Because of the nature of the job, it's rare to get a candid glimpse of the judiciary behind-the-scenes. This was a terrific discussion, thought-provoking and useful in understanding how the judiciary defines itself at this time.

Yesterday's 6–3 Supreme Court order ushering in a racist Alabama gerrymander broke two promises that Alito made *12 days earlier* in Callais and shamelessly broke the court's own (bogus) rule against late intervention in an ongoing election. slate.com/news-and-pol...

We've already run through steps 1-4 on this latest round—pulling for 5 to come through soon

Virginia Democrats have filed a long shot emergency application asking SCOTUS to stay the Virginia Supreme Court's decision against the new, voter-approved congressional map. www.documentcloud.org/documents/28...

Justice Alito has extended his administrative stay of the 5th Circuit ruling against mifepristone. Mifepristone remains available via telemedicine and mail, for now. New deadline is Thursday.

If this lawsuit succeeds, it may compel Democrats to "unpack" Illinois' majority-minority congressional districts—a process that could eliminate the state's three remaining Republican seats by spreading out Democratic voters more efficiently. Seems strategically dumb.

I'm back from parental leave until I take a much longer break in August! Kinda seems like everything went to shit over the past two weeks?

In 2022, the North Carolina Supreme Court's Democratic majority banned partisan gerrymandering under the state constitution. Republicans then won control of the court and spontaneously reversed that decision, re-legalizing gerrymandering. I suspect this is the model Virginia Democrats will follow.

What's especially funny about this is how hard Ilya worked to try to persuade people that he hadn't meant anything nefarious by referring to Justice Jackson, at the time of her nomination, as a "lesser black woman." When people show you who they are, believe them.

One more week of parental leave (for now). This is how your email finds me.

My New One at Slate: Justice Alito is a Coward (and Possibly a Liar) slate.com/news-and-pol...

Yep. It isn’t 2023. Telemedicine abortion remains broadly available everywhere: •Domestic providers can switch to a miso-only regime; slightly less effective but still extremely safe •International providers will still mail mifepristone uninterrupted The field has been planning for this moment.

Toro’s morning apple

Terrific thread. I’ll just add: 1. I think there’s a good chance the Supreme Court will stay this decision, allowing providers to keep mailing mifepristone for the time being. 2. The Trump administration didn’t want this! Its plan was to wait until after the midterms to crack down on mifepristone.

Justice Thurgood Marshall, dissenting in Mobile v. Alabama, which gave us the 1982 amendments to the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that the Supreme Court just nullified in Louisiana v. Callais. Every word applies to the current majority: tile.loc.gov/storage-serv...

I find this casual story thoroughly unconvincing. Legal scholars aren’t so powerful. Callais happened because Republican presidents selected conservative Justices who were hostile to the Voting Rights Act. The Biden Supreme Court Commission was irrelevant. bbaumann.substack.com/p/its-a-real...

What do conservatives always say when liberals criticize a Supreme Court decision? "Get Congress to pass a law," right? That is EXACTLY what happened here. In 1982, Congress explicitly overruled a Court case that narrowly interpreted the VRA. Today, Sam Alito said, nope, we were right all along.

Don't think I've ever seen @rickhasen.bsky.social this angry. "The Supreme Court itself has shown itself to be the enemy of democracy. [Democrats] have to consider reform of the Supreme Court itself, a conclusion I had been resisting until the court made this unavoidable." slate.com/news-and-pol...

I'm on parental leave this week and next, so of course Callais came down today. Just a few top-line thoughts: 1. Don't believe Alito's claim that the majority is merely tinkering with precedent. In effect, this decision pretty much eliminates what remained of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.

1/ As far as I can tell, the only thing Randy has posted about Renee Good or Alex Pretti is to complain that Jonathan Last referred to their murders as state terrorism. He openly mocks Obama's reaction to the murder of Trayvon Martin, in the process accusing Obama himself of violent leanings.

Programming note: Celebrated the birth of our second son this weekend. 😊His big brother is over the moon, as are we! Everybody is happy and healthy. I’ll be taking off the next two weeks, then back through July, after which I’ll be off again for a while. Good luck out there!

I didn't even notice this footnote. Ho, of course, had previously written that there was no serious argument against birthright citizenship, and that it was outright required by law. He exists in a soup of right-wing propaganda now, though.

Continuing his campaign for SCOTUS, Judge James Ho claims that other countries have "weaponized" mass migration against the U.S., citing a Breitbart conspiracy theorist for the proposition that Mexico is pushing migrants into the U.S. to reclaim old territory. s3.documentcloud.org/documents/28...

Interesting that Justice Kavanaugh, in remarks at Catholic University recently, included Dobbs in a discussion of how religious liberty has been strengthened during his time on the court. "I viewed that as -- that's not religious liberty per se -- but certainly related," he said.

I am begging someone, anyone, to answer Steve's question: Where did Baude get the idea that the government only faces "irreparable injury" when a lower court blocks its action, and not when the Supreme Court blocks it? Was this idea pulled out of thin air to defend Roberts' memos? It's mystifying.

If you’re a law professor thinking about reposting the claim that the Unite the Right rally was staged or faked, I’d encourage you to read the transcripts from Sines v Kessler. I know they run several thousand pages of testimony from the organizers, but they’re easily accessible and linked below.

FedSoc types are so triggered about SCOTUS leaks they are having a whole roundtable about it this afternoon: fedsoc.org/events/from-...

A shot across the bow from two scholars I respect. I do not agree that my post "confuse[d] the public." A Court that believes enjoining government actions always *irreparably* injures the government should think that fact relevant to the public interest analysis required to obtain emergency relief..

Man, this is absolutely huge, and I cannot believe Trump gets to claim it. There's no reason Biden's Justice Department couldn't have done this. Or Obama's!

The shadow docket hurts people, judges, and a functioning legal system. And I'm glad that Steve is out there, as patiently as humanly possible, reminding the public that, as much as defenders of the Supreme Court may try, there's simply no sanewashing it.

Fantastic, comprehensive piece, and I have no idea how Steve remains so calm while refuting all this nonsense. The sanewashing of the shadow docket is infuriating!

Here's my print feature piece in @thenation.com about the rise of AI-justice. Judges are already relying on AI, more than you probably think, and with some countries *replacing* human judges with bots, we will soon have to ask: Would you rather Justice Alito or Justice Mech-Hitler?

This would neutralize the current congressional rider that prohibits D.C. from legalizing recreational marijuana sales, as the Congressional Research Service explained two years ago, because the rider is pegged to Schedule I substances, not weed specifically. www.congress.gov/crs-product/...

The Supreme Court's second and FINAL decision is Hencely v. Fluor. By a 6–3 vote, with Thomas writing, the court holds that a service member's lawsuit against a military contractor is NOT preempted by federal law and can move forward. This is a great outcome! www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25p...

The Supreme Court's first (but not last) decision of the day is Enbridge v. Nessel. Per Sotomayor, the court unanimously holds that this removal to federal court was untimely. www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25p...

You can’t do that to rural voters! What are they, black people? bsky.app/profile/coll...

Here’s the 5th Circuit’s opinion openly and directly defying an on-point Supreme Court precedent that prohibits the display of the 10 Commandments in public school classrooms. Shameless defiance of SCOTUS, but we’ll see if the supermajority cares. txvalues.org/wp-content/u...

Stupid goo goo nonsense. The only way to get fair districting is to pinch republicans in the mouth enough until they agree to fairness. Doing this with Callais days away from ripping up the VRA is so stupid I don’t know where to begin.

A federal judge just blocked the Trump administration's effort to rip out the 15th Street bike lane on the national mall—which substantially reduced crashes and injuries—holding that the move was arbitrary and capricious in violation of the law: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

And it’s written by a Harvard Law professor who is not Adrian Vermeule💀

This article (proposing professional sanctions for lawyer-journalists who publish leaked SCOTUS material) is genuinely one of the stupidest things I’ve read in my entire adult life reason.com/volokh/2026/...

By a 6–3 vote, and with no opinion, the Supreme Court throws out a lower court decision denying qualified immunity who killed an unarmed, mentally ill man by using "bodyweight force" to restrain him. All three liberals dissent. www.supremecourt.gov/orders/court...

The Supreme Court will decide whether Colorado violated the First Amendment's free exercise clause by requiring schools participating in its universal pre-K program to abide by a non-discrimination policy that Catholic schools reject. (Exceedingly ominous.) www.supremecourt.gov/orders/court...

Jamal is too nice to say "utter hypocrisy," but that's what this is. Today's #SCOTUS treats *all* coercive relief against the executive branch as imposing irreparable harm on the government. For that proposition, they cite a 2014 opinion by ... Chief Justice Roberts. Its absence here is deafening.

The @nytimes.com reporting reveals more about the dysfunction and poor leadership at the Supreme Court. These revelations underscore the brilliant observations of @mjsdc.bsky.social , @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app , and @nanagyamfi.bsky.social at our 14th Amendment Ctr symposium last week.

I am so annoyed by @mattyglesias.bsky.social's head-in-the-sand takes on the DC mayoral race that I made this stupid meme

Still thinking about Justin Smith, Trump's pick for a seat on the Eighth Circuit, writing as a 39-year-old lawyer that he had been working to "advance conservative values for 30 years"

No major decisions from the Supreme Court today! The one opinion is Chevron v. Plaquemines Parish—the court unanimously removes a Louisiana environmental case to federal court. (Alito recused because of his stock holdings.) www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25p...

I really appreciate everybody who reached out after the unfortunate and bizarre pile-on I experienced on here a few weeks ago. Thanks especially to those of you who taught me how to limit engagement to dissuade trolls from fomenting a rage-fest in the future. I wish I knew about these tools earlier!

It's interesting how the FedSoc (& Never Trump) crowd are making a real push to defend and buttress the Supreme Court in the face of attacks from both the left and Trump. It's a cottage industry right now across podcasts, books, etc. And it's understandable they want to protect their own.