The Supreme Court has a defining couple of weeks ahead of it, as the justices are set to hear oral arguments on President Trump’s firing powers, campaign finance and how courts determine whether an inmate’s IQ is too low for capital punishment.
The justices lead off Monday with arguments in a case that will test how much judges must defer to their brethren on the immigration courts in key determinations about a migrant’s ability to claim asylum.
Should the court side with the regular judges, it could put a dent in Mr. Trump’s mass deportation plans. But if the justices agree that the immigration courts have expertise that regular judges lack, it would remove a hurdle for the administration.
“The case is significant because the decision may well determine the number of people who are eligible for asylum and those who are not,” David L. Hudson Jr., a professor at the Belmont University College of Law, wrote for the American Bar Association’s argument preview.
On Tuesday, the court will hear arguments over New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin’s attempt to obtain donor lists from pro-life pregnancy centers. The case raises First Amendment questions, but for now the justices are to decide only whether the case should play out in federal or state courts.
Wednesday brings another First Amendment case, this one involving a prolific Christian proselytizer who complains that a Mississippi town ordinance restricting where people can gather to demonstrate during live events restricts his rights.
After the ordinance was passed in 2019, Gabriel Olivier was ticketed for returning to his usual spot outside the amphitheater, where he preached through a loudspeaker.
He pleaded guilty and later launched a lawsuit claiming the ordinance runs afoul of his constitutional rights. The justices have to decide whether he can challenge the ordinance prospectively.
The City of Brandon, Mississippi, says its ordinance was needed because Mr. Olivier and his group were so loud that police officers had difficulty hearing their radios. And it says Mr. Olivier’s challenge should have come to his past conviction, not to a potential future charge that may not ever materialize.
On Dec. 8 the justices will consider whether to overturn a 90-year-old precedent that prevented President Franklin D. Roosevelt from firing a member of the Federal Trade Commission over political differences.
Mr. Trump this year tried to repeat Roosevelt’s actions in firing FTC Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter.
A district court said Mr. Trump overstepped by firing her without cause. The court ruled that the 1930 precedent, known as the Humphrey’s Executor case, remains the law of the land.
The justices allowed Mr. Trump to enforce the firing while the case developed in lower courts, suggesting an interest in revisiting the 1935 precedent.
On Dec. 9 the justices will take up the latest test of campaign finance restrictions with a case challenging limits on political parties’ direct coordination with campaigns.
A day later, the justices will tackle a challenge brought by a death row inmate out of Alabama who claims he is too mentally challenged to be put to death. A ruling from the court would instruct lower courts how to determine a defendant’s alleged intellectual disability when weighing multiple IQ tests.
In Hamm v. Smith, the issue of cumulative IQ scores in assessing a so-called “Atkins claim” will be settled. In Atkins v. Virginia, the majority of the court ruled in 2022 that executing a person who is intellectually disabled ran afoul of the 8th Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. Intellectual disability is usually an IQ score of 70 or below.
After the Atkins ruling, Joseph Smith renewed challenges to his death sentence. He was convicted of capital murder for beating a man to death in 1997 with a hammer and a saw during a robbery in Alabama.
Lower courts have sided with Smith in his challenge to his death sentence, ruling that his IQ is too low. But the state says all of his IQ tests have been above 70.
December’s cases will be followed by a seismic term in January, where the justices are slated to hear a couple of cases testing state bans on transgender kids playing women’s sports in school, a concealed-carry gun case and another challenge to Mr. Trump’s firing powers.
That last case will decide whether the president had legal authority to oust Lisa Cook, a Biden appointee to the Federal Reserve Board of Governors.
Unlike the other high-profile firings, where Mr. Trump booted them because of political differences, in Ms. Cook’s case he asserted malfeasance which he said gave him the power to fire her for cause.
The Supreme Court, unlike the other firing cases, has allowed Ms. Cook to remain on the job pending the outcome of the case.
Josh Blackman, a professor at South Texas College of Law, said those January cases are what he’s waiting for.
“Those seem more significant,” he said.
