Covering the Supreme Court, lower courts, and the law

Only hours before a crucial hearing in a federal trial court, the Trump Administration on Monday evening urged the Supreme Court to halt all further proceedings in the case, which tests the constitutionality of asking everyone in America about their citizenship, as part of the 2020 census.  The Court has refused twice before to block… Read More

Attempting once again a highly unusual legal maneuver for getting prompt Supreme Court review of major controversial issues, the Trump Administration on Friday asked the Justices to restore the military’s power to exclude most transgender people from serving in the armed forces.  That policy is temporarily blocked nationwide by orders of three federal trial judges…. Read More

Seeming to suggest that higher courts have left no other choice, a federal trial judge in Eugene, Ore., ordered a months-long delay of the trial of a children’s constitutional lawsuit claiming future harm from climate change, especially global warming.  That trial was to have started more than three weeks ago, but now will occur –… Read More

After two quick rulings by lower courts, the Trump Administration is now down to what appears to be its last option to seek a delay of a constitutional court case over the 2020 census.  Only a last-ditch plea to the Supreme Court remained Wednesday, and that would come in the wake of a string of… Read More

A federal judge, out of patience with the Trump Administration’s 12 attempts to stop a trial of a constitutional dispute over the 2020 census, put government lawyers on notice on Tuesday that they are risking punishment for some of those tactics.  U.S. District Judge Jesse M. Furman of New York City twice mentioned possible “sanctions”… Read More

Trying again to stop a trial in a federal court in a constitutional dispute over the 2020 census, the Trump Administration rushed into one court on Sunday and then, without waiting for action there, hurried to a higher court on Monday with the same request. At issue in both requests is whether a trial judge… Read More

Taking the suggestion of the Supreme Court, the Trump Administration has moved in two lower federal courts in a new attempt to stop the trial of a major lawsuit claiming that the government has wrongly followed policies that have worsened the nation’s climate. That trial, temporarily on hold while the trial judge and the lawyers… Read More

Blocked by three lower-court orders from shutting down the six-year-old “DACA” program that protects young, undocumented immigrants from being deported, the Trump Administration asked the Supreme Court on Monday to end the program and to do so in the Court’s current term. The “DACA” program – formally, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals – was created… Read More

The Supreme Court late Friday afternoon sent the Trump Administration two quite clear signals that the government has been depending too much on the Supreme Court to thwart challenges to the government’s policies in the lower federal courts. In two separate orders, each coming in a high-profile, heavily-contested case now unfolding in a lower federal… Read More

Arguing that one of President Trump’s Cabinet secretaries should not have to answer lawyers’ questions about why he plans to ask everyone in America about their citizenship as part of the 2020 census, the Administration urged the Supreme Court on Monday to delay a trial on that issue, now set to start next Monday. Commerce… Read More