Abortion, Trump and censorship top the Supreme Court docket in the new year

• The Supreme Court will hear issues related to former President Donald Trump, the Biden administration's communication with social media companies to censor online speech and the abortion pill before the 2024 election.
• Abortion is back at the Supreme Court just two years after it issued a landmark decision overturning Roe v. Wade, with two cases on the matter.
• The justices will hear oral arguments on Trump's eligibility for office under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment in February.

Issues related to the chemical abortion pill, former President Donald Trump and the Biden administration's push for online censorship top Supreme Court dockets in the New Year.

Although only one decision has been released so far this term, the judges have already heard arguments about the guns restrictions for domestic violence restraining order subjects, government officials blocking constituents on social media and the bankruptcy of Purdue Pharma settlement. Other pending cases will require the Supreme Court to address multiple important issues heading into the 2024 election.

the abortion

Just two years after overturning Roe v. Wade in June 2022, the judges agreed to hear another major abortion case challenging the US Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) approval of the chemical abortion pill mifepristone.

Matthew Kacsmaryk, US District Court Judge governed in April that the FDA must reverse its approval of the pill. The Fifth Circuit later refused to pull the pill off the market entirely, however maintained the part of the decision that overturned FDA rules issued in 2016 and 2021 that had expanded access, allowing the pill to be sent by mail and used later in pregnancy.

However, due to an emergency order issued by the Supreme Court in April, both decisions are on hold until the Supreme Court rules on the case.

The Supreme Court too agreed Friday to hear a second major case considering whether federal law requires emergency room doctors to perform abortions in violation of Idaho regulations. law, which prohibits abortion unless the mother's life is in danger. The Biden administration argues what the Emergency Medical and Labor Treatment Actwhich instructs doctors not to turn away patients who need “emergency stabilization care,” bypasses Idaho's ban and requires doctors to perform emergency abortions.

On Friday, the Court agreed to allow Idaho's ban to remain in place until it could hear the case in April.

Censorship

The Supreme Court will to weigh on the Biden administration's coordination with social media companies to suppress online speech in Murthy v. Missouri. District Court Judge Terry A. Doughty called the government's censorship efforts “Orwellian” in his July 4 ruling. decision found that the Biden administration likely violated the First Amendment, noting that the Republican attorneys general of Louisiana and Missouri “produced evidence of a massive effort by the defendants, from the White House to federal agencies, to suppress speech based on its content.”

The Supreme Court stayed the ruling in October pending consideration of the appeal. Justice Samuel Alito dissidentalong with Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch, writing the decision could be interpreted, meanwhile, as “giving the government the green light to use heavy-handed tactics to distort the presentation of opinions on the medium that increasingly dominates the dissemination of news”.

choice civil servants in eight states they presented a brief urging the Supreme Court to reject the appeals court's ruling, expressing dismay that communications made with platforms during the 2020 and 2022 election season have “essentially ended” before “a critical and highly contested 2024 election season “.

The Supreme Court will also recognize a box considering former New York Department of Financial Services Superintendent Maria Vullo lobbying banks and insurance companies not to do business with the National Rifle Association. Aaron Terr, Director of Public Advocacy at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), he said the Daily Caller News Foundation in November there are “clear parallels” between the cases.

“Each case involves government officials overstepping constitutional bounds by coercing private companies to censor or disassociate themselves from speakers who express views that those officials don't like,” he said.

trump

As the 2024 election approaches, issues surrounding former President Donald Trump are making their way onto the court docket.

The Supreme Court will to listen oral arguments on Feb. 8 to consider Trump's appeal of the Colorado Supreme Court's decision that found him ineligible to appear on the state's primary ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. The justices' decision will clarify whether other states can take similar actions to remove Trump from the ballot, as Democratic Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows did in a Dec. 28 event. decision finding Trump ineligible to run.

The judges too agreed to hear a case about the scope of a statute of obstruction used to indict hundreds of defendants from the Jan. 6, as well as Trump.

The statute, Section 1512(c)(2), threatens fines or up to 20 years in prison for anyone who “obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding.” It is related to two of the four counts in Jack Smith's impeachment against Trump for alleged election interference.

If the Supreme Court limits the scope, it could to shake increase the cases of January 6 and affect the case of the former president.

Special counsel Jack Smith already asked the justices in December to consider Trump's appeal of presidential immunity before the lower court had a chance to weigh in, a request they eventually granted. denied. Still, the issue will likely be back in court soon, as the D.C. Circuit is scheduled to hear oral arguments on the issue on Jan. 9 and issue a decision at some point.

Other cases to see

The Supreme Court will hear the arguments January 17 for a couple of cases that challenge “Chevron deference,” a legal doctrine that instructs courts to defer to executive agency interpretations of statutes when the language is ambiguous. critics to argue the doctrine allows federal agencies to adopt expansive interpretations of statutes that expand their power while circumventing judicial checks and balances.

In Februarythe Supreme Court will hear a case challenging a Trump-era federal ban stocksalong with a couple of cases that consider red state laws meant to prevent the view censorship in social networks.

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