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This blog is the work of an educated civilian, not of an expert in the fields discussed.

Monday, July 15, 2019

SCOTUS Watch: Orders etc.

During summer recess, the Supreme Court schedules three set days to release orders on various things, generally uncontroversial and not really notable matters. Order days during the regular term often are of the same caliber. For some reason, SCOTUSBlog does not put these summer days on the calendar provided on their website. I flagged this to them one year, noting the days are scheduled in each case. My opinion was duly noted as much as it usually is.  Anyway, first some general court news.

The citizenship question ruling in June was not the end of the line, leaving open a question not only in the future but possibly the present, though some thought practicably it was the end of the line there.  At first, it seems there was and ending -- an announcement that the new census forms would not have a question. But, Trump didn't like that.  Fake news!  So, the process to find a new method started, including replacing the current lawyers involved in defending the question. Two judges were "not so fast."

Finally, Trump basically admitted defeat though said (as was suggested originally) he will try to get the information some other way.  This whole thing poisoned the well and now census officials will try to run the 2020 census while many people are suspicious. This would include any other means used to collect data, including citizenship data.  The Republicans see the data as a means to apportion districts based on the number of citizens there, allowing a state's population as a whole to be based (per the Constitution) by persons, but districts drawn in a way that can favor one party.  This seems problematic, including on racial discrimination grounds, but it was left open as a possibility in a past case.

Meanwhile, yet again, the Trump Administration (as in the census case) wants to skip a level to rush things to the Supreme Court (border wall).  This is not common behavior and they have tried it more than the last two administrations (sixteen years) combined.  I'm sorry.  Almost 3x as much in less than three years. The census case suggests the limits of Trump's breach of the law, down to apparently some government lawyers perhaps being unwilling to defend a clearly specious argument.  Court orders have been followed and so forth.  But, this only goes so far, and their moves to use existing law in troubling ways remains clearly documented.

The partisan gerrymandering opinion has been subject to continual discussion.  I found New York's own rules, which blocks that sort of thing. How well this is applied is unclear.  Talking about blocking, the court of appeals held that Trump cannot block people on Twitter, noting various things make it clear his account (as compared to any account of a government official) is a public forum. For instance, it is covered by the presidential records law (though his status as a "president" to me is somewhat dubious).

Okay, so let's cover those orders. Nothing happened.  A request for bail was denied as were various petitions of lower court re-hearings being denied. For instance, following the docket number, Anson Chi's handwritten petition. There will be various actions on cases found only on docket pages and various stand-alone orders (various executions scheduled in August). But, these summer orders tend to be dull.  We are for completeness here.

(The bail request is a doozy.  First it was submitted to Gorsuch, he denied it, and then it was re-submitted to Sotomayor.  The request has a bunch of exhibits, totaling over one hundred pages.  Skimming, one is a handwritten petition.  The person's address is "Federal Prison," so she does have a lot of time on her hands.  It seems notable she posts her email at one point using an AOL email address.  [Hey, one of mine still is.]  A news article.)  

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