Supreme Court
June 11, 2026 — John Hinderaker
There are a great many things wrong with our election systems, but one of them may be addressed in a case that awaits decision in the Supreme Court. The case is Watson v. Republican National Committee, and the issue is whether the State of Mississippi’s statute allowing ballots that arrive after Election Day to be counted violates federal law. Article 1, Section 4 of the Constitution says: The Times, Places
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May 18, 2026 — John Hinderaker
The Trump administration is taking the position that federal law does not just permit the government to detain illegal immigrants, it requires such detention. This position has inspired outrage on the left, and circuits that have addressed the issue have split. So it is on to the Supreme Court. The question is a tricky one, involving interpretation of a law that is not particularly well drafted. That is probably due,
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May 15, 2026 — Bill Glahn
No surprise here. From The Hill newspaper, Supreme Court declines to restore Virginia Democrats’ congressional map. Restore? At no point was the Democrats’ map the actual map. The farcical vote was never certified. But in no event was the U.S. Supreme Court going to intervene in the state supreme court’s interpretation of their own state’s constitution. If you dig into the reasoning in the VA court’s decision, it’s clear that
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May 5, 2026 — John Hinderaker
Justice Sam Alito has emerged as a spokesman for the conservative (or, at least, moderate) majority on the Supreme Court, while Justice Ketanji Jackson seems to be auditioning for a role on MSNBC as a left-wing pundit. We wrote here about the Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais, where the Court held, correctly, that the Voting Rights Act cannot be interpreted to require racial gerrymandering. That decision was handed down
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May 4, 2026 — John Hinderaker
Justice Sam Alito has rightly become a hero to conservatives. He has built a distinguished record, implementing a philosophy that some have called “practical originalism.” Mollie Hemingway has written an admiring biography of Alito, which you can buy on Amazon. Mollie’s book, however, is not just a biography of Alito. It also chronicles the controversies and some of the major cases of recent years. Yesterday, Mollie recorded an hour-long Rationally
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April 29, 2026 — John Hinderaker
Today the Supreme Court decided an important case on the Voting Rights Act, Louisiana v. Callais. The decision holds that Louisiana’s new map of congressional districts is an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. The decision was 6-3, so you know it has political consequences. I have never liked the Voting Rights Act. It may have addressed issues that were still live when it passed in 1965, but for almost all of its
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April 26, 2026 — John Hinderaker
I have heard about the Supreme Court’s “shadow docket” for some time, but never knew what it meant. The phrase is in the news because Justice Jackson has been criticizing its use. So, what exactly is the shadow docket, and is its use a good thing or a bad thing? On the Rationally Based podcast, law professor Ilan Wurman and co-host Kathryn Johnson explain, in these two back to back
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April 19, 2026 — John Hinderaker
As the Supreme Court deliberates on the case that will determine the law regarding birthright citizenship, it should keep these numbers in mind: Nearly 10% of US births in 2023 came from illegal immigrant mothers, according to newly published research. Pew Research Center revealed that 320,000 of the 3.6 million babies born in the US that year were anchor babies who would not qualify for birthright citizenship if President Trump’s
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April 1, 2026 — John Hinderaker
This morning, the Supreme Court held oral argument in Trump v. Barbara, the case that will determine whether children of illegal immigrants will be granted American citizenship under the 14th Amendment. For everything you might want to know about the argument and the reactions of the justices, check out this special edition of the rationally BASED podcast, hosted by Ilan Wurman, the leading academic expert on the subject. Along with
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March 31, 2026 — Scott Johnson
As John notes in the adjacent post, the Supreme Court ruled 8-1 today in Chiles v. Salazar that Colorado’s law banning “conversion therapy” was unconstitutional under the First Amendment. Only Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented. Justice Jackson opined that the Court’s decision “opens a dangerous can of worms.” In addition to thinking unclearly, Justice Jackson apparently can’t write well either. She inclines to cliché and redundancy. Or she thinks in
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March 31, 2026 — John Hinderaker
This morning the Supreme Court decided the case of Chiles v. Salazar. Chiles is a therapist in Colorado who challenged that state’s anti-conversion therapy law on the ground that it infringed her freedom of speech under the First Amendment. The Supreme Court accepted certiorari to resolve a conflict among the circuits relating to such conversion therapy bans, which have been adopted in many states, and ruled 8-1 that Colorado’s law
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March 28, 2026 — John Hinderaker
One of the most important contemporary legal issues is the application of birthright citizenship to the children of illegal aliens. Liberals argue that the 14th Amendment makes anyone born in the territory of the U.S. an American citizen, with no exceptions. Except that there are, and always have been, exceptions. And the Supreme Court has never held that the 14th Amendment’s grant of citizenship applies to children of people who
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March 19, 2026 — Scott Johnson
Chuck Cooper is one of Washington’s most prominent conservative attorneys. A former law clerk to Chief Justice Rehnquist, he went on to serve as Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel in the Reagan Justice Department. He is now a principal in private practice at his own Washington firm. Last week Cooper testified at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on birthright citizenship under the Fourteenth Amendment. The video
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March 5, 2026 — Scott Johnson
Last month I wrote about Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison’s nonfeasance and lying in the Feeding Our Future case in connection with the last congressional circus featuring Ellison. I called the circus “Another wasted opportunity.” The thought continues to apply. In “Keith Ellison exposed,” Bill Glahn writes about Ellison’s civil cases resulting in the dissolution of a few of the nonprofits that featured prominently in the Feeding Our Future scandal.
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January 13, 2026 — John Hinderaker
Today the Supreme Court heard arguments in two cases that raise the question whether a state can bar boys from participating in girls’ sports. The answer is obvious: it can, and in fact all states did so, until about 15 minutes ago. Nevertheless, the Court is in a position of having to correct error, since in both of those cases, the Court of Appeals held that states must permit boys
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December 23, 2025 — John Hinderaker
Today the Supreme Court denied the Trump administration’s petition for a stay on a lower court order that enjoined the administration from using National Guard troops to quell violence in Chicago that was directed against federal law enforcement personnel. The Court’s opinion is being widely misrepresented. For an accurate account, keep reading. This is one of those cases where it is not easy for an outsider to understand why the
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December 10, 2025 — John Hinderaker
In yesterday’s edition of the American Experiment Podcast, Kathryn and Grace reviewed the latest developments in the Minnesota state government scandals that have become world-infamous. They also touched on the public bathroom crisis in Minneapolis, as that city continues to spiral downward. In the second half of the podcast, starting at 25:21, they interviewed University of Minnesota law professor Ilan Wurman, the leading authority on birthright citizenship under the Fourteenth
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