Justices Frustrated By Trump Census Case, Concerned About Nation’s Major Cybercrime Law
December 1, 2020
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING
|The Supreme Court heard arguments yesterday in a case concerning PRESIDENT TRUMP’S efforts to exclude undocumented immigrants from the Census count for the first time ever. But the justices weren’t too thrilled to have the dispute before them. They were frustrated by the fact that acting SOLICITOR GENERAL JEFFREY WALL didn’t know how many unauthorized immigrants Trump plans to exclude or how that number might affect the apportionment of Congressional seats and federal funds. JUSTICE SAMUEL ALITO said, “I find the posture of this case quite frustrating. It could be that this is much ado about very little.” Wall wasn’t able to say whether it would be possible at this point — with only 31 days left in the year — for the estimated 10.5 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. to be excluded from the count. And JUSTICE AMY CONEY BARRETT didn’t seem likely to come to Trump’s rescue either, at one point saying, “A lot of historical evidence and long-standing practice really cuts against your position.”
DON'T COUNT ON IT
|Michael Wines with The New York Times writes the question at the center of yesterday’s case regarding the 2020 Census “goes to the heart of American democracy.” That question — of whether to count every citizen living in the country regardless of their citizenship status — has resulted in the nation’s reply of “yes” for more than two centuries. But Wines notes how hard it actually is to count the number of unauthorized immigrants in the country. “It appears unlikely that the bureau will produce an estimate of unauthorized immigrants by the Dec. 31 statutory deadline for sending population totals to the White House. Indeed, Census Bureau officials told the Commerce Department this month that the 2020 census itself could not be completed until after Mr. Trump leaves office on Jan. 20. The bureau’s experts nevertheless are racing to complete a count of unauthorized immigrants for delivery to Mr. Trump in early or mid-January.”
DE-CODING COMPUTER CRIME
|The Supreme Court also heard a case yesterday involving the nation’s only major cybercrime law, and the justices appeared to have reservations about its ambiguity and scope. The case involves a Georgia police officer convicted of violating the 1986 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) by accessing a license plate database. The Washington Post notes that critics say the CFAA is vaguely worded and not always applied uniformly. “When the law’s language is interpreted narrowly — as in many U.S. court jurisdictions — it just criminalizes malicious hacking, such as breaking into a computer to steal credit card information. But other jurisdictions interpret the law more broadly to make it a federal crime whenever someone breaks a website’s terms of service or a company’s workplace computer rules. That could criminalize innocuous acts, such as lying about one’s height on a dating app or checking personal email at work.”
CAN'T HACK IT
|Eric Geller with POLITICO reports on the cybersecurity case at SCOTUS and writes justices “sounded alarmed” about a broader interpretation of the CFAA. “The case that could decide the scope of the CFAA stems from a tawdry sting operation. In 2017, a district court convicted police officer Nathan Van Buren for using his access to the license plate database to check whether a strip club dancer was an undercover officer in return for a loan from a man who turned out to be an FBI informant. Van Buren’s lawyers argued that he hadn’t violated the CFAA’s prohibition on unauthorized computer access because he’d had legitimate access to the database as part of his job. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit upheld Van Buren’s conviction, finding that the CFAA prohibited accessing a computer for improper purposes even if the defendant was authorized to use it for other purposes. Four appeals courts have now interpreted the CFAA in this broad manner, while three have interpreted it more narrowly.”
LEAVING A BAD TASTE IN YOUR MOUTH
|Before SCOTUS today comes an effort to hold Nestlé USA and Cargill responsible for child labor farms supplying their cocoa. Six Africans brought the suit forward and they say they were trafficked out of Mali and forced into labor on Ivory Coast cocoa farms. They’re seeking damages from the U.S. companies and asking that they stop supporting child labor. SCOTUS will decide whether their case can continue in the lower courts. Peter Whoriskey with The Washington Post reports.