Grab some hot cocoa, get comfortable, and press play on the Supreme Court’s live audio feed. The December sitting is here.
SCOTUS Quick Hits
- On Wednesday, the Supreme Court announced that it would not act on the Trump administration’s request to be able to fire the top U.S. copyright official until it rules on similar requests from the administration regarding a member of the Federal Trade Commission and a member of the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors.
- The court could issue its decisions in the interim docket cases on President Donald Trump’s effort to deploy the National Guard to Illinois and Texas’ new congressional map at any time.
- Today, the justices will hear argument in Cox Communications, Inc. v. Sony Music Entertainment, on whether a service provider can be held liable for copyright infringement if it continued to provide services to people it knew were engaged in such infringement, and Urias-Orellana v. Bondi, on federal courts’ role in asylum cases.
- Tomorrow, the justices will hear argument in First Choice Women’s Resource Centers, Inc. v. Platkin, on whether a federal court has the authority to rule at this stage in the litigation on faith-based pregnancy centers’ claim that New Jersey’s demand for certain information about their fundraising practices violates the First Amendment. For more on the case, check out the On Site section below.
- Mark your calendars: SCOTUSblog will be hosting a live blog during the oral argument in Trump v. Slaughter on Monday, Dec. 8. The live blog will begin at 9:30 a.m. EST.
Morning Reads
- Chaos Reigns as Texas Awaits Supreme Court’s Ruling on Redistricting (J. David Goodman, The New York Times)(Paywall) — As the Supreme Court considers whether to allow Texas to use its new congressional map in the 2026 elections, “[m]ore than a dozen candidates, as well as hundreds of state and county election officials across Texas, are watching and waiting,” according to The New York Times. “What we’re telling people: don’t make any changes right now. Whatever you’ve done, you’ve done. Let’s wait and see,” said Matt Angle, the director of the Lone Star Project, which supports Democratic candidates in Texas.
- Court allows North Carolina’s new Republican-drawn US House map to take effect (Nate Raymond, Reuters) — Like Texas, North Carolina adopted a new congressional map ahead of next year’s midterms and faced a legal battle over it. But unlike Texas’ new map, North Carolina’s map was left in place on Wednesday by the panel of three federal judges who reviewed it. “The judges rejected arguments by the North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP, Common Cause and several Black and Hispanic voters that the redrawn map the Republican-led North Carolina General Assembly enacted last month amounted to unconstitutional political retaliation and diluted the voting power of Black voters,” according to Reuters. They “backed the state’s contention that the mid-decade redistricting effort constituted nothing more than partisan gerrymandering, which the U.S. Supreme Court in 2019 ruled judges had no power to curb.”
- Where things stand 2 months after Trump ordered troops to Portland (Conrad Wilson, Oregon Public Broadcasting) — President Donald Trump’s effort to deploy the National Guard to Portland, Oregon, remains on hold as the Supreme Court considers whether to allow a separate deployment in Chicago. Like the Chicago deployment, the Portland deployment was put on hold by a U.S. district judge, who ruled that Trump’s deployment order exceeded his authority. “The Trump administration appealed that ruling, and the case currently sits before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. However, that court said it would wait to hear the case until the Supreme Court issues a ruling for Illinois,” according to Oregon Public Broadcasting.
- Gov. Cox says it’s ‘a good idea’ to add justices to the Utah Supreme Court — and it’s not court packing (Robert Gehrke, The Salt Lake Tribune) — Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican, has expressed support for “expanding the Utah Supreme Court from five to seven justices,” while also expanding “the court of appeals and the district courts,” according to The Salt Lake Tribune. When asked about Republican criticism of the Biden administration when it floated adding justices to the U.S. Supreme Court, Cox said “packing” is not the goal in Utah; the goal is “to speed up how long it takes for cases to make their way through the courts.”
- A Supreme Court Term With Unusually High Economic Stakes (Alan S. Blinder, The Wall Street Journal)(Paywall) — In a column for The Wall Street Journal, Alan S. Blinder observed that while the “nation’s most important economic decisions are rarely made by the Supreme Court,” this term will be an exception. He emphasized that the court’s decisions on tariffs and Trump’s effort to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook could hold consequences for trade relations, inflation, interest rates, and the Fed’s independence.
A Closer Look: Interim Docket Developments, Part One
Over the past three months, in between hearing 19 oral arguments and considering thousands of petitions for review, the justices addressed a host of significant matters on the interim docket, including several requests for relief from the Trump administration.
Here’s part one of our two-part overview of how those requests were resolved.
Immigration stops in Los Angeles
In Noem v. Perdomo, the court considered a ruling by a federal judge in Los Angeles that imposed restrictions on immigration stops. Specifically, the order said that federal agents could not rely solely on any combination of four factors – an individual’s apparent race or ethnicity, speaking in Spanish or accented English, presence at a location where undocumented immigrants typically gather, and working a job with which undocumented immigrants are associated – to justify a stop.
The Trump administration came to the Supreme Court in early August and asked the justices to put the ruling on hold. On Sept. 8, the court, in an apparent 6-3 vote, granted that request with no explanation. Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a dissenting opinion, which was joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, and described the court’s decision as a “grave misuse of [the] emergency docket.” But it was Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s concurring opinion that received the most attention from commentators, many of whom criticized the justice’s claim that U.S. citizens who are mistakenly stopped by federal agents are “promptly” let go. Indeed, nearly three months later, the phrase “Kavanaugh stop” continues to appear in headlines.
Independent federal agencies
The court currently has two cases on the president’s authority to fire the heads of independent agencies on its oral arguments docket, and both arrived there via the interim docket.
On Sept. 22, the court, in an apparent 6-3 vote, allowed President Donald Trump to fire FTC commissioner Rebecca Slaughter for now and agreed to hear arguments on the president’s authority to order such firings “without cause.” Kagan, joined by Sotomayor and Jackson, dissented from the grant of the stay request, contending that “the majority … has handed full control of” independent federal agencies “to the President.” Trump v. Slaughter will be heard on Monday, Dec. 8.
On Oct. 1, the court announced that it would allow a different federal official, Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, to remain in her position at least until it heard oral arguments on the Trump administration’s request to pause a lower court ruling allowing her to remain in office. There was no noted dissent when the court deferred a decision on the administration’s request. The justices will hear Trump v. Cook on Wednesday, Jan. 21.
Foreign-aid funding
On Sept. 8, the Trump administration – for the third time since February – asked the court to intervene in a dispute over foreign-aid funds. Specifically, it urged the justices to pause a district court injunction requiring it to spend $4 billion in funds by Sept. 30, contending that the order interfered with Congress’ review of the planned rescission.
The court, after another apparent 6-3 vote, agreed with the administration. Kagan wrote a dissenting opinion, joined by Sotomayor and Jackson, in which she criticized the majority for addressing “novel issues fundamental to the relationship between the President and Congress” from an emergency posture – that is, “with scant briefing, no oral argument, and no opportunity to deliberate in conference.”
SCOTUS Quote
“Everyone cannot have his own way, and each must yield something to the reasonable satisfaction of the needs of all.”
— Justice Stanley Reed in Breard v. Alexandria
On Site
From Amy Howe
Court Defers Decision on Whether Trump Can Fire Head of U.S. Copyright Office
The Supreme Court on Wednesday put off a decision on the Trump administration’s request to be able to remove Shira Perlmutter, the head of the U.S. Copyright Office, from her job while her challenge to an effort to fire her moves forward. In a brief, unsigned order, the court indicated that it would not act on the government’s request to pause a ruling by a federal appeals court that had temporarily reinstated Perlmutter to her position until after they rule on similar requests by the Trump administration to fire a member of the Federal Trade Commission and a member of the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors. Read Amy’s analysis for a deeper look at the dispute.
From Nora Collins
The Supreme Court’s Lottery System
Confused about (or interested in) how to get tickets to attend oral arguments through the Supreme Court’s lottery system? Nora Collins has answers. In her latest SCOTUSblog piece, she walks through her experience with the lottery and what she observed while attending arguments in Landor v. Louisiana Department of Corrections and Public Safety on Nov. 10.
Case Preview
Amy Howe on First Choice Women’s Resource Centers, Inc. v. Platkin
The Supreme Court will hear arguments on Tuesday, Dec. 2, in a case brought by First Choice Women’s Resource Centers, a group of faith-based pregnancy centers that the New Jersey attorney general’s office alleges may have misled women about whether it provides certain reproductive-health services. The question before the court is a somewhat technical one: Whether a federal court has the authority to rule on First Choice’s claim that New Jersey’s demand for certain information about the group’s fundraising practices discouraged it from exercising its First Amendment rights, or whether the group must instead litigate that claim in state proceedings. Learn more about First Choice by reading Amy’s argument preview.
Contributor Corner
The Irish Court
SCOTUSblog contributor Mark Walsh learned about the role justices of Irish descent played in the history of the Supreme Court at an event put on by the Supreme Court Historical Society, which featured Sean Meehan, author of “The Emerald Bench: The History of the Irish American Justices on the Supreme Court.” “Overall, slightly more than 20% of the 116 individuals who have served on the court have had Irish heritage,” Walsh wrote.
December’s Criminal Law Arguments
In his latest SCOTUScrim column, Rory Little explored the cases related to criminal law that the court will hear in December. “Hamm v. Smith, a death penalty case, is likely to attract the most public attention – but Urias-Orellana v. Bondi, largely unnoticed by the popular media, will affect far more cases in our legal system,” he explained.
Posted in Featured, Newsletters
Recommended Citation:
Kelsey Dallas,
SCOTUStoday for Monday, December 1,
SCOTUSblog (Dec. 1, 2025, 9:00 AM),
https://www.scotusblog.com/2025/12/scotustoday-for-monday-december-1/
