Ongoing discussion of SCOTUS cases (3 Viewers)

[MT15]

With the increased scrutiny due to recent revelations in the press I thought maybe we can use a SCOTUS thread. We can discuss the impending Senate investigation and the legislation proposed today by Murkowski and King in the Senate that will formalize ethical guidelines.

We can also use this thread to highlight cases that possibly don’t deserve their own thread, like the following.

I saw this case today, and I cannot believe the US Government is allowed to do this. Unreasonable search and seizure? The examples he gives in the rest of the thread are just sickening:

 

[MT15]

This is what Kavanaugh is encouraging. Outright pay to play, saying it’s okay if it’s on the honor system after the fact. What will Oman and other ME countries who are bankrolling this expect from a President who benefitted greatly from this project? Or rather, what have they already received? Was it copies of classified documents? The coverup of a state murder of a journalist who was critical of a regime?

 

[DaveXA]

Lots of stuff coming out regarding SCOTUS decisions. I'm particularly interested in the decision regarding the Perdue litigation where they came to an agreement that in exchange for a milti billion dollar payout, they would be immune to future lawsuits and the Court basically said nope. Can't make that deal. The majority vs minority opinion breakdown was pretty interesting. The justices were not at all aligned like they often do.

 

[GrandAdmiral]

Lots of stuff coming out regarding SCOTUS decisions. I'm particularly interested in the decision regarding the Perdue litigation where they came to an agreement that in exchange for a milti billion dollar payout, they would be immune to future lawsuits and the Court basically said nope. Can't make that deal. The majority vs minority opinion breakdown was pretty interesting. The justices were not at all aligned like they often do.

Kavanaugh didn't hold back either in his disagreement.

 

[DaveXA]

Kavanaugh didn't hold back either in his disagreement.

Yeah, I think there is some merit to his position, but you end up hurting them even more by allowing the agreement to stand and essentially make Perdue immune to future litigation. That would be incredibly dangerous. To the company, immunity to future suits is worth the billions paid now.

I think the short term harm from nullifying the agreement is outweighed by the long term, potentially catastrophic situation of people being unable to be made whole in a future case.

And it also would set bad precedent in other litigation and agreements. Not having the tool of avoiding future litigation will make settlements less likely, but I think that creating that sort of shield would lead to some really undesirable outcomes with that kind of lack of accountability.

 

[LA - L.A.]

Yeah, I think there is some merit to his position, but you end up hurting them even more by allowing the agreement to stand and essentially make Perdue immune to future litigation. That would be incredibly dangerous. To the company, immunity to future suits is worth the billions paid now.

I think the short term harm from nullifying the agreement is outweighed by the long term, potentially catastrophic situation of people being unable to be made whole in a future case.

And it also would set bad precedent in other litigation and agreements. Not having the tool of avoiding future litigation will make settlements less likely, but I think that creating that sort of shield would lead to some really undesirable outcomes with that kind of lack of accountability.

This is along the same lines as what I think. Corporations can't be criminally charged and it's very rare that individual's who make or implement decisions made by corporations are criminally charged.

That leaves civil actions as the only way to have any accountability for things done under the legal cover of a corporation.

If the Supreme Court had set the precedent that Kavanaugh wanted them to set, then a corporation could escape accountability for their bad actions by secretly filing a class action against themselves and then get the attorneys covertly working for them to concede a settlement term that no one else could sue them in the future.

We cannot allow any settlement to give total future immunity to anyone or any corporation. There isn't an accountability or liability loophole that corporations haven't taken advantage of and this would be the ultimate loophole which they would most certainly take advantage of. Kavanaugh's to smart, educated and experienced not to know that and I think that's the reason why he's so upset it didn't go the way he wanted.

He is one of many people that are trying to quickly turn our society and government into a Corpo-Christo-Fascist state. They've lost all patience in playing the long game. They are going all in right now in this election cycle.

 

[Optimus Prime]

The US supreme court has overturned one of its own most important precedents, the Chevron doctrine, that for the past 40 years has guided the work of federal government in critical areas of public life, from food and drug safety to environmental protection.

In a ruling that the Biden administration has warned could have a “convulsive” impact on the functioning of government, the court’s hardline conservative majority delivered a major blow to the regulatory powers of federal agencies. Voting as a block, the six rightwing justices who wield the supermajority threw out the supreme court’s own 1984 opinion in Chevron USA Inc v Natural Resources Defense Council, which has required the courts to defer to the knowledge of government experts in their reasonable interpretation of ambiguous laws.

Writing the opinion, chief justice John Roberts bluntly stated that the Chevron precedent “is overruled”. He lambasted the legal theory laid out in the ruling, claiming it “gravely erred” and calling it was “misguided” and “unworkable” despite the fact that it has steered the functions of the federal government for four decades.

Roberts not only eradicated the Chevron doctrine, he turned it on its head. Under his ruling, the relationship between courts and federal agencies is reversed: in the modern era, the courts have shown deference to the expertise of agencies, but from now on the courts alone will decide.

“The constitution assigns to the federal judiciary the responsibility and power to adjudicate cases and controversies,” Roberts wrote. “Agencies have no special competence in resolving statutory ambiguities. Courts do.”

In recent years, the Chevron doctrine has become a central target of rightwing groups that blame it for what they see as a proliferation of government regulations executed by unelected bureaucrats in the so-called “deep state”. A key group behind the supreme court challenge, the New Civil Liberties Alliance, was founded with seed money from the oil billionaire Charles Koch.…..

US supreme court strikes down 40-year precedent, reducing power of federal agencies

Court overturns Chevron doctrine, which had become a central target of rightwing groups

www.theguardian.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

The US supreme court has ruled that cities in the US west can criminalize unhoused people sleeping outside even when they lack access to shelter.

The ruling is a victory for Grants Pass, Oregon, which in 2019 passed ordinances prohibiting sleeping and camping in its public parks and on its streets, banning unhoused people from “using a blanket, pillow, or cardboard box for protection from the elements”. The city’s policies call for $295 fines and criminal prosecution punishable by up to 30 days in jail after multiple offenses.

The court ruled 6-3 that it is not “cruel and unusual punishment” under the eighth amendment to ban unhoused people from camping outside when they have nowhere else to go. The decision stands to broadly affect how American cities approach homelessness and could lead to more jurisdictions passing laws to ticket, fine and jail people for living outside, marking a significant erosion of unhoused people’s rights.

Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote: “Homelessness is complex. Its causes are many. So may be the public policy responses required to address it … A handful of federal judges cannot begin to ‘match’ the collective wisdom the American people possess in deciding ‘how best to handle’ a pressing social question like homelessness.”

In a blistering dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote: “Sleep is a biological necessity, not a crime. For some people, sleeping outside is their only option. The City of Grants Pass jails and fines those people for sleeping anywhere in public at any time, including in their cars, if they use as little as a blanket to keep warm or a rolled-up shirt as a pillow. For people with no access to shelter, that punishes them for being homeless. That is unconscionable and unconstitutional. Punishing people for their status is ‘cruel and unusual’.”……

US supreme court rules unhoused people sleeping outside can be fined and jailed

Ruling strays from earlier decision, which said a ban without providing shelter was ‘cruel and unusual punishment’

www.theguardian.com

 

[DaveXA]

The US supreme court has overturned one of its own most important precedents, the Chevron doctrine, that for the past 40 years has guided the work of federal government in critical areas of public life, from food and drug safety to environmental protection.

In a ruling that the Biden administration has warned could have a “convulsive” impact on the functioning of government, the court’s hardline conservative majority delivered a major blow to the regulatory powers of federal agencies. Voting as a block, the six rightwing justices who wield the supermajority threw out the supreme court’s own 1984 opinion in Chevron USA Inc v Natural Resources Defense Council, which has required the courts to defer to the knowledge of government experts in their reasonable interpretation of ambiguous laws.

Writing the opinion, chief justice John Roberts bluntly stated that the Chevron precedent “is overruled”. He lambasted the legal theory laid out in the ruling, claiming it “gravely erred” and calling it was “misguided” and “unworkable” despite the fact that it has steered the functions of the federal government for four decades.

Roberts not only eradicated the Chevron doctrine, he turned it on its head. Under his ruling, the relationship between courts and federal agencies is reversed: in the modern era, the courts have shown deference to the expertise of agencies, but from now on the courts alone will decide.

“The constitution assigns to the federal judiciary the responsibility and power to adjudicate cases and controversies,” Roberts wrote. “Agencies have no special competence in resolving statutory ambiguities. Courts do.”

In recent years, the Chevron doctrine has become a central target of rightwing groups that blame it for what they see as a proliferation of government regulations executed by unelected bureaucrats in the so-called “deep state”. A key group behind the supreme court challenge, the New Civil Liberties Alliance, was founded with seed money from the oil billionaire Charles Koch.…..

US supreme court strikes down 40-year precedent, reducing power of federal agencies

Court overturns Chevron doctrine, which had become a central target of rightwing groups

www.theguardian.com

This is gonna open the floodgates of litigation, and the courts, already heavily burdened by litigation is going to face much higher case loads because the courts gotta be the ones making the decisions. This is a direct result of Congress dropping the ball.

 

[GrandAdmiral]

This court is such a joke.

 

[Sendai]

Chevron doctrine goes down because of the arrogance

We’re going to put an inspector on your boat and you have to pay the inspector.

A bridge too far.

Congress will actually have to learn to write proper legislation.

 

[LA - L.A.]

This is a direct result of Congress dropping the ball.

How so?

 

[LA - L.A.]

Congress will actually have to learn to write proper legislation.

Yeah, no, that's not it at all. You're being grossly misinformed or even worse.

The level of logistical, technical and scientific details involved in the regulation of most industries makes it impossible for anyone to write specific legislation that covers every possible scenario and closes every possible loophole.

That's why the only practical way is to draft legislation that focuses on the desired outcome more than on the specifics of how to get to that outcome. Then the agencies carry out the mission of accomplishing those tasks on a case by case basis. That's the only way to keep our environment and the products we use safe. The corpo-christo-fascists on the Supreme Court just destroyed those protections and they did it so corporations can make even more billions by just dumping their pollution and dangerous products on all of us.

The Chevron doctrine went down because of the hubris, greed and corruption of a bunch of billionaires. One of those billionaires that have been "gifting" a lavish lifestyle to Thomas benefits tremendously from this decision. Did Thomas recuse himself? No, he did not. Is the press raising Thomas's conflict of interest regarding this case and ruling? No, they are not.

The corpo-christo-fascists are about to go as HAM on us as we let them.

If you think Biden is too old or feeble to vote for him, then get back to me when:

You and your loved ones are dying of cancer from the air you breath, the water you drink and/or the food you eat, and you can't do anything about it because a judge told you to pound sand.​

​

Your loved one dies in a car, plane and/or train crash because of intentionally unsafely made parts and assembly, and you can't do anything about it because a judge told you to pound sand.​

​

And that's just the tip, of the tip, of the tip, of the tip of the crapberg that's going to crush us if Trump wins the election.

 

[Optimus Prime]

Elena Kagan issued a devastating dissent to the decision of her hard-right fellow supreme court justices to overturn the Chevron doctrine that has been a cornerstone of federal regulation for 40 years, accusing the majority of turning itself into “the country’s administrative czar”.

Kagan was joined by her two fellow liberal-leaning justices, Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, in delivering a withering criticism of the actions of the ultra-right supermajority that was created by Donald Trump.

Such caustic missives have become commonplace from the three outnumbered liberals, with each carefully crafted dissent sounding more incensed and despairing than the last.

In a speech at Harvard last month, Sotomayor revealedthat after some of the supreme court’s recent decisions she has gone back to her office, closed the door and cried.

“There have been those days, and there are likely to be more,” she said.

Kagan’s dissent in Loper Bright Enterprises v Raimondo on Friday was the literary equivalent of crying over 33 pages. But she was also searingly angry.

She said that in one fell swoop, the rightwing majority had snatched the ability to make complex decisions over regulatory matters away from federal agencies and awarded the power to themselves……..

Elena Kagan’s scathing Chevron dissent highlights US supreme court’s disregard for precedent

The court is turning into ‘an administrative czar’, says liberal justice after 40-year-old doctrine is overturned

www.theguardian.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

Under Chief Justice John Roberts, the supreme court has been supremely pro-corporate – one study even called the Roberts court “the most pro-business court in history”.

Not only have many justices been groomed and vetted by the business-backed Federalist Society, but Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito have taken lavish favors from billionaire corporate titans. Thomas has even spoken at two Koch network fundraising “donor summits”, gatherings of rightwing, ultra-wealthy business barons.

While the court is decidedly pro-corporate, most Americans probably don’t know just how anti-worker and anti-union it really is. The justices have often shown a stunning callousness toward workers, and that means a callousness toward average Americans.

One of the most egregious examples was a 2014 ruling – with an opinion written by Thomas – that held that Amazon, which holds workers up to 25 minutes after the ends of their shifts waiting to be screened to ensure they didn’t steal anything, doesn’t have to pay them for that time.

Or take this month’s decision in which the court ruled in favor of Starbucks by making it harder for the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to win rapid reinstatement of workers who are illegally fired for supporting a union.

In that case, Starbucks fired five of the six baristas who were heading an effort to unionize a Memphis Starbucks. After NLRB officials found that the workers had been fired unlawfully for backing a union, a federal judge agreed to the NLRB’s request to issue an injunction to quickly reinstate them.

Many labor relations experts say it’s important for the NLRB to be able to win quick reinstatement after companies fire workers who lead unionization drives, as Starbucks has repeatedly done, because those firings often terrify co-workers and cause union drives to collapse…….

A 2022 study found that of the 57 justices who have sat on the court over the past century, the six justices with the most pro-business voting records are the six members of today’s 6-3, rightwing super-majority, all appointed by Republican presidents: Thomas, Alito, Roberts, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett.

The study found that Donald Trump’s three appointees – Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett – were the three most pro-business justices of the 57 evaluated.

(That study also found that the court’s Democratic appointees at the time – Kagan, Sotomayor and Stephen Breyer – were among the top 20 pro-business justices.)…….

Most Americans have no idea how anti-worker the US supreme court has become | Steven Greenhouse

The court’s current justices are some of the most hostile to labor rights in modern US history

www.theguardian.com

 

[zztop]

What it means for the Supreme Court to block enforcement of the EPA's 'good neighbor' pollution rule

The Environmental Protection Agency won't be able to enforce a key rule limiting air pollution in nearly a dozen states while separate legal challenges proceed around the country.

apnews.com

 

[SaintForLife]

The Chevron ruling is a huge blow to the federal bureaucracy and the unelected bureaucrats that should have never been allowed to interpret and enforce their own rules.

It goes back to how it should be. Congress has to write the laws and they shouldn't have ceded their power to the Executive branch.




Basically, the really short version of what happened was this -- a family fishing business sued because they were paying $700 a day to have federal regulators oversee their business. The statute governing the National Marine Fisheries Service says nothing about making their business pay for the cost of their own regulation, and it was just decided along the way that businesses would have to foot the bill for the NMFS' own enforcement.

Because of Chevron, which grants overly broad powers to bureaucrats to interpret the law, the idea that federal agencies could essentially make their own regs and make people pay if they didn't have the budget to enforce them was tolerated.

That's insane. Imagine if your local cops decided they needed a bigger budget -- gotta keep the town safe! -- and started stopping your car at checkpoints all over town to make you pay up. And the mayor and no one else in town could stop them from doing this because only the cops were allowed to determine what was legal.

That's essentially what the feds were doing here under Chevron. It was outrageous, and the fisheries service's abuse of power was hardly an isolated instance of federal overreach defended by Chevron.

It was corrupt and needed to end.

 

[bird]

The Chevron ruling is a huge blow to the federal bureaucracy and the unelected bureaucrats that should have never been allowed to interpret and enforce their own rules.

It goes back to how it should be. Congress has to write the laws and they shouldn't have ceded their power to the Executive branch.




Basically, the really short version of what happened was this -- a family fishing business sued because they were paying $700 a day to have federal regulators oversee their business. The statute governing the National Marine Fisheries Service says nothing about making their business pay for the cost of their own regulation, and it was just decided along the way that businesses would have to foot the bill for the NMFS' own enforcement.

Because of Chevron, which grants overly broad powers to bureaucrats to interpret the law, the idea that federal agencies could essentially make their own regs and make people pay if they didn't have the budget to enforce them was tolerated.

That's insane. Imagine if your local cops decided they needed a bigger budget -- gotta keep the town safe! -- and started stopping your car at checkpoints all over town to make you pay up. And the mayor and no one else in town could stop them from doing this because only the cops were allowed to determine what was legal.

That's essentially what the feds were doing here under Chevron. It was outrageous, and the fisheries service's abuse of power was hardly an isolated instance of federal overreach defended by Chevron.

It was corrupt and needed to end.

Wrong, but unsurprising. Do you have any idea what is involved in refining crude? Manufacturing plastics? Processing food, processing rare earth minerals?

I tell you what. Go move next door to a petrochemical plant in Cancer Alley.

 

[LA - L.A.]

Wrong, but unsurprising. Do you have any idea what is involved in refining crude? Manufacturing plastics? Processing food, processing rare earth minerals?

I tell you what. Go move next door to a petrochemical plant in Cancer Alley.

It doesn't matter where anyone lives in the country, because when dirty coal burning starts again it's going to be, "you get some mercury poisoning, and you get some mercury poisoning, and you get some mercury poisoning, everyone gets some mercury poisoning."

And that's just one of the toxins that will be everywhere.

You'd think the people who hate people who are trans would be upset about this ruling. People being born trans is a biologically natural phenomenon, but there has been a noticeable spike in the percentages of people who are naturally born trans. There is a strong correlation between the spike in endocrine disrupting pollutants in the environment and the spike in the percentage of people naturally born trans.

That's just the top two molecules at the very top of the toxinberg that's going to make us the sickest population on the planet with the shortest average lifespan on the planet. Yay for American exceptionalism.