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Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan appeared to take umbrage at Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s majority opinion in a copyright case involving Andy Warhol and Prince, telling readers in her dissent that she would trust their “good judgment” rather than counter her colleague’s “fistfuls of comeback footnotes.” The shot at Kagan’s fellow liberal came in a lengthy second footnote of her dissent, which several Supreme Court observers found “interesting” and “noteworthy.” Kagan and Chief Justice John Roberts were the only justices that didn’t rule in favor of music photographer Lynn Goldsmith’s claim that the the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts...

A win for Geraldine Tyler, who is now 94 years old, would be a win for property rights.The Supreme Court on Wednesday heard arguments in a consequential case. The query before the justices: Was it unconstitutional when the government seized a woman's home over an unpaid tax bill, sold it for more than the amount of the debt, and then kept the profit? It may sound like a slam dunk case. Over the last several years, it has not been. But yesterday's arguments provided both a glimmer of optimism for the state of property rights in the U.S., as well...

At The New Yorker website (his other gig), CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin explained that he is a longtime friend of Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan and went to law school with her, even studied with her in a small group -- and yet, her political views are somehow a "mystery" to him. Not even liberals are buying this (take Matthew Yglesias at Think Progress). Toobin stated: The justices are not really managers of people, certainly not in comparison to the dean of a major law school. Judgment, values, and politics are what matters on the Court. And here I...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court won’t allow the Biden administration to implement a policy that prioritizes deportation of people in the country illegally who pose the greatest public safety risk. The court’s order Thursday leaves the policy frozen nationwide for now. The vote was 5-4 with conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett joining liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson in saying they would have allowed the Biden administration to put in place the guidance. The court also announced it would hear arguments in the case, saying they would be in late November. The guidance, issued after...

The Supreme Court heard oral argument on Monday in two challenges to S.B. 8, the Texas law that bans almost all abortions in the state. After nearly three hours of argument by four different lawyers, the justices appeared likely to allow the case brought by a group of Texas abortion providers to go forward, even if they did not necessarily appear to agree on the rationale for that lawsuit. The justices were more skeptical about the lawsuit filed by the Biden administration, and they did not give any hint as to whether the law will continue to remain in effect....Monday’s...

The left thinks its power is so broad as to be essentially limitless, and so singularly vested as to be checked virtually solely at its own discretion.Interested to know what the top liberal legal minds of the United States Supreme Court think about government power and your private property? First, take 10 minutes to read Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s opinion, written for the majority, in the court’s Thursday night decision to stop the ban on rental income; then spend another 10 minutes on Justice Stephen Breyer’s dissent.Here’s a hint: The left thinks its power is so overarching as to impact nearly...

The U.S. Supreme Court handed a stunning defeat to the enemies of the First Amendment by invalidating a California law forcing nonprofits to disclose their largest donors — and liberals are losing it. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the opinion of the Court in Americans for Prosperity Foundation v. Bonta, Attorney General of California. The syllabus for the opinion reasoned that “California’s disclosure requirement imposes a widespread burden on donors’ associational rights.” It continued: “[T]his burden cannot be justified on the ground that the regime is narrowly tailored to investigating charitable wrongdoing, or that the State’s interest in administrative convenience...

Shannon Bream just now on Fox: Arizona law upheld. Sounds like good news!

On Monday, the Supreme Court unanimously rejected an illegal immigrant’s attempt to twist immigration law and create a loophole that would allow thousands of illegal immigrants to become lawful permanent residents. Democratic senators and attorneys general advocated for this loophole, but a liberal justice wrote the opinion for a unanimous Court. “Petitioner Jose Santos Sanchez entered this country unlawfully from El Salvador. Years later, because of unsafe living conditions in that country, the Government granted him Temporary Protected Status (TPS), entitling him to stay and work in the United States for as long as those conditions persist. Sanchez now wishes...

Several Democratic lawmakers are pushing for Justice Amy Coney Barrett to recuse herself from an upcoming case linked to a conservative group that funded an ad blitz supporting her confirmation to the Supreme Court. In a three-page letter, the lawmakers argued that Barrett was at risk of bias in favor of a litigant funded by Charles Koch, the conservative billionaire behind a group that bankrolled a high-priced ad campaign for the Trump appointee’s Senate confirmation last fall. “Statute, constitutional case law, and common sense all would seem to require your recusal,” Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and...

The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a request to block a Florida law requiring those who have been convicted of felonies and served their sentences to pay outstanding fines and fees owed in connection with their cases before voting. The court's order keeps the law in place heading into the state's primary election for non-presidential races, which is scheduled for Aug. 18 with a registration deadline of July 20. Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Elena Kagan dissented with the majority's opinion. "This Court's order prevents thousands of otherwise eligible voters from participating in Florida's primary election simply because...

The Supreme Court on Wednesday lifted another injunction on the Trump administration's rapid push to resume federal death sentences this week. A divided court lifted one of a handful of injunctions temporarily blocking the execution of a man whose lawyers say suffers from severe dementia. The vote was 5-4 with the liberal justices — Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor — dissenting. DEVELOPING...

In a major win for religious liberty, the Supreme Court ruled 7-2 on Wednesday that employers with moral or religious objections would be exempt from the federal mandate that requires company health insurance to cover birth control. The case was a consolidation of The Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania and Trump v. Pennsylvania, both of which sought to alter the implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA). While the bill itself had no requirements for contraceptive access being guaranteed, this became mandatory through interim final rules (IFRs). While Churches have always been exempt...

The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that states can prohibit their Electoral College representatives from disregarding voters when casting their ballots in presidential elections. The unanimous decision, arising out of a case from Washington state, essentially gives states the right to outlaw "faithless electors" who cast their votes for people other than those chosen by their voters. "Nothing in the Constitution expressly prohibits States from taking away presidential electors’ voting discretion as Washington does," Justice Elena Kagan wrote in the majority decision. --This breaking news report will be updated.

The oral arguments at the Supreme Court in the case of Harris Funeral Homes v. EEOC and two other cases involving LGBT employment issues seem to indicate that we’re heading toward yet another set of close decisions split along partisan lines. If you’ve been following our ongoing coverage of the case here, you’re already aware that the dispute in Harris involves a funeral director named Aimee Stephens who was fired after announcing that he was transgender and planned to begin living and dressing as a woman on the job. Two other cases deal with gay workers who were allegedly...

Chief Justice Roberts, joined by the four liberal justices (Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor), declared that “the evidence tells a story that does not match the explanation the Secretary gave for his decision.” The “sole stated reason” for adding the citizenship question to the census, he observed, “seems to have been contrived.” Federal agencies must “offer genuine justifications for important decisions, reasons that can be scrutinized by courts and the interested public.” Otherwise, judicial review becomes “an empty ritual.” In dissent, Justice Clarence Thomas, joined by Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, correctly called the...

In a much-awaited decision, the Supreme Court held on Thursday in a 5-4 decision that partisan gerrymandering is a political question beyond the reach of the federal courts. This should come as no surprise, since it’s the same conclusion the court reached the last time this issue was before it in 2004 in a case out of Pennsylvania, Vieth v. Jubelirer. This time, plaintiffs in both Maryland and North Carolina challenged congressional redistricting maps, claiming they discriminated against Republicans in Maryland and Democrats in North Carolina. They argued that such partisan redistricting (i.e. engaging in politics when drawing legislative district...

- A divided Supreme Court ruled Monday that a federal law requiring longer prison sentences for using a gun during a "crime of violence" is unconstitutionally vague. The court voted 5-4 stating the law "provides no reliable way" to determine which offenses qualify as crimes of violence. Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion on behalf of Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. "In our constitutional order, a vague law is no law at all," Gorsuch wrote. "Only the people's elected representatives in Congress have the power to write new federal criminal laws. And when...

A new book on Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts offers new details of his negotiation with liberal justices Elena Kagan and Stephen Breyer to save ObamaCare ahead of the court's landmark ruling in 2012, according to excerpts released on CNN. In Joan Biskupic's "The Chief" which is scheduled to release next Thursday, she writes that Roberts originally opposed upholding the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate that required people to buy insurance, and cast his initial vote to strike it down, but he did join the liberal justices in voting to uphold Medicaid expansion, according to the book. He later...

The Supreme Court sent a case concerning a death row inmate, who claims he can no longer remember his crimes because of several strokes he had while in prison, back down to the lower courts to take a second look. The court had already stayed the inmate Vernon Madison's execution last January. In a 5-3 vote, Chief Justice John Roberts sided Wednesday with the liberals on the court in favor of Madison. Only eight justices had heard the case because Justice Brett Kavanaugh had not been confirmed by the time the case was argued.