The Supreme Court has roughly a handful of opinions left to be handed down before the end of its term, which will now stretch into July.
They include history-making decisions such as former President Trump’s criminal immunity defense claims, the validity of a charge levied against more than 300 Jan. 6 defendants and the potential demise of a major administrative law known as the Chevron deference.
Technically, the court has eight argued cases remaining. But a few of those cases may be merged into a singular opinion, such as the case involving Chevron and a set of challenges to social media moderation in Florida and Texas, so the expectation is that six total decisions remain.
The court will release opinions on Friday morning and now on Monday morning, missing its traditional end-of-June deadline. The last day of the term has yet to be officially determined.
Here is the full list of cases still before the high court.
Trump immunity (Trump v. United States)
The justices let the first presidential debate pass by on Thursday night before handing down their highly anticipated decision on whether Trump has criminal immunity for official acts while in office.
Trump contends his defense would require the dismissal of charges in his three criminal cases that have yet to go to trial, and Trump’s Supreme Court appeal has tied up his federal Jan. 6 case for months.
“Without presidential immunity from criminal prosecution, there can be no presidency as we know it,” D. John Sauer, Trump’s lead attorney in the case, told the Supreme Court at oral arguments.
Michael Dreeben, who argued the case on behalf of special counsel Jack Smith, was spotted in the courtroom on Wednesday when the justices handed down opinions, but immunity has yet to be among those made public so far.
Jan. 6 obstruction charge (Fischer v. United States)
The Justice Department’s sweeping prosecution of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack is further under the microscope with rioter Joseph Fischer’s challenge to an obstruction law that criminalizes “corruptly” obstructing, impeding or interfering with an official government proceeding.
Prosecutors pointed to Congress’s certification of the 2020 presidential election results that day, which formalized President Biden’s win over Trump, as reason to use the charge against Fischer and more than 350 other rioters.
But Fischer contends that the DOJ overreached and improperly applied the law to rioters, pointing to its origin with the Enron accounting scandal, passed to deal with the destruction of documents.
The justices seemed wary of the law’s application during arguments in April, which could spell trouble for the government’s efforts to hold rioters to account and Trump’s federal election subversion case.
Chevron (Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo and Relentless, Inc. v. Department of Commerce)
Chevron deference may be on its death bed.
The justices are weighing whether to overrule the precedent, a bedrock of administrative law that has given federal agencies across the government wide authority to enact regulations.
At oral arguments, the conservative majority appeared poised to either limit Chevron’s reach or overrule it entirely, which would dramatically claw back the executive branch’s powers when Congress hasn’t spoken clearly about an issue.
“You say don’t overrule Chevron because it would be a shock to the system, but the reality of how this works is Chevron itself ushers in shocks to the system every four or eight years when a new administration comes in,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh told the Biden administration’s lawyer at oral arguments.
Florida, Texas social media cases (NetChoice v. Paxton and Moody v. NetChoice)
Two cases involving the rights of social media companies remain in a Supreme Court term riddled with big questions involving online speech.
Tech industry groups challenged laws in Florida and Texas that seek to bar social media platforms from banning users for their political views, even if platform policies were violated. They say the laws — passed in the wake of the 2020 election, when conservatives feared their views were being unfairly censored by major platforms — trample over private companies’ First Amendment right to decide which content to host.
Several justices expressed concern about the apparent overreach of the laws, pointing to non-traditional platforms like Gmail and the online marketplace Etsy that could face unintended consequences should the justices rule in favor of the states. Kavanaugh specifically raised that the First Amendment was designed to protect companies from government overreach – not the other way around.
Ticketing the homeless (City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson)
Americans without housing could face new restrictions if the Supreme Court rules in favor of an Oregon city cracking down on public sleeping.
The justices are weighing whether cities can ticket homeless people for camping in public if no alternative shelter is available to them after the city of Grants Pass, Oregon sought to implement a law that would fine campers $295 per night for sleeping in public parks.
A lower court ruled that the law amounts to cruel and unusual punishment, which the city claims prevents it from implementing “common sense” laws to combat public camping.
With rates of homelessness at record levels across the country, the justices’ ruling stands to dramatically alter the lives of Americans without a permanent place to live. During arguments, several justices acknowledged the complicated nature of the issue.
Statute of limitations (Corner Post v. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System)
Among the Supreme Court’s final remaining cases will resolve a split among the nations’ federal appeals courts as to when plaintiffs can challenge government regulations in court.
Some lower courts — and the Biden administration — believe the six-year statute of limitations clock begins ticking when a federal agency issues its regulation.
But Corner Post, a North Dakota truck stop, believes the timer doesn’t start until it is first adversely affected by the regulation, a theory that would open up regulations to additional lawsuits.
Corner Post opened its doors in 2018 and is attempting to challenge Federal Reserve’s regulations of maximum debit card “swipe fees,” which were issued seven years earlier.
