PARTISAN GERRYMANDERING STILL A BIG QUESTION MARK | SCOTUS Says Texas And North Carolina Maps Are Fine For Now | Happy Birthday To Justices Thomas And Sotomayor
June 25, 2018
OLDER AND HOPEFULLY WISER
|Wishing a happy belated to JUSTICE CLARENCE THOMAS who turned 70 years old over the weekend. To celebrate, check out all the photos his wife has been posting of the justice’s visits with PRESIDENT TRUMP and VICE PRESIDENT PENCE. Strong move as the rest of the country waits for the Supreme Court’s judgement on the future of the president’s travel ban. SCOTUSDaily would also like to wish a happy birthday to JUSTICE SONIA SOTOMAYOR who turns 64 today.
THE GLOVES ARE OFF
|Ruling 5-4, the Supreme Court today said that Texas’ legislative and congressional maps are not racial gerrymanders save for one — House District 90. The maps had been previously struck down by a lower court for diluting the votes of black and Hispanic voters. But the Supreme Court had a different view. JUSTICE SAMUEL ALITO wrote the majority opinion which asserted that there wasn’t enough evidence to prove that state Republicans acted in bad faith and intentionally discriminated when they adopted those maps. JUSTICE SONIA SOTOMAYOR was joined by her fellow Democratic appointees in dissent, which was so fiery it seemed to challenge the justices’ custom of public civility. At one point in her dissent, Sotomayor referred to Alito’s majority opinion as “just flat wrong” while Alito wrote that the dissent “loses track of its own argument.”
WE DON'T WANNA GO TO WORK WORK WORK WORK
|The justices refused yet again today to decide how far is too far when it comes to partisan gerrymandering. The Supreme Court sent back to a lower court for further review a challenge to North Carolina’s 13 congressional districts. Similar to their recent ruling in the Wisconsin partisan gerrymandering case, the justices took issue with some of the procedural elements of the appeal. All in all, it looks like the current court isn’t ready to settle on the long-unresolved issue of partisan gerrymandering, so we shall spend another summer wondering when the day will finally come.
ANOTHER HARD PASS
|The Supreme Court also passed up another major opportunity today when it refused to take up an appeal out of Washington state over whether a business owner’s religious beliefs can justify refusing gay couples seeking wedding services. Sound familiar? It’s basically the cake case but with flowers. The justices ordered a lower court to reconsider requiring a florist to comply with a state anti-discrimination law after she refused to provide flowers for same-sex weddings. By kicking the case back down to lower courts, the justices leave open the core questions of how and when business owners can turn away customers on religious or free-speech grounds.
NOT MADE FOR SCOTUS
|“Making a Murderer” will not be going to SCOTUS for a full hearing as justices today turned down a plea to intervene in the case of BRENDAN DASSEY. The court gave no reason for denying the petition from Dassey and his lawyers. The young man is now in his late 20s and is serving a life sentence in prison.
SWIPER NOT SWIPING
|Credit card giant American Express got a big high court win today when justices threw out a government lawsuit that accused AMEX of thwarting competition by prohibiting merchants from steering customers to cards with lower fees. The justices split 5-4 and ruled that the U.S. government and 11 states failed to prove that the rules from AMEX harmed cardholders as well as merchants.
AFTER ANTHONY
|Dylan Matthews with Vox wonders what America would look like after JUSTICE ANTHONY KENNEDY leaves the Supreme Court. Matthews considers the implications of his departure with PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP in office on issues including abortion, gay rights and more. “An America after Anthony Kennedy looks significantly different from America before. The movement against mass incarceration could run into unprecedented resistance from the Court, and the anti-abortion movement could notch its greatest victories in a half-century.”
SNAPS FOR SONIA
|Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern is calling JUSTICE SONIA SOTOMAYOR a Fourth Amendment visionary for the role she played in the recent Carpenter ruling. “Six years ago, in just six pages, Sotomayor laid out a potent theory of the Fourth Amendment. On Friday, her prophetic vision of modern privacy became the law of the land.” Read how Justice Sotomayor, and by extension the Supreme Court, vindicated her “prescient theory of digital privacy.”
AIN'T OVER TIL IT'S OVER
|That’s not all folks. We’re still waiting to hear from the justices on not one, not two, but six significant cases before closing out the end of the term. We can expect those rulings tomorrow morning, bright and early. Until then, read CNN’s Ariane de Vogue preview those cases and what you should be watching for.