If it follows its typical schedule, the Supreme Court will release around 30 rulings over the next four weeks and bring its current term to a close by early July.
Among those rulings will be decisions on issues like presidential immunity, abortion access and gun rights, which will hold significant consequences for November’s election.
Although the Supreme Court often releases its most contentious decisions in the final week of the term, there’s no requirement forcing the justices to save their biggest rulings for last.
In other words, any of the remaining major cases could be resolved on any upcoming decision day. All that court watchers can do is sit back and wait.
Well, they can also refresh their memory of the cases awaiting resolution, and that’s where this guide comes in. Here are the major rulings to watch for this month.
Trump v. United States
- Key question: Can former President Donald Trump be prosecuted for allegedly working to overturn the 2020 presidential election?
- Lower court ruling: The lower courts rejected Trump’s claim that presidents enjoy broad immunity from criminal prosecution.
- Why it matters: In the short term, a ruling for Trump would derail Special Counsel Jack Smith’s case against him and potentially make it easier for the former president to be reelected this year. In the long term, the ruling could change the nature of the presidency, making future leaders feel either more invincible or more vulnerable.
- Takeaways from oral arguments: During oral arguments at the end of April, the justices seemed to reject the Trump camp’s vision of broad presidential immunity, but they also seemed worried that the lower courts had gone too far in the opposite direction, as the Deseret News previously reported. The most likely outcome may be that the Supreme Court will ask the lower courts to reconsider which of Trump’s decision should be classified as “official acts,” a move that would further delay the actual criminal trial.
Relentless v. Department of Commerce
- Consolidated with: Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo.
- Key question: Should the Chevron doctrine, which gives federal agencies broad authority to interpret and enforce the often nonspecific laws put in place by Congress, be overturned?
- Lower court ruling: The federal government won at the circuit court level in each of the now-consolidated cases. The judges upheld the Chevron doctrine, deferring to a federal agency’s interpretation of a law governing commercial fishing.
- Why it matters: Chevron deference has shaped the work of the federal government since the 1980s, giving agencies broad authority to craft rules related to health care, religious freedom, the environment and a number of other high-profile issues. If it’s overturned, the pressure would be on Congress to pass clearer policies, since federal agencies would have less authority to interpret general guidance.
- Takeaways from oral arguments: Several of the court’s more conservative justices appeared interested in overturning or at least limiting the scope of the 1984 Chevron ruling, as the Deseret News previously reported.
FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine
- Consolidated with: Danco Laboratories v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine.
- Key question: Can a pill that’s used to induce abortion remain widely accessible nationwide?
- Lower court ruling: The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against the FDA and Danco Laboratories, which manufactures mifepristone, determining that the FDA acted improperly when it updated its guidelines for use of the pill to allow for it to be used up to 10 weeks into a pregnancy and to be provided by mail.
- Why it matters: Mifepristone is typically used in tandem with misoprostol in medication abortions, which is the most common type of abortion in the U.S., according to The Associated Press. By limiting access to mifepristone, the Supreme Court would essentially limit access to abortion and deepen the significance of its 2022 decision that overturned Roe v. Wade.
- Takeaways from oral arguments: Much of the conversation during oral arguments in March centered on whether the doctors who challenged the FDA’s policy have legal standing, as the Deseret News previously reported. A majority of justices seemed to imply that the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine should not have been able to limit access to mifepristone nationwide.
Moyle v. United States
- Consolidated with: Idaho v. United States.
- Key question: When state-level abortion restrictions conflict with federal laws regarding emergency medical treatment, which policy wins out?
- Lower court ruling: The Biden administration, which is fighting to block Idaho’s near-total abortion ban, won at the district court level and again when the full 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard the case. Those rulings put Idaho’s abortion law on hold, but the Supreme Court allowed it to go into effect when it agreed to hear the case.
- Why it matters: A ruling for Idaho would build on the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, making it even harder for the federal government to influence state-level abortion policy.
- Takeaways from oral arguments: A majority of justices seemed skeptical of the Biden administration’s claims about the scope of the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act and willing to keep Idaho’s abortion restrictions in place.
Garland v. Cargill
- Key question: Does a 1986 law prohibiting the purchase or sale of machine guns justify a modern ban on bump stocks?
- Lower court ruling: The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the bump stock ban, ruling that bump stocks, which make semiautomatic rifles shoot more rounds more quickly, do not fit the legal definition of a machine gun.
- Why it matters: Amid a congressional gridlock on gun control, the federal government has used old laws to justify new gun restrictions. If the Supreme Court upholds the 5th Circuit’s ruling, it would complicate this approach and put more pressure on Congress to take up the gun control debate.
- Takeaways from oral arguments: Several justices appeared willing to uphold the ban on bump stocks, although some of the more conservative members of the court worried that such a ruling would lead to unfair attacks on gun owners, as the Deseret News previously reported.
Fischer v. United States
- Key question: Were men and women who took part in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol charged with the wrong crime?
- Lower court ruling: Although more than a dozen lower court judges have upheld cases against Jan. 6 rioters, a district court judge broke with the pack in Fischer v. United States, ruling that a federal statute originally written to address white-collar crime should not have applied. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals later reinstated the charge.
- Why it matters: If the Supreme Court rules that it was not legally sound to charge participants in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol with impeding official proceedings, then prosecutors would have to revisit more than 100 cases, including the ongoing election interference case against Trump.
- Takeaways from oral arguments: The court was divided over whether prosecutors acted appropriately, and some of the more conservative justices appeared interested in ruling against the Biden administration.
The most notable rulings so far
The Supreme Court has already weighed in on a few of this term’s most notable cases, including a battle over whether Colorado could keep Trump off its 2024 ballots.
The court ruled in favor of the former president in that case, saying that the authority to enforce the relevant part of the 14th Amendment rests with Congress.
“Responsibility for enforcing Section 3 (of the 14th Amendment) against federal officeholders and candidates rests with Congress and not the States. The judgment of the Colorado Supreme Court therefore cannot stand,” the court’s per curiam ruling, which was released on March 4, said.
And just last week, the court upheld a disputed congressional map in South Carolina.
The 6-3 decision will make it harder for future claims of racial gerrymandering to succeed, according to SCOTUSblog.