Covering the Supreme Court, lower courts, and the law

The Trump Administration’s $1.8 billion plan to pay off people who claim to be victims of Biden Administration harassment is, as of today, somewhere between dead and still alive but on life support.  Statements to Congress this week by a top Justice Department official refusing to put in writing the fund’s supposed closure have not… Read More

NOTE TO READERS:  The following story is the second of two developments Friday on the legal controversy over the new Trump “slush fund.”  The earlier development is reported in the post just below this one. A federal judge in Florida on Friday ordered lawyers for President Trump and for government agencies to answer “grievous” claims… Read More

In a serious though temporary setback for President Trump’s plan to hand out millions in federal funds to his political allies and friends, a federal judge in Virginia on Friday blocked any further steps to create and operate that highly unusual and deeply controversial project. U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema of Alexandria, who is… Read More

A group of retired federal judges on Wednesday started what may be the most significant threat so far to the Trump Administration’s plan to take $1.8 billion of U.S. Treasury funds and hand them out to President Trump’s political allies and followers – widely criticized as an illegal “slush fund.”  The retired jurists’ maneuver may be… Read More

Since the nation’s founding, the federal government has tried a variety of ways to pay people who have been harmed by the actions of U.S. officials.  At times, the effort has led to scandal as demands on the Treasury multiplied. In some sense, though, this was a noble idea.  President Abraham Lincoln, for example, told… Read More

The Supreme Court, continuing to sort out voting rights, on Monday morning issued two brief new orders – with no explanation.  The near-silence deepened a constitutional mystery that has lingered for years: will the conservative majority allow the main federal voting rights law to remain, in a workable form? While the six conservative Justices who… Read More

The Democratic Party’s already fading hopes of regaining control of the U.S. House of Representatives this year dimmed further Friday.  The Supreme Court denied the Democrats any emergency help in Virginia, one of that party’s best places to pick up House seats. The Court acted without a word of explanation and without any Justice willing to be listed in support… Read More

After a major rewriting by the Supreme Court last month of the meaning of a historic federal voting rights law, significantly reducing the rights of minorities at the polls, the Court is scheduled to meet in private tomorrow (Thursday) to examine a sequel. If, as the three dissenting Justices have complained, the Court’s conservative six-Justice… Read More

In a move with broad political and legal meaning, state officials in Virginia took action Monday afternoon to draw the U.S. Supreme Court further into the intense national feud over redrawing congressional election maps. In a 24-page filing, the state asked the Justices to clear the way for officials to go ahead with plans to… Read More

Virginia Democrats made a plan to join in the nation’s spreading gerrymander war, with the two major political parties seeking to capture more seats in Congress’s closely-divided House of Representatives.  The Virginia skirmish in the war would result in a 10-to-1 Democratic advantage over the Republicans, a switch of four seats from the GOP. Enlisting… Read More