Tag Archives: Supreme Court

SCOTUS To Hear Case About Trump’s “Small” Penis

NBC News reports: A crude joke that Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., used to mock what he said was then-2016 presidential candidate Donald Trump’s “small hands” will be the centerpiece of a Supreme Court ruling on whether a California lawyer can trademark the phrase “Trump too small.” The court on Monday agreed to consider whether Steve Elster could register the trademark …

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SCOTUS Curbs EPA’s Power To Conserve Wetlands

CBS News reports: The Supreme Court on Thursday curtailed the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to regulate certain wetlands that qualify as “waters of the United States” under the Clean Water Act, curbing what has long been seen as a key tool to protect waterways from pollution. The high court ruled against the agency in a long-running dispute with Idaho landowners …

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Roberts Signals Ethics Reforms For Supreme Court

USA Today reports: Chief Justice John Roberts told an audience he is committed to ensuring the “highest standards of conduct” at the Supreme Court as pressure has mounted from congressional Democrats for changes in the wake of a series of scandals involving Justice Clarence Thomas. Without offering specifics or addressing the recent controversies directly, Roberts framed the ethics debate as …

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Clarence Thomas’ Sugar Daddy Refuses Questions By Senate: You Don’t Have Authority To Investigate Me

Bloomberg News reports: Harlan Crow, the Texas billionaire and GOP megadonor with close ties to Clarence Thomas, refused to answer questions from a Senate committee about his years of gifts to the Supreme Court justice. Crow’s lawyers in a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee argued that Congress does not have “the authority to investigate Mr. Crow’s personal friendship” with …

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DeSantis Unveils Plan To Skew SCOTUS Further Right

The Washington Post reports: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis previewed more of his 2024 pitch Monday night with a new emphasis on the next president’s ability to push the Supreme Court further to the right, calling for new justices in the mold of Clarence Thomas and “improvements” to others such as Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., a Republican appointee who …

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SCOTUS Upholds Liability Shield For Social Media Firms

Bloomberg News reports: The US Supreme Court left in place a broad liability shield for social media companies for content posted by users, insulating Twitter Inc., Facebook Inc. and Google LLC from claims that they provided assistance to Islamic State terrorists. Acting in a case involving Google, the court said it wouldn’t rule on efforts to limit the immunity internet …

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SCOTUS Rejects Challenge To IL Assault Weapons Ban

NBC News reports: The Supreme Court on Wednesday declined for now to block a new law in Illinois that bans assault-style weapons such as the AR-15 semiautomatic rifle, which has been used in multiple mass shootings. The decision in a brief unsigned order means the Illinois law enacted in the wake of a July 4 shooting in the city of …

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Supreme Court To Hear Case On Trump’s Hotel Records

Politico reports: The Supreme Court has agreed to take up a case that could empower members of the House and Senate minority to compel the Executive Branch to cough up information to congressional investigators. The justices agreed Monday to hear the case, which began with a Democrat-led effort in 2017 to obtain records related to former President Donald Trump’s lease …

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Study: Abortion-Related Violence Soars Post-Roe Ruling

Axios reports: The Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade was followed by a “sharp increase” in violence directed against abortion providers and patients, according to a new report from the National Abortion Federation. The report found that states that protect abortion access saw a “disproportionate” increase, including a ninefold increase in reported cases of stalking, a doubling of …

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Thomas’s Sugar Daddy Asked For Full List Of Gifts

The Washington Post reports: The Senate Judiciary Committee in a letter Monday asked billionaire Harlan Crow to provide a full accounting of the free travel and other gifts he has made to Supreme Court Judge Clarence Thomas or any other justice, marking an escalation of the powerful committee’s efforts to convince the Supreme Court to adopt stricter ethical standards for …

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Sen. Mike Lee: Criticism Of Clarence Thomas Is Racist

“This is absolutely dreadful. This is an attack on Justice Thomas, a good man who has risen from poverty in the Jim Crow south to a position as one of the most respected jurists in our nation’s history. “They don’t like that. They don’t like the fact he has the audacity to be a conservative as a black man. This …

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Dick Durbin: Thomas’s “Tangled Web Just Gets Worse”

The Hill reports: Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) on Sunday said the “tangled web” around Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who is facing criticism over his financial disclosures, “just gets worse.” “This tangled web around Justice Clarence Thomas just gets worse and worse by the day. I don’t know what’s going to come up next. I thought I’d heard it all, …

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Pence Defends “Man Of Integrity” Clarence Thomas

Fox News reports: Former Vice President Mike Pence defended Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas from what he called malicious attacks against the conservative Black jurist. “Ever since his nomination to the Supreme Court in 1991 Justice Thomas has been maliciously attacked by the Left, including by then Sen. Joe Biden,” Pence said in a tweet. “The attacks on his character …

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Judicial Activist Made Secret Payments To QAnon Ginni

The Washington Post reports: Conservative judicial activist Leonard Leo arranged for the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to be paid tens of thousands of dollars for consulting work just over a decade ago, specifying that her name be left off billing paperwork, according to documents reviewed by The Washington Post. In January 2012, Leo instructed the GOP pollster …

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Billionaire Secretly Paid Tuition For Thomas’s “Son”

ProPublica reports: In 2008, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas decided to send his teenage grandnephew to Hidden Lake Academy, a private boarding school in the foothills of northern Georgia. The boy, Mark Martin, was far from home. For the previous decade, he had lived with the justice and his wife in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. Thomas had taken legal …

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GOP Senators Back Call For SCOTUS Ethics Oversight

Politico reports: Partisan cannon fire dominated Senate Democrats’ high-profile hearing Tuesday on Supreme Court ethics, but behind the bluster, some Republicans acknowledged the high court needed to address a spate of controversies about justices’ conduct. “What I would urge the court to do is take this moment to instill more public confidence,” said South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, top Republican …

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Supreme Court To Hear Challenge To Federal Agencies

The Washington Post reports: The Supreme Court on Monday said it would take up a case that could do away with a decades-old precedent that tells judges to defer to federal agencies when interpreting ambiguous federal laws, a deference long targeted by conservatives concerned about the power of the administrative state. As the Supreme Court has become more conservative, the …

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Alito Has “Pretty Good Idea” Who Leaked Roe Draft

The Washington Examiner reports: Just days before the anniversary of a leak that changed the scope of trust in the nation’s highest court, Justice Samuel Alito says he has a “good idea” of who leaked the draft signaling the end of Roe v. Wade. Alito says the Supreme Court marshal tasked with investigating the leak “did a good job with …

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Roberts Refuses To Testify About Supreme Court Ethics

NBC News reports: Chief Justice John Roberts on Tuesday declined an invitation from a high-ranking Democratic senator to testify at a congressional hearing on ethics rules for members of the Supreme Court. In a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Roberts suggested that his participation could pose a threat to judicial independence. “Testimony before the Senate Judiciary …

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Gorsuch Sold Property To Head Of Major Law Firm

Politico reports: For nearly two years beginning in 2015, Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch sought a buyer for a 40-acre tract of property he co-owned in rural Granby, Colorado. Nine days after he was confirmed by the Senate for a lifetime appointment on the Supreme Court, the then-circuit court judge got one: The chief executive of Greenberg Traurig, one of …

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