

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  • The fate of this consumer watchdog is in the hands of the Supreme Court | CNN Business

    The fate of this consumer watchdog is in the hands of the Supreme Court | CNN Business

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    New York
    CNN
     — 

    On Tuesday, the Supreme Court began hearing oral arguments in a case that will determine the fate of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

    The case was brought on by the Community Financial Services Association of America, a trade group representing payday lenders.

    The group scored a victory last year in a case it brought before the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, in New Orleans. The three-judge panel ruled the CFPB’s funding violates the Constitution’s Appropriations Clause and separation of powers. The Supreme Court will have the final say on that, however.

    The consumer watchdog agency was created after the 2008 financial crisis by way of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. The agency was the brainchild of Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren. She began advocating for it in 2007 when she was a Harvard Law School professor.

    The broad purpose of the CFPB is to protect consumers from financial abuses and to serve as the central agency for consumer financial protection authorities.

    Prior to the CFPB’s formation, “[c]onsumer financial protection had not been the primary focus of any federal agency, and no agency had effective tools to set the rules for and oversee the whole market,” the agency said on its site.

    The CFPB is funded by the Federal Reserve in an effort to keep the agency independent from political pressure. It also means that the agency doesn’t depend on Congressional appropriations funds.

    While there are critics of the agency’s current structure and funding, it has saved consumers money, made it easier for them to seek redress and to get better clarity and more tailored responses from companies when they have a problem with their accounts, loans or credit reports.

    “Today virtually all financial transactions for residential real estate in the United States depend upon compliance with the CFPB’s rules, and consumers rely on the rights and protections provided by those rules,” the Mortgage Bankers Association, the National Association of Homebuilders and the National Association of Realtors said in an amicus brief to the Supreme Court.

    For instance, the CFPB recently ordered Bank of America to pay $100 million to customers and $90 million in penalties saying that the nation’s second-largest bank harmed consumers by double-dipping on fees, withholding credit card rewards and opening fake accounts.

    The CFPB also took action against Wells Fargo after the agency found the bank had been engaging in multiple abusive and unlawful consumer practices across several financial products between 2011 and 2022 — from auto loans to mortgage loans to bank accounts.

    The agency ordered the bank to pay a $1.7 billion civil penalty in addition to more than $2 billion to compensate consumers.

    The Supreme Court’s decision, which likely won’t be announced until the spring of 2024, has far-reaching implications.

    If the Supreme Court finds the CFPB’s funding structure unconstitutional, it could shutter the agency and invalidate all of its prior rulings.

    “Without those rules substantial uncertainty would arise as to how to undertake mortgage transactions in accordance with federal law,” the associations said in their joint brief. “The housing market could descend into chaos, to the detriment of all mortgage borrowers,” they added.

    It could also call into question the constitutionality of other government agencies like the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation that also aren’t funded by Congressional appropriations.

    “We are confident in the constitutionality of the statute that created the CFPB within the Federal Reserve System and provides its funding,” Sam Gilford, a spokesperson for the CFPB, told CNN in a statement. “We will continue to carry out the vital work Congress has charged us to perform.”

    There’s also a way for the Supreme Court to change the CFPB’s funding structure in a way that wouldn’t invalidate prior rulings, said Joseph Lynyak III, a partner at the law firm of Dorsey & Whitney and a regulatory reform expert.

    “This result would be far more probable rather than voiding the last decade of the CFPB’s activity,” he added.

    From listening to the case on Tuesday, though, Lynyak believes the Supreme Court will rule that the CFPB’s funding structure is constitutional.

    “As we have argued from the outset, the CFPB’s unique funding mechanism lacks any contemporary or historical precedent,” said Noel Francisco, a lawyer arguing on behalf of those challenging the constitutionality of the CFPB’s funding structure.

    He added that it “improperly shields the agency from congressional oversight and accountability, and unconstitutionally strips Congress of its power of the purse under the Appropriations Clause of the Constitution.

    But both Republican and Democratic-appointed justices told Francisco on Tuesday they could not understand the crux of his argument.

    “I’m at a total loss,” said Justice Sonia Sotomayor. Echoing her remarks, Justice Amy Coney Barrett said, “we’re all struggling to figure out what’s the standard that you would use.”

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  • Supreme Court returns for first private meeting of the term amid even more controversy | CNN Politics

    Supreme Court returns for first private meeting of the term amid even more controversy | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The Supreme Court returns to Washington to face a new term and the fresh reality that critics increasingly view the court as a political body.

    In the wake of a series of controversial decisions made possible by former President Donald Trump’s three nominees, including the seismic reversal of Roe v. Wade, the justices find themselves catapulted into the very center of the political discourse.

    Their opinions feature prominently on the campaign trail, approval ratings have plummeted to new lows and Democrats in Congress are vowing to regulate the third branch in the midst of allegations justices are skirting ethics rules and attacks on the very legitimacy of the court.

    So far, they have struggled to respond. At public appearances they grasp at the promise of judicial independence while sending mixed signals about changes that might be afoot.

    Tuesday, the justices will meet in person for their first closed-door conference of the term.

    Chief Justice John Roberts is at the center of it all.

    How he navigates this term will shape the trajectory of his tenure going forward. Some say he’ll remain on the sidelines, out of the fray. Others say he cannot afford to do so.

    Earlier this year, Roberts declined an invitation to appear before the Democratic-led Senate Judiciary Committee to discuss Supreme Court ethics, citing separation of powers concerns. In May, speaking before an audience in Washington, Roberts said he wanted to assure the public that the court is committed to adhering to the “highest standards of conduct.”

    It was one line in one speech.

    But at the end of June, as controversy continued amid a raft of high-profile decisions that largely broke along ideological lines, Roberts made an unusual choice. In a 6-3 opinion striking down President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness program, the chief strayed from the case at hand.

    He said that it had become a “disturbing feature of some recent opinions to criticize the decisions with which they disagree as going beyond the proper role of government.”

    He appeared to be responding to the dissent penned by Justice Elena Kagan and joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. “In every respect, the Court today exceeds its proper limited role in our Nation’s governance,” Kagan began.

    Noting her disagreement, Roberts took the occasion to write, “we do not mistake this plainly heartfelt disagreement for disparagement.” He added: “Any such misperception would be harmful to this institution and our country,” he wrote.

    It was unclear if the line was directed at his dissenting colleagues or critics outside of court or both, but it was an unusual digression from a justice who, by definition, lacks an obvious pulpit to defend his branch of government.

    The way forward for Roberts is not obvious.

    Even if he did believe a formal ethics code is necessary, it’s unclear whether he would need a unanimous vote to move forward. Conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito might, for instance, balk at such a move arguing that it would never satisfy critics whose true goal is to damage the institution.

    Some believe Roberts ultimately will steer clear of the controversy.

    “I don’t see him moving in any direction to encourage further disclosure reforms, and I don’t see Congress as being able to get sufficient traction,” Cate Stetson, a lawyer at Hogan Lovells, said at the Cato Institute earlier this month.

    But if the court does nothing, pressure will continue.

    Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin, a Democrat, traveled to the Supreme Court on September 12 as an invited guest to the annual meeting of the Judicial Conference – the policymaking body for the federal courts.

    Sitting next to the chief justice on Roberts’ home turf, Durbin lobbied him to adopt an enforceable code of conduct directed specifically at the justices, according to a source.

    Roberts and others have continuously stressed how difficult it would be to adopt such a code, particularly when it comes to recusal issues.

    In April, all nine justices released a new statement hoping to provide “clarity” to the public about their ethics procedures, noting that they consult a “wide variety of authorities” when addressing specific ethics issues. They noted that while the Judicial Conference has a code of conduct followed by lower court judges, the conference “does not supervise the Supreme Court.”

    The statement outlined complications that distinguish the Supreme Court from the lower courts.

    At the lower court level, for instance, federal judges can substitute for each other if one judge recuses from a case. That’s not true at the high court where only members can hear a dispute.

    The statement did little to appease critics who say the justices can no longer continue to voluntarily follow rules that govern lower court judges. They must, critics say, have a code of conduct that binds them directly.

    Response from the bench

    Some conservatives believe there is no impending judicial crisis. Instead, they say, critics of the court are manufacturing a controversy to delegitimize the institution and staunch the flow of conservative opinions.

    Carrie Severino, president of the conservative Judicial Crisis Network, who is also a former clerk for Justice Clarence Thomas, tweeted recently that the problem is not corruption.

    “The problem is the coordinated campaign by dark money activists, radical politicians, and a willing media to imply there is corruption, undermining the Court’s integrity and selectively smearing the justices they disagree with,” she wrote.

    Alito, who wrote the opinion overturning Roe, has taken a radically different approach than the chief justice.

    In an interview in July that appeared on The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page, Alito said forthrightly that Congress should stay out of the Supreme Court’s business.

    “I know this is controversial view, but I’m willing to say it,” he said. “No provision in the Constitution gives them the authority to regulate the Supreme Court – period.”

    Alito said that he marveled “at all the nonsense that has been written about me in the last year” and noted that in the face of a political onslaught he was rejecting the notion that judges and justices “should be mute” and leave it to others to defend them.

    “I’ve said to myself, nobody else is going to do this, so I have to defend myself,” he wrote.

    A month earlier he sought to preempt a ProPublica report that had not yet been published concerning allegations that he should have disclosed luxury travel from 2008.

    Over the summer, other justices were asked about ethics and the court’s legitimacy by friendly questioners at universities and judicial conferences – although they never addressed specifics.

    Unlike Alito, Justice Elena Kagan suggested in August that here was some daylight on the question of whether Congress has a role to regulate the Supreme Court. Last week, she told an audience in Indiana that she thought it would be a “good” idea if the court were to adapt the ethics code used by lower court justices to fit the Supreme Court.

    For her part, Justice Amy Coney Barrett noted that criticism of the court is nothing new. At an appearance before a judicial conference in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, she said that “critiques of the court” are part of its history. Public criticism “comes with the job” she said.

    Justice Brett Kavanaugh had a different message in Ohio saying he was “hopeful” that there would be some “concrete steps” taken soon to address the ethics issue.

    But his sentiment may have been aspirational.

    As the justices grapple with how to respond, they are hampered by an additional factor.

    Change at the high court comes slowly. The court’s unofficial mascot – the tortoise – can be found at the bottom of bronze lampposts on the building grounds. The tortoises are meant to symbolize the slow and steady pace of justice.

    Almost nothing at the high court comes quickly, and the institution is not new to controversy. The justices may decide to ride out the storm.

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  • NYT: Architect of Trump fake electors plot thought SCOTUS would ‘likely’ reject plan, but pushed ahead anyway | CNN Politics

    NYT: Architect of Trump fake electors plot thought SCOTUS would ‘likely’ reject plan, but pushed ahead anyway | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    An internal Trump campaign memo from December 2020, made public Tuesday by The New York Times, reveals new details about how the campaign initiated its plan to subvert the Electoral College process and install fake GOP electors in multiple states after losing the 2020 presidential election.

    In the December 6, 2020, memo, pro-Trump lawyer Kenneth Chesebro laid out the plan to put forth slates of Republican electors in seven key swing states that then-President Donald Trump lost. The memo then outlines how then-Vice President Mike Pence, while presiding over the Electoral College certification on January 6, 2021, should declare “that it is his constitutional power and duty, alone, as President of the Senate, to both open and count the votes” from the GOP electors.

    Chesebro conceded in the memo that this idea was a “controversial” long shot that would “likely” be rejected by the Supreme Court – but nonetheless promoted the strategy. He wrote that despite the legal dubiousness, “letting matters play out this way would guarantee that public attention would be riveted on the evidence of electoral abuses by the Democrats and would also buy the Trump campaign more time to win litigation that would deprive Biden of electoral votes and/or add to Trump’s column.”

    The fake electors scheme has become an integral part of the recent federal indictment against Trump, which alleges the plot took shape after it became clear that efforts to convince state officials to not certify Joe Biden’s victories would be unsuccessful.

    CNN previously reported that the scheme was overseen by Trump campaign officials and led by Rudy Giuliani. Chesebro, who authored the newly released memo, is an unindicted co-conspirator in the Trump indictment and was described by prosecutors as “an attorney who assisted in devising and attempting to implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding.” He has not been charged with any crimes.

    According to Trump’s January 6-related indictment and previous CNN reporting, there were multiple planning calls between Trump campaign officials and GOP state operatives, and Giuliani participated in at least one call. The Trump campaign lined up supporters to fill elector slots, secured meeting rooms for the fake electors to meet on December 14, 2020, and circulated drafts of fake certificates that they later signed.

    At the time, their actions were largely dismissed as an elaborate political cosplay. But it eventually became clear that this was part of an orchestrated plan.

    “Under the plan, the submission of these fraudulent slates would create a fake controversy at the certification proceeding and position the Vice President-presiding on January 6 as President of the Senate to supplant legitimate electors with the Defendant’s fake electors and certify the Defendant as president,” the indictment states.

    Prosecutors say Chesebro told Guiliani – both identified in the indictment only as co-conspirator 5 and co-conspirator 1, respectively – that he had been told by state-level operatives that “it could appear treasonous for the AZ electors to vote on Monday if there is no pending court proceeding.”

    “I recognize that what I suggest is a bold, controversial strategy, and that there are many reasons why it might not end up being executed on Jan. 6,” Chesebro wrote in the December 6 memo, despite pushing the idea and outlining a plan in the days to come. “But as long as it is one possible option, to preserve it as a possibility it is important that the Trump-Pence electors cast their electoral votes on Dec. 14.”

    That is ultimately what ended up happening on December 14, 2020.

    Many of the fake GOP electors who signed the phony certificates that day have since come under legal scrutiny: The fake electors from Michigan are facing state-level felony charges for forgery and publishing a counterfeit record, and many of the fake electors from Georgia are targets of the 2020-related criminal probe in Fulton County.

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  • Federal court strikes down Alabama congressional map after legislature snubbed Supreme Court | CNN Politics

    Federal court strikes down Alabama congressional map after legislature snubbed Supreme Court | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    A federal court blocked a newly drawn Alabama congressional map on Tuesday because it didn’t create a second majority-Black district as the Supreme Court had ordered earlier this year.

    In a unanimous decision from a three-judge panel, which had overseen the case before it reached the Supreme Court, the judges wrote that they were “disturbed” by Alabama’s actions in the case.

    The state had snubbed the Supreme Court’s order – a surprise 5-4 decision in June – that the maps should be redrawn. White voters currently make up the majority in six of the state’s seven congressional districts, although 27% of the state’s population is Black.

    “We are deeply troubled that the State enacted a map that the State readily admits does not provide the remedy we said federal law requires,” wrote the judges, two of whom were appointed by former President Donald Trump.

    Alabama officials on Tuesday filed notice that they are appealing the ruling.

    “While we are disappointed in today’s decision, we strongly believe that the Legislature’s map complies with the Voting Rights Act and the recent decision of the U.S. Supreme Court,” the office of Alabama Attorney General Steven Marshall said in a statement. “We intend to promptly seek review from the Supreme Court to ensure that the State can use its lawful congressional districts in 2024 and beyond.”

    Alabama officials also asked the three-judge court to freeze its opinion invalidating the congressional map but said they will formally ask the Supreme Court for a stay on Thursday.

    This redistricting battle – and separate, pending litigation over congressional maps in states such as Georgia and Florida – could determine which party controls the US House of Representatives after next year’s elections. Republicans currently hold a razor-thin majority in the chamber.

    The three federal judges overseeing the Alabama case on Tuesday ordered a special master to submit three proposed maps that would create a second Black-majority district by September 25.

    The panel wrote that it was “not aware of any other case” in which a state legislature had responded to being ordered to a draw map with a second majority-minority district by creating one that the state itself admitted didn’t create the required district.

    “The law requires the creation of an additional district that affords Black Alabamians, like everyone else, a fair and reasonable opportunity to elect candidates of their choice,” and Alabama’s new map, they wrote, “plainly fails to do so.”

    JaTaune Bosby Gilchrist, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama, which has been fighting the case, praised the ruling: “Elected officials ignored their responsibilities and chose to violate our democracy. We hope the court’s special master helps steward a process that ensures a fair map that Black Alabamians and our state deserve.”

    This summer, the Supreme Court, in a 5-4 ruling, had affirmed an earlier decision by the three-judge panel and ordered the state to redraw congressional maps to include a second majority-Black district or “something quite close to it.”

    The Supreme Court’s surprise decision in Alabama – coming after the right-leaning high court has chipped away at other parts of the Voting Rights Act in recent years – has given fresh hope to voting rights activists and Democrats that they could prevail in challenges to other maps they view as discriminating against minorities.

    But the new map approved by Alabama’s Republican-dominated legislature – and signed into law by GOP Gov. Kay Ivey – in July created only one majority-Black district and boosted the share of Black voters in a second district from roughly 30% to nearly 40%.

    The pending cases center on whether GOP state legislators drew congressional maps after the 2020 census that weakened the power of Black voters in violation of Section 2 of the historic Voting Rights Act.

    Republicans control all statewide offices in Alabama and all but one congressional seat. The single Black-majority congressional district is represented by Democratic Rep. Terri Sewell, the state’s first Black woman elected to Congress.

    Alabama officials have argued that the map as redrawn by state lawmakers was aimed at maintaining traditional guidelines for congressional redistricting, such as keeping together communities of interest. And they have signaled that they hope to sway one of the Supreme Court justices who sided with the majority in June.

    The state’s briefs before the three-judge panel referenced a concurring opinion by Justice Brett Kavanaugh – one of the two conservatives who sided with the liberal justices on the high court to vote against the original Alabama map – that questioned whether “race-based redistricting” can “extend indefinitely into the future.”

    The lower-court judges weren’t convinced by the state’s arguments.

    They wrote that after reviewing the concurrence, as well as a part of the Supreme Court’s ruling which Kavanaugh didn’t join, “We do not understand either of those writings as undermining any aspect of the Supreme Court’s affirmance; if they did, the Court would not have affirmed the injunction.”

    The judges also rejected Alabama’s argument that drawing a second Black-majority district would unconstitutionally constitute “affirmative action in redistricting.”

    “Unlike affirmative action in the admissions programs the Supreme Court analyzed in [this year’s affirmative action case], which was expressly aimed at achieving balanced racial outcomes in the makeup of the universities’ student bodies, the Voting Rights Act guarantees only ‘equality of opportunity, not a guarantee of electoral success for minority-preferred candidates of whatever race,’” the panel wrote.

    “The Voting Rights Act does not provide a leg up for Black voters – it merely prevents them from being kept down with regard to what is arguably the most ‘fundamental political right,’ in that it is ‘preservative of all rights’ – the right to vote.”

    Earlier, in a letter to state lawmakers, Marshall had argued that a separate Supreme Court ruling in June – after the high court’s Alabama redistricting decision came down – that ended affirmative action in college admissions meant that using a map in which “race predominates” would open up the state to claims that it was violating the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection.

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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  • A moment of reckoning for gerrymandering | CNN Politics

    A moment of reckoning for gerrymandering | CNN Politics

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    A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.



    CNN
     — 

    Americans’ reckoning with their own democracy extends beyond the looming presidential election to a much more local level.

    There are new details about how the conservative-dominated US Supreme Court issued its most unexpected decision of the past year and threw out Alabama’s congressional map, part of a secret negotiation between Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Read that incredible behind-the-scenes reporting from CNN’s Joan Biskupic.

    Meanwhile, in Wisconsin, the inverse is occurring – lawmakers who enjoy a majority thanks to gerrymandered state-level districts are keen on throwing out a liberal state Supreme Court justice even though she took the bench last month after being elected to a 10-year term.

    State and federal courts are hearing challenges to maps across the country, which could have a major impact on the coming election and help determine who controls Congress.

    Also this week:

    • A federal court has also thrown into question the congressional map drawn by Republicans that helped them gain seats in Florida.
    • There’s a trial over congressional maps underway in Georgia.

    The selective drawing of legislative district maps during periods of redistricting after the US census every 10 years – colloquially known as gerrymandering – is a practice that has been the subject of political and court fights for most of the country’s history. The Supreme Court has said partisan gerrymandering done for political reasons is not its concern, but this year it reaffirmed that racial gerrymandering that keeps minorities shut out of the power structure is not allowed.

    An endless series of adjustments has sought to address the issue of gerrymandering. These have ranged from major legislation like the Voting Rights Act in the 1960s to the adoption of nonpartisan or independent redistricting commissions in recent decades. The Congressional Research Service has a list of which states, many on the West Coast, have tried to de-politicize the process.

    But lawmakers in multiple states continue to work hard to protect their party control, a battle that is being fought on multiple fronts.

    Republicans in Alabama, for instance, unhappy with the Supreme Court’s decision this summer, essentially ignored the court by drawing a map that did not include an additional majority-Black district as the justices demanded. A federal court sent the state back to the drawing board again this week with the rebuke that it was “disturbed” by Alabama’s actions.

    Alabama argued that creating a second majority-Black district would be a sort of “affirmative action.”

    But the three-judge panel that threw out the map rejected that idea.

    “The Voting Rights Act does not provide a leg up for Black voters – it merely prevents them from being kept down with regard to what is arguably the most ‘fundamental political right,’ in that it is ‘preservative of all rights’ – the right to vote.” Read more from CNN’s Fredreka Schouten and Ethan Cohen.

    Alabama plans to appeal to the US Supreme Court again with an eye to changing Kavanaugh’s mind.

    Gerrymandered lawmakers target anti-gerrymander judge

    In Wisconsin, a Marquette University Law School review of data tells the story of how partisan gerrymandering – the kind the Supreme Court doesn’t concern itself with – makes it virtually impossible for Democrats to win the state’s assembly. When Gov. Tony Evers narrowly won statewide in 2018, he got 49.6%, or about half of the vote. But because of how the state’s legislative maps were drawn, the Republican then-Gov. Scott Walker got a majority in 63 of the state’s 99 assembly districts, just two fewer than in 2014, when Walker won a majority of votes in 2014.

    It is lawmakers elected from Republican-friendly maps who now want to remove the liberal state Supreme Court justice, Janet Protasiewicz, from office in part for her opposition to the maps. Read more from CNN’s Eric Bradner.

    North Carolina’s new Supreme Court overturns gerrymandering ruling

    North Carolina Republicans tried to cut the state courts out of the federal redistricting and elections process altogether by pushing a fringe legal theory known as the “independent state legislature theory.” The US Supreme Court rejected that argument, which could have upended how federal elections are contested in a consequential decision earlier this year.

    But North Carolina Republicans seem likely to ultimately get the map they want. Republicans gained a majority on the state’s Supreme Court this year, and the court has ruled it has no authority to oversee partisan gerrymandering.

    There are many more legal fights over congressional maps underway. The US Supreme Court in June also allowed for the Louisiana congressional map to be redrawn to allow for another majority-Black district.

    From CNN’s report on the Louisiana decision by Tierney Sneed: “Louisiana state officials were sued last year for a congressional map – passed by the Republican legislature over Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards’ veto – that made only one of its six districts majority Black, despite the 2020 census showing that the state’s population is 33% Black.”

    Congressional maps are in question in many states, including Georgia, where there is a trial underway in Atlanta.

    Kentucky’s Supreme Court is set to hear arguments later this month about whether gerrymandered maps violate the state’s constitution.

    On the flip side, Democrats are trying to get more friendly maps in New York, where a court-drawn map led them to lose congressional seats in 2022.

    One way to view these court decisions is that the US Supreme Court allowing or insisting that maps in Alabama or Louisiana be redrawn could have a real impact on who controls Congress after the 2024 election. Republicans hold a tiny five-seat majority.

    Another way to view these court decisions is that when the US Supreme Court allowed the GOP-drawn maps to be used in these states in the 2022 election, it helped Republicans gain that slim majority.

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  • Major Supreme Court cases to watch in the new term | CNN Politics

    Major Supreme Court cases to watch in the new term | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Looking at an upcoming Supreme Court term from the vantage point of the first Monday in October rarely tells the full story of what lies ahead, but the docket already includes major cases concerning the intersection between the First Amendment and social media, gun rights, racial gerrymandering and the power of the executive branch when it comes to regulation.

    The court will still determine if it will hear oral arguments on issues such as medication abortion and transgender rights, not to mention the possibility of a flurry of emergency requests related to the 2024 election.

    Here are some of the key cases on which the court will hear oral arguments this term:

    After the Supreme Court issued a major decision last year expanding gun rights nationwide, lower courts began reconsidering hundreds of firearms regulations across the country under the new standard crafted by Justice Clarence Thomas that a gun law passes legal muster only if it is rooted in history and tradition.

    On the heels of that decision, a federal appeals court invalidated a federal law that bars an individual who is subject to a domestic violence restraining order from possessing a firearm. That law, the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled, “is an outlier that our ancestors would never have accepted.”

    The Biden administration has appealed, saying the ruling “threatens grave harms for victims of domestic violence.”

    In 2019, nearly two-thirds of domestic homicides in the United States were committed with a gun, according to Everytown for Gun Safety.

    Lawyers for Zackey Rahimi, a man who was prosecuted under the law in 2020 after a violent altercation with his girlfriend, have urged the justices to let the lower court opinion stand, arguing in part that there is no law from the founding era comparable to the statute at hand.

    Racial gerrymandering: South Carolina congressional maps

    Justices will consider a congressional redistricting plan drawn by South Carolina’s Republican-controlled legislature in the wake of the 2020 census. Critics say it was designed with discriminatory purpose and amounts to an illegal racial gerrymander.

    The case focuses the court’s attention once again on the issue of race and map drawing and comes after the court ordered Alabama to redraw the state’s congressional map last term to account for the fact that the state is 27% black. The decision, penned by Chief Justice John Roberts, surprised liberals who feared the court was going to make it harder for minorities to challenge maps under Section 2 of the historic Voting Rights Act.

    In the latest case, the South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP and a Black voter named Taiwan Scott, are challenging the state’s congressional District 1 that is located along the southeastern coast and is anchored in Charleston County. Although the district consistently elected Republicans from 1980 to 2016, in 2018 a Democrat was elected in a political upset, though a Republican recaptured the seat in 2020.

    The person who devised the map has testified that he was instructed to make the district “more Republican leaning,” but that he did not consider race. He did, however, acknowledge that he examined racial data after drafting each version and that the Black voting age population of the district was likely viewed during the drafting process.

    A three-judge district court panel struck down the plan in January, saying that race had been the predominant motivating factor. “To achieve a target of 17% African American population,” the court said, “Charleston County was racially gerrymandered and over 30,000 African Americans were removed from their home district.”

    Expert explains why Justice Thomas’ gifts from wealthy friends are problematic

    In the latest attack against the so-called administrative state, the justices are considering whether to overturn decades old precedent to scale back the power of federal agencies, impacting how the government tackles issues such as climate change, immigration, labor conditions and public health.

    At issue is an appeal from herring fishermen in the Atlantic who say the National Marine Fisheries Service does not have the authority to require them to pay the salaries of government monitors who ride aboard the fishing vessels.

    In agreeing to hear the case, the justices signaled they will reconsider a 1984 decision – Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council – that sets forward factors to determine when courts should defer to a government agency’s interpretation of the law. First, they examine a statute to see if Congress’ intent is clear. It if is – then the matter is settled. But if there is ambiguity – the court defers to the agency’s expertise.

    Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar told the justices that the agency was acting within the scope of its authority under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and said the fishermen are not responsible for all the costs. The regulation was put in place to combat overfishing of the fisheries off the coasts of the US.

    Representing the fishermen, former Solicitor General Paul Clement argues that the government exceeded its authority and needs direct and clear congressional authorization to make such a demand. “The ‘net effect’ of Chevron,” Clement said, is that it “incentives a dynamic where Congress does far less than the Framers anticipated, and the executive branch is left to do far more by deciding controversial issues via regulatory fiat”

    For the second time in recent years, the court is taking aim at a watchdog agency created to combat unfair and deceptive practices against consumers, in a case that could deal a fatal blow to the future of the agency and send reverberations throughout the financial services industry.

    At the center of the case at hand is the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau – an independent agency set up in the wake of the 2008 financial meltdown that works to monitor the practices of lenders, debt collectors and credit rating agencies.

    Congress chose to fund the CFPB from outside the annual appropriations process to ensure its independence. As such, the agency receives its funding each year from the earnings of the Federal Reserve System. But the conservative 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals held last year that the funding scheme violates the Appropriations Clause of the Constitution, that, the court said “ensures Congress’ “exclusive power over the federal purse.”

    According to the CFPB, the agency has obtained more than $18.9 billion in ordered relief, including restitution and canceled debts, for more than 195 million consumers, and more than $4.1 billion in penalties, in actions brought by the agency against financial institutions and individuals that have broken federal consumer financial protection laws.

    A handful of other agencies have similar funding schemes including the Federal Reserve, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

    Three years ago, the Supreme Court limited the independence of the CFPB by invalidating its leadership structure. A 5-4 court held that the structure violated the separation of powers because the president was restricted from removing the director, even if they had policy disagreements.

    Agency regulatory authority: Securities and Exchange Commission

    The justices are looking at the in-house enforcement proceedings of the US Securities and Exchange Commission in another case that invites the conservative majority to pare back the regulatory authority of federal agencies.

    The court’s decision could impact whether the SEC and other agencies can conduct enforcement proceedings in-house, using administrative courts staffed with agency employees, or whether such actions must be brought in federal court.

    On one side are critics of such agency courts who argue that they allow federal employees to serve as prosecutors, judges and jury, issuing rulings that could particularly hurt small businesses. On the other side are those who point out that several agencies, including the Social Security Administration, have such internal proceedings because the topics are often complex and the agency has more expertise than a federal judge.

    The case arose in 2013 after the SEC brought an enforcement action against George Jarkesy, who had established two hedge funds with his advisory firm, Patriot28, for securities fraud.

    The 5th Circuit ruled that the SEC’s proceedings deprive individuals of their Seventh Amendment right to a civil jury. In addition, the court said that Congress had improperly delegated legislative power to the SEC, which gave the agency unconstrained authority at times to choose the in-house administrative proceeding rather than filing suit in district court.

    In December, the court will examine the historic multibillion-dollar Purdue Pharma bankruptcy settlement with several states that would ultimately offer the Sackler family broad protection from OxyContin-related civil claims.

    Until recently, Purdue was controlled by the Sackler family, who withdrew billions of dollars from the company before it filed for bankruptcy. The family has now agreed to contribute up to $6 billion to Purdue’s reorganization fund on the condition that the Sacklers receive a release from civil liability.

    The Biden administration, representing the US Trustee, the executive branch agency that monitors the administration of bankruptcy cases, has called the plan “exceptional and unprecedented” in court papers, noting that lower courts have divided on when parties can be released from liability for actions that caused societal harm.

    “The plan’s release ‘absolutely, unconditionally, irrevocably, fully, finally, forever and permanently releases’ the Sacklers from every conceivable type of opioid-related civil claim – even claims based on fraud and other forms of willful misconduct that could not be discharged if the Sacklers filed for bankruptcy in their individual capacities,” Prelogar argued in court papers.

    For the second year running, the justices will leap into the online moderation debate and decide whether states can essentially control how social media companies operate.

    If upheld, laws from Florida and Texas could open the door to more state legislation requiring platforms such as Facebook, YouTube and TikTok to treat content in specific ways within certain jurisdictions – and potentially expose the companies to more content moderation lawsuits.

    It could also make it harder for platforms to remove what they determine is misinformation, hate speech or other offensive material.

    “These cases could completely reshape the digital public sphere. The question of what limits the First Amendment imposes on legislatures’ ability to regulate social media is immensely important – for speech, and for democracy as well,” said Jameel Jaffer, the executive director of Columbia University’s Knight First Amendment Institute, in a statement.

    “It’s difficult to think of any other recent First Amendment cases in which the stakes were so high,” Jaffer added.

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  • Conservative justices suggest South Carolina GOP gerrymandering was based on politics, not race | CNN Politics

    Conservative justices suggest South Carolina GOP gerrymandering was based on politics, not race | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The Supreme Court’s conservatives expressed doubt at oral arguments Wednesday that South Carolina GOP lawmakers engaged in impermissible racial gerrymandering when they redrew congressional lines for a House seat to benefit Republicans.

    The case is one of several racial and political gerrymandering-related lawsuits that could impact which party controls the House after next year’s congressional elections.

    The district at issue was reworked in 2020 to benefit the GOP and current incumbent, Rep. Nancy Mace – one of the eight Republicans who voted to oust Kevin McCarthy as House speaker last week.

    The South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP and a Black voter named Taiwan Scott say the use of race dominated the decision-making process and that the state worked to intentionally dilute the power of Black voters. A federal court agreed, referring to the revised map as “bleaching.”

    Several of the conservative justices on Wednesday suggested that map drawers had taken politics into consideration, not race.

    Chief Justice John Roberts said those challenging the map had “no direct” evidence that race had predominated in the decisionmaking process. He said that there were no “odd-shaped” districts drawn and that there existed a “wealth of political data” that would justify the chosen boundaries. He said the challengers had only presented “circumstantial evidence” and suggested the court would be “breaking new ground” in its voting jurisprudence if it were to side with them.

    Justice Samuel Alito repeatedly suggested that a lower court had made serious legal error in invalidating the map by relying upon erroneous expert testimony. He said the Supreme Court could not “rubber-stamp” the district court’s finding and he noted that the individual charged with drawing the maps had years of experience and had worked for both Democrats and Republicans.

    Alito contended that there was “nothing suspicious” if a map drawer is aware of race as long as it is not a predominant factor when drawing lines.

    Justice Neil Gorsuch said there was “no evidence ” that the legislature could have achieved its “partisan tile in any other way.”

    For their part, the liberals on the court suggested that the Republican-controlled South Carolina Legislature adopted the maps by considering race as a predominant factor, in violation of the equal protection clause of the US Constitution.

    Justice Sonia Sotomayor said that Republicans were launching “pot shots” at the experts who claimed the maps could only be explained by race. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson noted that the challengers are not required to produce a “smoking gun” to prove their point.

    The dispute comes as the justices this year ordered Alabama to redraw its congressional map to account for the states’ 27% Black voting population. That decision, penned by Roberts, came as a welcome relief to liberals who feared that the court was poised to make it harder for minorities to challenge maps under Section 2 of the historic Voting Rights Act. A federal court approved a new map last week that significantly boosts the Black population in a second district, which could lead to the pickup of a Democratic seat next year.

    The South Carolina case raises different questions rooted in the Constitution concerning when a state crosses the line between permissible partisan goals and illegal racial discrimination.

    The state chapter of the NAACP and Scott are challenging the state’s 1st Congressional District, located along the southeastern coast and anchored in Charleston County. Although the district consistently elected Republicans from 1980 to 2016, in 2018 a Democrat was elected in a political upset.

    Two years later a Republican candidate, Mace, regained the seat in a close race. When the state House and Senate began considering congressional reapportionment in 2021, the Republican majorities sought to create a stronger GOP tilt in the district, one of seven in the state. A new map could make the seat more competitive.

    After an eight-day trial featuring 42 witnesses and 652 exhibits, a three-judge district court panel in January held that District 1 amounted to an unconstitutional racial gerrymander in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment because race was the predominant factor in the district’s reapportionment plan.

    “To achieve a target of 17% African American population,” the court said, “Charleston County was racially gerrymandered and over 30,000 African Americans were removed from their home district.” The court referred at one point to the “bleaching” of Black voters out of the Charleston County portion of the district.

    “State legislators are free to consider a broad array of factors in the design of a legislative district, including partisanship, but they may not use race as a predominant factor and may not use partisanship as a proxy for race,” the court concluded.

    South Carolina Republicans, led by state Senate President Thomas Alexander, appealed the decision to the Supreme Court, arguing that the maps had not been drawn impermissibly based on race, but instead with politics in mind.

    The person who devised the map testified in federal court that he was instructed to make the district “more Republican leaning,” but that he did not consider race while drawing the lines. He did, however, acknowledge that he examined racial data after drafting each version and that the Black voting-age population of the district was viewed during the drafting process.

    “If left uncorrected, the panel’s holding would place States in an impossible bind by exposing them to potential racial gerrymandering liability whenever they decline to make majority-white, modestly-majority Republican districts majority-Democratic,” argued John Gore, a lawyer for the Republicans.

    Mace filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the high court in support of the Republicans, charging that the lower court “ignored one of the most important traditional districting principles – the preservation of the core of existing districts.”

    Joined by other GOP members of Congress from South Carolina, Mace argued that constituent services, voter education and the seniority of long-serving members of the House are “vital interests” and that the lower court was “bent on destroying the legislatures’ duly enacted and carefully negotiated map.”

    Lawyers for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund told the justices in court papers that the state impermissibly used race as a predominant factor when drawing the district.

    “Using race as the predominant means to sort voters is unconstitutional even if done for partisan goals,” they argued.

    They said the lower court made clear that the state “intentionally exiled more than 30,000 Black Charlestonians from CD1 predominately because of their race.”

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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  • Supreme Court allows Biden administration to continue fully enforcing ghost gun regulations | CNN Politics

    Supreme Court allows Biden administration to continue fully enforcing ghost gun regulations | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The Supreme Court on Monday allowed the Biden administration to continue regulating so-called ghost guns – untraceable homemade weapons – as firearms under federal law.

    The court’s brief order grants the Justice Department’s request to wipe away a lower court order and allow the regulations to remain in effect while a legal challenge brought by firearm manufacturers continues to play out in the lower courts.

    There were no noted dissents to the order.

    Ghost guns are kits that a user can buy online to assemble a fully functional firearm. They have no serial numbers, do not require background checks and provide no transfer records for easy traceability. Critics say they are attractive to people who are legally prohibited from buying firearms.

    In the Justice Department’s emergency application to the justices, Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar pointed out that a district court judge had essentially ignored an order the Supreme Court issued just two months ago.

    Back in August, a 5-4 court sided with the Biden administration in a challenge brought by a group of manufacturers and allowed the regulations to remain in effect while legal challenges play out. At the time, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett sided with the liberal justices in the government’s favor.

    After the order was issued, however, a district court judge based in Texas stepped in to block the regulations as applied to two manufacturers. The injunction was then largely upheld by the conservative 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals.

    In an unusually sharp filing, Prelogar told the justices in an emergency application that the district court and the 5th Circuit “have effectively countermanded this Court’s authoritative determination about the status quo that should prevail during appellate proceedings in this case.”

    The court “should not tolerate that affront,” she wrote.

    “Although there’s no explanation for today’s ruling, it’s hard to see it as anything other than a repudiation of the lower courts for not correctly reading the tea leaves of the court’s August ruling that froze a similar injunction,” said Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at the University of Texas School of Law. “In that sense, it’s just the latest in an increasing line of rulings by the Supreme Court pushing back against district courts in Texas and the 5th Circuit.”

    Prelogar called the lower court ruling “a grave threat to public safety because the lack of background checks makes ghost guns uniquely appealing to felons, minors, and other prohibited persons – and because when ghost guns are inevitably used in crime, they are essentially impossible to trace.”

    In 2022, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives updated its regulations to define the kits as firearms under the law so that the government could more carefully track them.

    The rule does not prohibit the sale or possession of any ghost gun kit, nor does it block an individual from purchasing such a kit. Instead, it requires compliance with federal laws that impose conditions on the commercial sale of firearms. Those conditions include requirements that commercial manufacturers and sellers mark products with serial numbers and keep records to allow law enforcement to trace firearms used in crimes.

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  • Amy Coney Barrett: Supreme Court ethics code would be a good idea | CNN Politics

    Amy Coney Barrett: Supreme Court ethics code would be a good idea | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Amy Coney Barrett on Monday became the latest Supreme Court justice to address ethics concerns, saying that she thought it would be a “good idea” for the justices to adopt a formal code of conduct that would directly bind the justices.

    Her comments came during an appearance that was briefly interrupted by protesters at University of Minnesota Law School in a talk moderated by Professor Robert A. Stein. “Not the Court, not the State, People must decide their fate,” chanted the protesters, who appeared to make reference to her controversial vote last year to overturn Roe v. Wade – a decision that has triggered protests nationwide.

    When the talk resumed, Barrett confirmed that the justices have been discussing ethics concerns and are committed to holding themselves to the “highest standards.”

    It would be a “good idea” to adopt a formal code, she said, “particularly so that we can communicate to the public exactly what it is that we are doing in a clearer way than perhaps we have been able to do so far.”

    She stressed there is “unanimity among all nine justices that we should and do hold ourselves to the highest ethical standards possible.”

    Although Barrett didn’t address specific concerns, news reports over the last several months have detailed alleged ethics lapses on the part of some of the justices and Democrats in Congress are pushing for legislation that would enforce a code conduct.

    Other justices have confirmed in recent months that talks about ethics are ongoing, although no concrete steps have been announced. Barrett said she couldn’t speak to the timing of any announcement.

    Barrett, who voted with her conservative colleagues last year to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that established a constitutional right to an abortion, was also asked about when a justice should vote to overturn precedent.

    She said that there are several considerations a judge thinks about when voting to overrule precedent, including the “effects of that error” on the law today and whether the error “has distorted other areas of the law.”

    “Overturning precedent is not something to be done lightly,” Barrett said.

    On a different note, Barrett, who has seven children, also spoke of the perils of being a working mother – noting that she shares the same struggles as many working parents.

    She recounted a morning last term where one of her children had been listening to the Baha Men’s “Who let the dogs out” just before the school bus arrived.

    Hours later, Barrett confessed, she found herself walking down the austere marble hallways of the court humming the hit because she couldn’t get it out of her head.

    Motherhood, Barrett said, is very “grounding” and keeps her “very much rooted in real life.”

    Asked if she was enjoying herself on the high court, Barrett said the job has its “ups and downs” and that she feels a “grave responsibility” at times.

    “Enjoying myself is not quite the word I would use, but it is a privilege to serve, and I have no regrets about undertaking the service, and I am fully conscious that everything I am doing is very important for the people of America and those are the people for whom I work,” she said.

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  • Redistricting fights in these 10 states could determine which party controls the US House | CNN Politics

    Redistricting fights in these 10 states could determine which party controls the US House | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Around the country, politicians are waging high-stakes battles over new congressional lines that could influence which party controls the US House of Representatives after the 2024 election.

    In North Carolina, the Republicans who control the state legislature have crafted a map that could help them flip at least three seats. Democrats, meanwhile, could pick up seats in legal skirmishes now playing out in New York, Louisiana, Georgia and other states.

    In all, the fate of anywhere from 14 to 18 House seats across nearly a dozen states could turn on the results of these fights. Republicans currently hold just a five-seat edge in the US House. That razor-edge majority has been underscored in recent weeks by the GOP’s chaotic struggle to elect a new speaker.

    “Given that the majority is so narrow, every outcome matters to the fight for House control in 2024,” said David Wasserman, who follows redistricting closely as senior editor and elections analyst for The Cook Political Report with Amy Walter.

    And with fewer competitive districts that swing between the political parties, Wasserman added, “every line change is almost existential.”

    Experts say several other factors have helped lead to the slew of consequential – and unresolved – redistricting disputes, just months before the first primaries of the 2024 cycle.

    They include pandemic-related delays in completing the 2020 census – the once-a-decade population count that kicks off congressional and state legislative redistricting – as well as a 2019 Supreme Court ruling that threw decisions about partisan gerrymandering back to state courts.

    In addition, some litigation had been frozen in place until the US Supreme Court’s surprise ruling in June, which found that a Republican-crafted redistricting plan in Alabama disadvantaged Black voters in the state and was in violation of the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act.

    That decision “is functionally reanimating all of these dormant cases,” said Adam Kincaid, the president and executive director of the National Republican Redistricting Trust, which supports the GOP’s redistricting efforts.

    Kincaid said it’s too soon to tell whether Republicans or Democrats will emerge with the advantage by Election Day 2024. In his view, either party could gain or lose only about two seats over redistricting.

    In many of the closely watched states where action is pending, just a single seat hangs in the balance, with two notable exceptions: North Carolina and New York, where multiple seats are at stake. Republicans control the map-drawing in the Tar Heel State, while the job could fall to Democrats in New York, potentially canceling out each party’s gains.

    “Democrats kind of need to run the table in the rest of these states” to gain any edge, said Nick Seabrook, a political scientist at the University of North Florida and the author of the 2022 book “One Person, One Vote: A Surprising History of Gerrymandering in America.”

    Here’s a state-by-state look at recent and upcoming redistricting disputes that could shape the 2024 race for control of the US House:

    In one of the cycle’s highest-profile redistricting cases, a three-judge panel in Alabama approved a map that creates a second congressional district with a substantial Black population. Before the court action, Alabama – which is 27% Black – had only one Black-majority congressional district out of seven seats.

    The fight over the map went all the way to the Supreme Court – which issued a surprise ruling, affirming a lower-court opinion that ordered Alabama to include a second Black-majority district or “something quite close to it.” Under the map that will be in place for the 2024 election, the state’s 2nd District now loops into Mobile to create a seat where nearly half the population is Black.

    The high court’s 5-4 decision in June saw two conservatives, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh, side with the three liberals to uphold the lower-court ruling. Their action kept intact a key pillar of the Voting Rights Act: that it’s illegal to draw maps that effectively keep Black voters from electing a candidate of their choice.

    The ruling has reverberated around the country and could affect the outcome of similar court cases underway in Louisiana and Georgia that center on whether Republican-drawn maps improperly diluted Black political power in those states.

    Given that Black voters in Alabama have traditionally backed Democrats, the party now stands a better chance of winning the newly reconfigured district and sending to of its members to Congress after next year’s elections.

    The new map – approved in recent days by the lower-court judges – also could result in two Black US House members from Alabama serving together for the first time in state history.

    A state judge in September struck down congressional lines for northern Florida that had been championed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, ruling that the Republican governor’s map had improperly diluted Black voting power.

    This case, unlike the Alabama fight decided by the US Supreme Court, centers on provisions in the state constitution.

    The judge concluded that the congressional boundaries – which essentially dismantled a seat once held by Al Lawson, a Black Democrat, that connected Black communities across a northern reach of the Florida – violated the state’s Fair Districts amendments, enacted by voters. One amendment specifically bars the state from drawing a district that diminishes the ability of racial minorities “to elect representatives of their choice.”

    Arguments before an appeals court are slated for later this month, with litigants seeking a decision by late November. The case is expected to land before the all-Republican state Supreme Court, where DeSantis appointees hold most seats.

    A separate federal case – which argues that the map violates the US Constitution – is pending.

    But observers say the outcome of the state litigation is more likely than the federal case to determine whether Florida lawmakers must restore the North Florida district, given the state constitution’s especially strong protections for the voting rights of racial minorities and the lower burden of proof required to establish that those rights were abridged.

    A redistricting case now before a federal judge could create a more competitive seat for Democrats in the Atlanta suburbs.

    The plaintiffs challenging the congressional map drawn by Georgia Republicans argue that the increasingly diverse population in the Peach State should result in an additional Black-majority district, this one in the western Atlanta metro area. A trial in the case recently concluded and awaits a final ruling by US District Judge Steve Jones.

    In 2022, Jones preliminarily ruled that some parts of the Republicans’ redistricting plan likely violated federal law but allowed the map to be used in that year’s midterm elections.

    A separate federal case in Georgia challenges the congressional map on constitutional grounds and is slated to go to trial next month.

    Currently, Republicans hold nine of the 14 seats in Georgia’s congressional delegation. Black people make up a majority, or close to it, in four districts, including three in the Atlanta area.

    The Kentucky Supreme Court could soon decide whether a map drawn by the state’s Republican-controlled legislature amounts to what Democrats assert is an “extreme partisan” gerrymander in violation of the state’s constitution.

    Much of the case focuses on disputes over state legislative maps, but the congressional lines also are at stake, with critics saying lawmakers moved Kentucky’s capital city – Democratic-leaning Frankfort – out of the 6th Congressional District and into an oddly shaped – and solidly Republican – 1st District to help shore up Republican odds of holding the 6th District.

    The 6th District, represented by GOP Rep. Andy Barr, was one of the more competitive seats in Kentucky under its previous lines. (Democrat Amy McGrath came within 3 points of beating Barr in 2018; last year, Barr won a sixth term under the new lines by 29 points.)

    A lower-court judge already has ruled that the Republican-drawn map does not violate the state’s constitution.

    The Supreme Court’s decision in Alabama could pave the way for a new congressional map in Louisiana ahead of the 2024 election, but the case has quickly become mired in appeals.

    Although Black people make up roughly a third of the state’s population, Louisiana has just one Black lawmaker in its six-member congressional delegation.

    A federal judge threw out the state’s Republican-drawn map in 2022, saying it likely violated the Voting Rights Act. Republican officials in the state appealed to the US Supreme Court, which put the lower-court ruling on hold until it decided the Alabama case, which it did in June this year.

    Once the high court weighed in on the Alabama case, the legal skirmishes again lurched to life in Louisiana.

    Louisiana Republicans have filed an appeal with the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals and successfully halted a district court hearing to discuss imposing a new, court-ordered map.

    On Thursday, the US Supreme Court declined to allow the federal district judge to move forward with discussions about drawing a new map while the appeal advances through the courts.

    GOP state officials say, among other things, that they are seeking time to redraw the map themselves. Critics of the state’s original map argue that Republicans are using legal maneuvers to delay a new redistricting plan, which could result in a second Democratic-leaning seat.

    Legal battles that drag on risk judges invoking the so-called Purcell Principle, a doctrine that limits changing voting procedures and boundaries too close to Election Day to guard against voter confusion.

    “Some of the reason it becomes too late is because, in many of these cases, the state is prolonging the litigation … and buying more time with an illegal map,” said Kareem Crayton, senior director for voting and representation at the liberal-leaning Brennan Center for Justice.

    Republicans in New Mexico say the congressional lines drawn by the Democrats who control state government amount to an illegal gerrymander under the state’s constitution.

    At stake: a swing district along the US border with Mexico. If Republicans prevail, the seat – now held by a Democratic Rep. Gabe Vasquez – could become more favorable to Republicans.

    A state judge recently upheld the map drawn by Democrats, but the New Mexico Supreme Court is expected to review that order on appeal.

    Republicans flipped four US House seats in New York in the 2022 midterm elections, victories that helped secure their party’s majority in the chamber.

    Current legal fights in the Empire State over redistricting, however, could erase those gains.

    A state court judge oversaw last year’s process of drawing the current map following a long legal battle and the inability of New York’s bipartisan redistricting commission to agree on new lines. But Democrats scored a court victory earlier this year when a state appellate court ruled that the redistricting commission should draw new lines.

    Republicans have appealed that decision, and oral arguments are set for mid-November before New York’s Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court. The commission’s map-making also is on hold.

    If Democrats prevail, it could make it easier for their party to pick up as many as six seats now held by Republicans.

    North Carolina’s legislature, where Republicans hold a supermajority, has drawn new congressional lines that observers say could prove a windfall for the GOP and boost the party’s chances of retaining its House majority next year.

    The state’s current House delegation is split 7-7 between Democrats and Republicans.

    A map that state lawmakers recently approved puts three House Democrats in what one expert called “almost impossible to win” districts.

    The affected Democrats are Reps. Jeff Jackson, who currently represents a Charlotte-area district; Wiley Nickel, who holds a Raleigh-area seat; and Kathy Manning, who represents Greensboro and other parts of north-central North Carolina.

    A fourth Democrat, Rep. Don Davis, saw his district retooled to become more friendly toward Republicans while remaining competitive for both parties.

    State-level gains in the 2022 midterm elections have given the GOP new sway over redistricting in this swing state. Last year, Republicans flipped North Carolina’s Supreme Court, whose members are chosen in partisan elections. The new GOP majority on the court this year tossed out a 2022 ruling by the then-Democratic leaning court against partisan gerrymandering.

    A map that had been created after the Democratic-led high court’s ruling resulted in the current even split in the state’s House delegation.

    Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper does not have veto power over redistricting legislation.

    A redistricting case pending before the US Supreme Court centers on the future of a Charleston-area seat held by Republican Rep. Nancy Mace, who made headlines recently for joining House GOP hard-liners in voting to remove Kevin McCarthy as speaker.

    Earlier this year, a three-judge panel concluded that lines for the coastal 1st Congressional District, as drawn by state GOP lawmakers, amounted to an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.

    The Republican lawmakers appealed to the US Supreme Court. And, during oral arguments earlier this month, several justices in the court’s conservative majority expressed skepticism that South Carolina officials had engaged in an improper racial gerrymander and seemed inclined to reinstate the lawmakers’ map.

    The state Supreme Court, in a case it heard in July, is considering whether it even has the authority to weigh in on map-drawing decisions by the GOP-controlled state legislature.

    Republican state officials argue that the court’s power over redistricting decisions is limited.

    Advocacy groups and a handful of voters are challenging a congressional map that further carved up Democratic-leaning Salt Lake County between four decidedly Republican districts.

    Doing so, the plaintiffs argued in their lawsuit, “takes a slice of Salt Lake County and grafts it onto large swaths of the rest of Utah,” allowing Republican voters in rural areas and smaller cities far away from Salt Lake to “dictate the outcome of elections.”

    Redistricting fights over congressional maps are ongoing in several other states – ranging from Texas to Tennessee – but those cases might not be resolved in time to affect next year’s elections.

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  • Justice Kagan order: Apple doesn’t have to change app store terms while battling Epic in court | CNN Business

    Justice Kagan order: Apple doesn’t have to change app store terms while battling Epic in court | CNN Business

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    A judicial order forcing Apple to change some of its app store terms will not need to take immediate effect while litigation over the decision plays out, Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan said on Wednesday, handing a temporary defeat to opponents of the company.

    The order is a setback for “Fortnite”-maker Epic Games as Apple appeals a lower-court ruling that found the iPhone-maker had violated California competition law.

    Epic Games declined to comment on Kagan’s decision, which occurred in the Supreme Court’s so-called “shadow docket” and was not referred to the full court.

    Apple didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

    Apple had previously been ordered not to interfere with efforts by iOS app developers to inform their users within their apps about alternatives to Apple’s in-app payment system, which allows Apple to take a commission.

    In April, a federal appeals court upheld the order that, if allowed to take effect, would prevent Apple from intervening when developers include “buttons, external links or other calls to action that direct customers to purchasing mechanisms” apart from Apple’s own channels.

    The appeals court temporarily paused enforcement of the injunction while Apple appeals the ruling to the Supreme Court. But last month, Epic Games filed an emergency request to the court calling for the order to be put into effect immediately, saying the public would otherwise be harmed by Apple’s practices.

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