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Supreme Court

Supreme Court divided over disputed civil rights attorney’s fees

The justices on Tuesday were divided over a dispute regarding attorney’s fees for plaintiffs in civil rights cases. A federal appeals court in Richmond, Va., ruled that a group of drivers challenging a state motor vehicle law was entitled to reimbursement of their attorney’s fees because a federal district court had issued an order that temporarily barred the state from enforcing the law – and then the Virginia legislature repealed the law. During roughly 80 minutes of oral argument … Read the rest

Supreme Court

Justices divided on the constitutionality of the federal law that bans “encouraging” immigrants to remain unlawfully in the United States

Both oral advocates faced fairly cold receptions on Monday morning in United States v. Hansen when the Supreme Court heard argument on whether 8 U.S.C. § 1324(a)(1)(iv), the federal law that criminalizes “encouraging or inducing” an immigrant to come or remain in the United States unlawfully, violates the First Amendment’s guarantee of freedom of speech.

The argument also shed more light on the newer justices’ views on the freedom of speech. The newly reconfigured Court appears less strongly … Read the rest

Supreme Court

Divided court authorizes Alabama execution, but state is unable to carry it out before midnight deadline

The Supreme Court on Thursday night cleared the way for Alabama to carry out a lethal injection of an inmate who argued that he had the right to be executed by nitrogen hypoxia, a method that supporters say is more humane. In an unsigned order that divided the justices 5-4, the court lifted an order by a federal judge that would have required the state to use nitrogen hypoxia to execute Alan Eugene Miller. But the state called off … Read the rest

Supreme Court

Divided court declines to reinstate Biden’s immigration guidelines, sets case for argument this fall

The Supreme Court will again weigh the executive branch’s authority to set immigration policy as some red states claim that the Biden administration’s enforcement decisions are too lax. The justices on Thursday agreed to take up a challenge by Texas and Louisiana to a new federal policy that prioritizes certain groups of unauthorized immigrants for arrest and deportation. The justices will hear the case in late November without waiting for a federal appeals court to weigh in.

The justices … Read the rest