SCOTUS

[dislaxxic]

The Supreme Court Has Planned for a June So Awful It Will Be Impossible to Keep Up

The problem, as Georgetown Law professor Steve Vladeck has explained, is that the Supreme Court has fundamentally altered its approach to granting cases in recent years. It used to be that the justices primarily took up small cases to clarify muddled areas of law, topped off with a handful of blockbusters. Today, they’re taking up fewer and fewer little cases while maxing out on the front-page supernovas. So areas of the law that are important within the legal system but uninteresting to most people, like the Fourth Amendment’s protections against unreasonable search and seizures, remain muddy, because the justices can’t be bothered to deal with them. Meanwhile, the court wades into contentious disputes where it has no business interfering. And big decisions typically provoke longer opinions plus concurrences and dissents, which must circulate for weeks or months as the justices respond to one another. Thus, the docket is smaller than ever, yet the justices say they are as busy as ever, because they can’t help but reach out and grab the shiny toys.

In fairness, there are some major cases that the court can’t avoid. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, for instance, keeps jamming the justices with crazy decisions; as the adult in the room, SCOTUS feels an obligation to take up and reverse these rulings. Some attention-grabbers on the docket this term came straight from the Fightin’ 5th Circuit, including decisions limiting access to medication abortion and granting domestic abusers the right to bear arms. There are, however, a ton of other big cases this term that the Supreme Court had zero compelling reasons to take. Why, for example, did the court decide now was the time to let states criminalize homelessness? Or make it harder to halt illegal, union-busting, anti-labor tactics? Or consider whether to preemptively kill a wealth tax, using a dispute built on bogus facts? There was nothing urgent about any of these cases or the underlying issues, no reason the court could not put them off for another day. The conservative justices were, it appears, simply eager to bend the law rightward in each instance and stacked them atop one another in the same overstuffed term to get the job done ASAP.

No cases better illustrate this phenomenon than Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo and Relentless v. Department of Commerce. Both involve challenges to a federal program that required the fishing industry to share the cost of compliance monitors onboard their vessels. Conservative lawyers developed both as a challenge to Chevron deference, the 40-year-old principle that courts must defer to federal agencies’ reasonable interpretation of ambiguous laws. Overturning Chevron deference would make it harder for presidents to interpret and enforce the law, in turn limiting the government’s ability to protect the public. This power grab is high on the Republican Party’s wishlist because it will kneecap countless regulations that protect us from pollution, fraud, exploitation, discrimination, and other societal ills.

It’s no secret that the Supreme Court’s Republican-aligned bloc is hungry to overrule Chevron. So hungry, in fact, that it initially took up a case from which Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson had to recused, Loper Bright Enterprises. (She participated in an earlier stage while serving on a lower court.) Recognizing, perhaps, that they should not reverse landmark precedent with a short-staffed court, the conservative justices later took up an identical “companion” case, Relentless. They therefore burdened themselves with double the briefing and double the arguments, enlarging their (already heavy) workload. Worse yet, the two cases do not even involve a live dispute. A ruling in favor of the fishing industry will do nothing for the parties. The case is entirely theoretical, a faux-dispute manufactured for the sole purpose of overturning Chevron. And it could not wait till next term: The court had to gobble it up now.

Less wonky but just as egregious is SCOTUS’s intrusion into the Jan. 6 cases. It abruptly decided to jeopardize the prosecution of more than 350 defendants from the Capitol riot by gutting the federal obstruction law under which they’ve been charged. The lower courts reached a near-unanimous consensus that the Justice Department used this law appropriately; the Supreme Court’s intervention was totally unwarranted and may signal broader hostility toward accountability for the insurrectionists. That obstruction law also lies at the heart of special counsel Jack Smith’s indictment of former President Donald Trump for election subversion; eviscerating the statute will eviscerate a key part of the indictment.

Of course, thanks to the Supreme Court, it’s not even clear that Smith will ever prosecute Trump for his alleged crimes relating to Jan. 6. And this sin, too, is partly a story of devious docket management. After the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit denied Trump’s absurd claim of presidential immunity in February, SCOTUS could (and should) have denied Trump’s appeal. Or it could have quickly, summarily affirmed the D.C. Circuit’s decision. Or it could have taken up the case on the same fast-track schedule it used to keep Trump on the ballot in Colorado. But it didn’t. Rather, the Supreme Court took up the case on a more drawn-out schedule, hearing arguments in late April, with a decision likely in late June. The former president’s arguments in this case are so frivolous that a responsible SCOTUS would have disposed of the whole thing months ago. Instead, the court has treated Trump’s claim as plausible, maybe even persuasive, bogging itself down with a distraction of no merit and monumental importance.

Rightwing activist judges are getting ready to fundamentally alter liberal democracy. They have been steadily stripping away the protections liberal democracy has set up between the People and avaricious, out-of-control capitalism in the private sector. These things will, at the end of the day, effect ALL of us where we live and where we play.

Got out and VOTE if this behavior is abhorrent to you...

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[a fan]

Did Thomas report these payments as income? I’ll bet all the money in my retirement account that he did not. So why isn’t the IRS going after him? Hopefully they are.

Because if they go after him, the Republicans (and we have 'em here on this forum) while whine and complain, and tell us how it's not fair for Republicans to have to follow the same tax laws the rest of us have to follow. And claim banana Republic.

You'll notice, though, that at no point will they deny that their favored Republican broke laws.

And have no problem prosecuting Dems for breaking tax laws.

Wondering when they plan on stopping with this stupid game? I thought they might stop after Trump left office.

Boy, was I wrong.

I would prefer that congress not exempt themselves from the law, like Obamacare for their staffers or insider trading. Most come out way wealthier than they went in.

That's right. Makes it that much more sad when you see guys like Menendez, who are so freaking stupid that they don't take advantage of the legal financial corruption that's open to to them, and decide instead to break laws. Moron.

[ggait]

Hey Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk.

You are a partisan hack tool in a robe.

Overturned 9-0 on one of the dumbest decisions ever.

Have a nice day!

[jhu72]

Well looks like the SCOTUS cowards didn't have the balls to ban Mifepristone They naturally left the door open to do so in the future. Not even a little surprising. Totally predictable.

Absolutely a presidential election year feint, so as not to further damage their Orange God's election chances.

[Seacoaster(1)]

Restrained, cogent, and compelling, by Philip Lacovara, a former Deputy Solicitor General of the US, President of the DC Bar Association, and Counsel to the Watergate Special Prosecutor:

https://www.thebulwark.com/p/the-case-f ... to-recusal

"Dear Justice Alito,

The drip-drip-drip of reports about the roles that you and your wife are playing in partisan controversies has risen to a torrent. You must reconsider your decision not to recuse yourself from pending and future cases that come before the Supreme Court involving former President Donald Trump or participants in the events at the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Compliance with governing law and public respect for the integrity of the Court’s process require this result.

For more than half a century, I have been a member of the bar of the Court, and I have had the privilege of appearing regularly before the Court over that period. Nothing is more important to the rule of law than assuring the people of our country that each justice is adhering to the judicial oath that you and your colleagues have taken to “administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich,” and “impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me.”

As you know, there has been great public concern about your impartiality in light of the display of two flags at your properties that appear to signal support for former President Trump’s claim that he won the 2020 election and for those who were inspired by Trump’s claim to act out violently during the events of January 6th.

Your May 29 letter to Senators Durbin and Whitehouse explaining your reasons for refusing to recuse yourself from cases involving former President Trump’s interests before the Court or related cases acknowledges the salient facts that have led to calls for you to do so. In the letter, you assigned responsibility for the events to your wife. While recent reports in the Washington Post and elsewhere have cast doubt on the accuracy of your explanation, even your own narrative demonstrates why recusal is necessary. Additionally, Rolling Stone this week has disclosed surreptitious recordings of you and your wife indicating that both of you have chosen political sides.

The only reasons you have offered for refusing to step aside misperceive both the governing legal standards for recusal, on one hand, and the reasonability of concerns about your impartiality, on the other. As a consequence, your decision against recusal in any January 6th–related cases has already begun undermining the legitimacy and integrity of any decision in which you participate on these important issues.

In your letter, you refer to the Court’s code of conduct, adopted last November, which states that a justice “should disqualify himself or herself in a proceeding in which the Justice’s impartiality might reasonably be questioned, that is, where an unbiased and reasonable person who is aware of all relevant circumstances would doubt that the Justice could fairly discharge his or her duties.” (Emphases added.)

After summarizing your explanation of the background circumstances that have generated so much public concern, you assert:

A reasonable person who is not motivated by political or ideological considerations or a desire to affect the outcome of Supreme Court cases would conclude that this event does not meet the applicable standard for recusal.

There are several serious problems with this conclusion.

First, your letter refers only to the Court’s precatory code of conduct, which merely notes the general circumstances in which a justice “should” recuse himself.

But you overlook the mandatory directive of a federal statute that prescribes requirements for judicial disqualification. The statute, 28 U.S.C. § 455, which explicitly applies to justices of the Supreme Court, requires that any “justice . . . shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned,” and also holds that he “shall also disqualify himself” if “his spouse” is “known by the judge to have an interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding.” (Emphases added.)

By its terms, Congress has made these requirements apply to all members of the federal judiciary, including “any justice,” thus establishing the important principal that protection of the integrity of the Supreme Court’s decision-making process is at least as important as the handling of federal cases by lower court judges.

Thus, federal law makes recusal mandatory in at least two of the circumstances present here. One is when a justice’s impartiality might reasonably be questioned. Your letter addressed only an optional alternative to that mandatory ground for recusal.

But the statute separately (“also”) establishes a requirement for recusal when a spouse of the justice has an “interest” that could be “substantially affected” by the outcome of the proceeding. The “interest” need not be financial. As the statute recognizes, judicial integrity is so important that safeguarding it requires that some interests and activities of the spouse of a justice be attributed to the justice himself, creating new conditions for recusal.

Although you originally suggested that your wife’s display of the upside-down American flag was merely part of a local spat with a neighbor, her recently recorded words make clear that she uses these displays to communicate her point of view supporting conservative causes, particularly that of the Christian right. “You know what I want? I want a Sacred Heart of Jesus flag because I have to look across the lagoon at the Pride flag for the next month,” she said, adding that she told her husband that once he is “free of this nonsense,” she will continue to fly her banners: “I’m putting it up and I’m gonna send them a message every day, maybe every week, I’ll be changing the flags.”

Do any of these things—Mrs. Alito’s choices of flag, or the kind of political-communication-via-vexillology that she describes, or the admission of political frustration that she made to her surreptitious interlocutor—rise to the level of having an “interest” in the proceeding and the outcome of the cases directly affecting former President Trump and his supporters? Opinion here might differ, and might hinge in part on the plausibility of your letter’s claim that you and your wife were unaware that the “Appeal to Heaven” flag flown by your wife had been adopted by the pro-Trump “Stop the Steal” movement.

In your letter, you defended the “Appeal to Heaven” flag on the ground that it dates back to the American Revolution, and “the use of an old historic flag by a new group does not necessarily drain the flag of all other meanings.” In fact, there is persuasive evidence that, in the decades after the Revolution, there was “no systematic or popular use of this flag until 2013,” at which time it “began to assume its contemporary connotations” as the “rallying standard” for those who desire to reconstitute American government on a Christian right basis—and since the 2020 election, it has further evolved to become the symbol of a “mass spiritual warfare campaign for Trump’s fallacious reinstatement.” Whether you or your wife understood the symbol in this way is immaterial; it is grounds for reasonable people to doubt your impartiality.

Your letter does not address whether you and your wife were aware that the upside-down American flag had likewise been adopted as a symbol of the pro-Trump Stop-the-Steal movement.

This degree of personal advocacy by your spouse, which plausibly touches on matters that are or will be before the Court, arguably constitutes the kind of interest that the statute makes grounds for mandatory recusal.

Second, you assert that a “reasonable person” aware of all the circumstances would not see grounds for recusal. Yet reasonable people with knowledge of the circumstances as you yourself describe them have, unfortunately, questioned your impartiality.

Third, you have superimposed another limitation on the controlling standards for recusal under either the applicable statute or the Court’s code of conduct. You assert that you are concerned about a “reasonable person” who is “not motivated by political or ideological considerations or a desire to affect the outcome of Supreme Court cases.” This explanation conflates two distinct issues.

The motives of the observers who raise an objection are distinct from the salient issue, which is whether the ordinary “reasonable person” would view the circumstances as a basis to “question” the “impartiality” of a justice. Nothing in the statute or in the code of conduct authorizes this kind of speculation about motives as an excuse for refusing to step aside, if a controlling standard (“reasonable person” or “potentially affected interest”) is otherwise established.

In any event, my concern about maintaining (or restoring) the all-important respect for the integrity of the Court’s judicial decision-making process is not motivated either by political or ideological bias or by a desire to “affect” the outcome of these cases. Instead, I seek to enhance the possibility that the outcome—whatever it turns out to be—may be seen as nonpolitical and unbiased. Your refusal to recuse yourself taints the process and inevitably will undermine confidence in the Court’s decision on the merits.

Accordingly, I respectfully invite you to reconsider your decision and to take the proper course: recuse."

[Typical Lax Dad]

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/13/us/p ... trips.html

[dislaxxic]

Proof That Alito is a Partisan Hack

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[CU88a]

DEPLORABLE

Her desired flags are not about love at all; it is about revenge and hate toward American citizens who live a little differently than she does.
WWJD?

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/10/us/p ... -flag.html

"Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.’s wife, Martha-Ann, recently told a woman posing as a conservative supporter that she wanted to fly a Catholic flag at the couple’s Virginia home in response to a Pride flag in her neighborhood.

“You know what I want?” the justice’s wife said to the woman, Lauren Windsor, who secretly recorded the conversation during a black-tie event last week at the Supreme Court. “I want a Sacred Heart of Jesus flag because I have to look across the lagoon at the Pride flag for the next month.”

She said that she had agreed, for now, but that she had told him that “when you are free of this nonsense,” “I’m putting it up and I’m going to send them a message every day, maybe every week. I’ll be changing the flags.”

She added that she would come up with her own flag, which would be white with yellow and orange flames and read, in Italian, “shame.”


This woman is cnut, just another member of the religious "right" cult who think the only people allowed to exist in the world are their people.

[Typical Lax Dad]

DEPLORABLE

Her desired flags are not about love at all; it is about revenge and hate toward American citizens who live a little differently than she does.
WWJD?

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/10/us/p ... -flag.html

"Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.’s wife, Martha-Ann, recently told a woman posing as a conservative supporter that she wanted to fly a Catholic flag at the couple’s Virginia home in response to a Pride flag in her neighborhood.

“You know what I want?” the justice’s wife said to the woman, Lauren Windsor, who secretly recorded the conversation during a black-tie event last week at the Supreme Court. “I want a Sacred Heart of Jesus flag because I have to look across the lagoon at the Pride flag for the next month.”

She said that she had agreed, for now, but that she had told him that “when you are free of this nonsense,” “I’m putting it up and I’m going to send them a message every day, maybe every week. I’ll be changing the flags.”

She added that she would come up with her own flag, which would be white with yellow and orange flames and read, in Italian, “shame.”


This woman is cnut, just another member of the religious "right" cult who think the only people allowed to exist in the world are their people.

Would love to hear her and Jenny Thomas on the phone.

[dislaxxic]

Clarence Thomas’ Opinion Legalizing Bump Stocks Is Indefensible

These a-hole activist justices, led by Thomas and Alito, are legislating from the bench. They are ASKING for impeachment, or an expansion of the SCOTUS. They're just double-dog DARING congress to try it...

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[WaffleTwineFaceoff]

Clarence Thomas’ Opinion Legalizing Bump Stocks Is Indefensible

These a-hole activist justices, led by Thomas and Alito, are legislating from the bench. They are ASKING for impeachment, or an expansion of the SCOTUS. They're just double-dog DARING congress to try it...

..

Oh good heavens. The a-hole agency ATF was legislating from the executive branch. The SCOTUS ruling today told them "Sorry, you can't do that. That is the job of Congress, the legislative branch of the Federal Democratic Republic known at the United States of America". Congress should be thanking SCOTUS for upholding the rule of law and roles of the three branches of government. And if Congress would like, they can work their magic and get such a law passed. End of.

[dislaxxic]

That post makes about as much sense as Thomas' load of gibberish. The agency charged with enforcing gun regulations knows a TAD more about guns than the numbskull partisan hack Clarence Thomas. It's black and white.

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[WaffleTwineFaceoff]

That post makes about as much sense as Thomas' load of gibberish. The agency charged with enforcing gun regulations knows a TAD more about guns than the numbskull partisan hack Clarence Thomas. It's black and white.

..

I'm not sure what your definition of gibberish is, but the case and ruling was fairly simple and straightforward. What the case was not about is the relative knowledge of guns between Justice Thomas and the ATF. But, just for gits and shiggles, let's examine the ATF and their expertise.

ATF director in his testimony before congress - you should watch every second - is profoundly incapable of answering simple questions posed to him. Couldn't define what an "assault weapon" is, or what elements qualify or disqualify said weapon making it different from other semiautomatic firearms. He incorrectly stated pistol braces converted pistols into short barreled rifles to be fired from the shoulder, therefore they should be treated as such, quite literally being so wrong he should have resigned in shame. The ATF, you recall, wrote a letter in 2017 stating bump stocks were legal accessories and didn't create machine guns/automatic rifles our of semiautomatic rifles.

In a now infamous interview with CBS, Director Dettelbach misuses "clip" and "magazine". That would be like the CEO of a tech company not knowing the difference between WiFi and Ethernet. During the same interview, he turns it over to Chris Bort, his firearms expert and a top lieutenant at ATF. Mr. Bort is the head of ATF's Firearms Ammunition Technology Division. On national TV, Mr. Bort is unable to accomplish the first step of a field strip - removing the slide - of the most ubiquitous pistol in America - a glock. As he hamfistedly monkey fondles the firearm, he repeatedly places his finger on and inside the trigger guard. Oh, and he didn't clear the firearm when he picked it up off the table. That breaks a golden rule of gun safety.

A bit of further research into the expertise of the ATF in handling firearms was the time that an ATF gun-destruction facility in West Virginia had thousands of guns and gun parts stolen from it - you know, the guns that end up in the hands of criminals.

But let's stay on point. The SCOTUS decision yesterday, which by the way included 5 justices in addition to Thomas voting in the affirmative, wasn't about relative firearm expertise. It was about government agency overreach and did nothing to prevent the legislative branch of the government to make a law banning bump stocks. That's kind of how it's supposed to work, no?

[Seacoaster(1)]

That post makes about as much sense as Thomas' load of gibberish. The agency charged with enforcing gun regulations knows a TAD more about guns than the numbskull partisan hack Clarence Thomas. It's black and white.

..

I'm not sure what your definition of gibberish is, but the case and ruling was fairly simple and straightforward. What the case was not about is the relative knowledge of guns between Justice Thomas and the ATF. But, just for gits and shiggles, let's examine the ATF and their expertise.

ATF director in his testimony before congress - you should watch every second - is profoundly incapable of answering simple questions posed to him. Couldn't define what an "assault weapon" is, or what elements qualify or disqualify said weapon making it different from other semiautomatic firearms. He incorrectly stated pistol braces converted pistols into short barreled rifles to be fired from the shoulder, therefore they should be treated as such, quite literally being so wrong he should have resigned in shame. The ATF, you recall, wrote a letter in 2017 stating bump stocks were legal accessories and didn't create machine guns/automatic rifles our of semiautomatic rifles.

In a now infamous interview with CBS, Director Dettelbach misuses "clip" and "magazine". That would be like the CEO of a tech company not knowing the difference between WiFi and Ethernet. During the same interview, he turns it over to Chris Bort, his firearms expert and a top lieutenant at ATF. Mr. Bort is the head of ATF's Firearms Ammunition Technology Division. On national TV, Mr. Bort is unable to accomplish the first step of a field strip - removing the slide - of the most ubiquitous pistol in America - a glock. As he hamfistedly monkey fondles the firearm, he repeatedly places his finger on and inside the trigger guard. Oh, and he didn't clear the firearm when he picked it up off the table. That breaks a golden rule of gun safety.

A bit of further research into the expertise of the ATF in handling firearms was the time that an ATF gun-destruction facility in West Virginia had thousands of guns and gun parts stolen from it - you know, the guns that end up in the hands of criminals.

But let's stay on point. The SCOTUS decision yesterday, which by the way included 5 justices in addition to Thomas voting in the affirmative, wasn't about relative firearm expertise. It was about government agency overreach and did nothing to prevent the legislative branch of the government to make a law banning bump stocks. That's kind of how it's supposed to work, no?

On the Court's decision, I think that is right -- it was presented as a question of whether the Agency had the authority under the Congressional enabling legislation to do what it did. And I think Sotomayor is essentially saying that the enabling legislation is broad enough to encompass ATF's actions. No one would mind, really, if the Court were to send this back to Congress with a polite request that Congress makes its delegation of power more clear and unmistakable. But we all know that two things make action on that polite request literally impossible: (1) Congress cannot function around any topic except naming the post office for former Congressmen; and (2) coalescing around gun regulation is, in particular, impossible in the age of gerrymandered districts and elections of those very politicians who could, perhaps, otherwise regulate the field.

[WaffleTwineFaceoff]

That post makes about as much sense as Thomas' load of gibberish. The agency charged with enforcing gun regulations knows a TAD more about guns than the numbskull partisan hack Clarence Thomas. It's black and white.

..

I'm not sure what your definition of gibberish is, but the case and ruling was fairly simple and straightforward. What the case was not about is the relative knowledge of guns between Justice Thomas and the ATF. But, just for gits and shiggles, let's examine the ATF and their expertise.

ATF director in his testimony before congress - you should watch every second - is profoundly incapable of answering simple questions posed to him. Couldn't define what an "assault weapon" is, or what elements qualify or disqualify said weapon making it different from other semiautomatic firearms. He incorrectly stated pistol braces converted pistols into short barreled rifles to be fired from the shoulder, therefore they should be treated as such, quite literally being so wrong he should have resigned in shame. The ATF, you recall, wrote a letter in 2017 stating bump stocks were legal accessories and didn't create machine guns/automatic rifles our of semiautomatic rifles.

In a now infamous interview with CBS, Director Dettelbach misuses "clip" and "magazine". That would be like the CEO of a tech company not knowing the difference between WiFi and Ethernet. During the same interview, he turns it over to Chris Bort, his firearms expert and a top lieutenant at ATF. Mr. Bort is the head of ATF's Firearms Ammunition Technology Division. On national TV, Mr. Bort is unable to accomplish the first step of a field strip - removing the slide - of the most ubiquitous pistol in America - a glock. As he hamfistedly monkey fondles the firearm, he repeatedly places his finger on and inside the trigger guard. Oh, and he didn't clear the firearm when he picked it up off the table. That breaks a golden rule of gun safety.

A bit of further research into the expertise of the ATF in handling firearms was the time that an ATF gun-destruction facility in West Virginia had thousands of guns and gun parts stolen from it - you know, the guns that end up in the hands of criminals.

But let's stay on point. The SCOTUS decision yesterday, which by the way included 5 justices in addition to Thomas voting in the affirmative, wasn't about relative firearm expertise. It was about government agency overreach and did nothing to prevent the legislative branch of the government to make a law banning bump stocks. That's kind of how it's supposed to work, no?

On the Court's decision, I think that is right -- it was presented as a question of whether the Agency had the authority under the Congressional enabling legislation to do what it did. And I think Sotomayor is essentially saying that the enabling legislation is broad enough to encompass ATF's actions. No one would mind, really, if the Court were to send this back to Congress with a polite request that Congress makes its delegation of power more clear and unmistakable. But we all know that two things make action on that polite request literally impossible: (1) Congress cannot function around any topic except naming the post office for former Congressmen; and (2) coalescing around gun regulation is, in particular, impossible in the age of gerrymandered districts and elections of those very politicians who could, perhaps, otherwise regulate the field.

Solid points. Okay, coffee consumed, workout incoming, and a long ride scheduled. Be well, folks.

[dislaxxic]

So, a device that allows a gun to fire 400-800 rounds with "a single function of the trigger" is not a "machine gun"? ATF has evidently been monitoring various iterations of the bump stock over the past several years...should "accuracy" have anything to do with this? The Las Vegas gunman didn't really care about accuracy and nearly 60 people died as a result of his ability to spray thousands of rounds into a crowd.

What do we dispute in these observations?

After wrongly accusing the agency of a politically motivated about-face—and using this charge to discount its expertise and authority—Thomas adopted a highly technical interpretation of the statute that does not align with its text. A “single function of the trigger,” he wrote, does not mean a single pull of the trigger, but rather a complete “cycle” of the spring-loaded hammer inside the gun. Because the hammer (rapidly) resets to its original position between shots, Thomas concluded, “bump firing” involves more than “a single function of the trigger.” And because the shooter must “actively maintain” a particular stance to put pressure on certain parts of the weapon, the justice wrote, the resulting fire is not truly “automatic.”

Sotomayor’s dissent, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, rebuts this butchering of the text in a tone that toggles between scathing and mournful. She pointed out that when Congress first banned “machineguns” in 1934, their “internal mechanisms” “varied enormously”: Some used triggers, others buttons; some relied on the shooter’s backward pressure on the weapon, while others harnessed the recoil produced by a bullet’s discharge. “To account for these differences,” Sotomayor wrote, “Congress adopted a definition” that encompassed all guns that fire continuously without any need for the shooter to reengage the trigger. That had, until Friday, been the ordinary meaning of “automatic” fire. Extensive records of congressional debate around the 1934 bill confirms beyond a doubt that lawmakers intended to codify this definition. And “evidence of contemporaneous usage overwhelmingly supports that interpretation,” too.

Yet the Supreme Court has now replaced this near-century-old understanding with a narrow, highly technical one that lacks a basis in statutory text. By doing so, Sotomayor noted, the majority “arrogates Congress’s policymaking role to itself.” Its indefensible decision “eviscerates Congress’s regulation of machineguns,” “enables gun users and manufacturers to circumvent federal law,” and “hamstrings the government’s efforts to keep machineguns from gunmen like the Las Vegas shooter.”

Creating new term definitions like this...is there ANY doubt that Justice Thomas and probably Alito, will find a way to make Donald Trump immune from federal prosecution? It's the rightwing mindset about these kind of things that offends me so...and their upcoming likely demolition of the authority of the administrative state is troubling, to say the least. The likes of Thomas and Alito (and the champ: Scalia) want to decide what the "normal meaning" of statutory text is when they disagree with it ideologically...when they kinda like the text, they say "Well, this is how the Framers MEANT the words to read. I find that problematic...

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[Seacoaster(1)]

It would interesting to determine where in the appellate record Thomas found the definition of “single function of a trigger.”

[youthathletics]

It would interesting to determine where in the appellate record Thomas found the definition of “single function of a trigger.”

The ATF?

18 U.S.C. 921(a)(23): Definition of machinegun: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/921

Redirected here --> https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/5845

This language includes a device that, when activated by a single pull of the trigger, initiates an automatic firing cycle that continues until the finger is released or the ammunition supply is exhausted.

[Seacoaster(1)]

It would interesting to determine where in the appellate record Thomas found the definition of “single function of a trigger.”

The ATF?

18 U.S.C. 921(a)(23): Definition of machinegun: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/921

Redirected here --> https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/5845

This language includes a device that, when activated by a single pull of the trigger, initiates an automatic firing cycle that continues until the finger is released or the ammunition supply is exhausted.

No, that is the statutory definition of machinegun. I am asking not where Thomas found the utterance of the phrase "a single function of the trigger," but the meaning of that phrase as it pertains to the firearm's trigger and action.

I think if you look at the Court's opinion for the majority, you will see that Thomas got the basic defining explanation from the amicus brief of the FPC Action Foundation, a "nonprofit organization founded on a philosophy of natural rights that has an unambiguous purpose," whose "efforts are focused on the right to keep and bear arms and adjacent issues." That is to say, a gun rights lobbying and advocacy organization.

Listen, I think the Court majority's decision is not crazy; we want our basic laws to be derived from and the result of laws passed under the Constitution by the two Houses of Congress and signed by the President. ATF stepped in here and reinterpreted its prior definition and guidance on what is a machinegun because of an extraordinary catastrophe, which prominently featured the bump stock in 58 deaths and 500 injured at a rock concert, and because the Congress couldn't act, paralyzed by posturing toadies extending their thoughts, prayers and not much else -- despite an arsenal (oh dear, pardon the play on words) of legislative tools to do so. So the Court went back to its mantra about the political branches having to do their jobs...while allowing the political branches the immunity to gerrymander congressional districts into extremist havens for the likes of feckless f*ckwads like Gosar and Biggs and Jordan and Comer and Crenshaw and Greene.

Government cannot be responsive to "the people" when the Congress is paralyzed, or cowardly, or too concerned about keeping their jobs to act on the people's behalf. Knowing that this is the case today throughout Congress, the Court nonetheless stands on its principle. And I get that. But the chances are good that this exercise of "principle" will increase the death toll at a Walmart or a church or a concert. And that makes me sad.

[dislaxxic]

SCOTUS Keeps Marching Right

OK, i get it. Thomas found a technicality. The gun manufacturers had found a way to automatically "pull the trigger" by pressing the stock and letting the rest of the weapon slide back and forth, thereby spraying hundreds of bullets out at a time. Is the human even touching the trigger during this volley? Thus, instead of of attempting to divine the INTENT of the wording of the definition of "machinegun"...like the good little "originalists" do in nearly every case nowadays...which might reasonably be to imagine that the writers of that rule MEANT to forbid the rapid discharge of HUNDREDS of bullets at a time, Thomas says they have to write a better, more clear law. Good luck with that, as Seacoaster says.

It seems that our legislators need to be able to divine future technological advances when they write laws, yet still avoid the inevitable challenge to "overbroad" language that would surely come from conservative justices in assessing constitutionality, right?

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