May 16, 2024
Mike Fox

University of Virginia School of Law faculty are available to speak to the media about the 2023 Supreme Court term. The list will be updated as more cases are announced.

​Some descriptions of cases or holdings are derived from SCOTUSBlog.

Acheson ​Hotels v. Laufer

Holding: Because Deborah Laufer voluntarily dismissed her pending suits under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, Laufer’s case against Acheson is moot.

Bayefsky’s work addresses both the practical workings of legal institutions and underlying philosophical ideas such as dignity and equality. Her paper “Public-Law Litigation at a Crossroads: Article III Standing and ‘Tester’ Plaintiffs” analyzes Acheson Hotels. Bayefsky clerked for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Bayefsky: “Acheson is a case about the Article III standing of a plaintiff with disabilities who sought to ‘test’ a hotel’s compliance with disability discrimination laws, though she lacked concrete plans to visit the hotel. The Supreme Court dismissed Acheson as moot for case-specific reasons, leaving unanswered the broader question about the standing of disability tester plaintiffs.”

Alexander v. South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP

Holding: Because the District Court’s finding that race predominated in the design of South Carolina’s 1st Congressional District was clearly erroneous, the District Court’s racial-gerrymandering and vote-dilution holdings cannot stand.

Ross teaches and writes in the areas of constitutional law, constitutional theory, election law, administrative law and statutory interpretation. He co-directs the school’s Karsh Center For Law and Democracy.

Ross: “What I think the court has done is set up these cases in a way that’s easier for the state to make the argument that all we were doing was taking partisanship into account. We weren’t thinking about race. And to the extent that it's easier for the state to do that, it makes it harder for the court to police real instances of racial gerrymandering.” (Salon)

In the News

5.25.24 “Expert Says SCOTUS Ruling Subjects Black Voters to ‘Abuse.’ Clarence Thomas Wants To Go Even Further” (Salon)

Bissonnette v. LePage Bakeries Park St. LLC

Holding: A transportation worker need not work in the transportation industry to be exempt from coverage under Section 1 of the Federal Arbitration Act.

Verkerke teaches contracts, several employment law courses and a seminar on conservation planning and law. He directs the school’s Program for Employment and Labor Law Studies.

Verkerke: “The Bissonnette decision simply confirms the reasoning of Circuit City and Southwest Airlines v. Saxon. The court holds that the FAA § 1 exception is limited to transportation workers engaged in moving goods in interstate commerce, but those workers don’t have to be in the transportation industry. That’s an extremely modest extension of the § 1 exclusion from FAA coverage, and one that’s completely consistent with the rationale of Circuit City and Saxon. The focus remains on what duties ‘transportation workers’ perform rather than on the industry within which they do that work.”

Cantero v. Bank of America

Holding: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit failed to analyze whether New York’s interest-on-escrow law is preempted as applied to national banks in a manner consistent with the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 and Barnett Bank of Marion Cty., N. A. v. Nelson.

Mahoney’s teaching and research areas are securities regulation, law and economic development, corporate finance, financial derivatives and contracts.

Mahoney: “The court concluded that the Second Circuit’s test put too big a thumb on the side of federal preemption. It didn’t, however, accept the plaintiffs’ invitation to declare that the New York statute is not preempted. Instead, it sent the case back to the Second Circuit to reconsider under the correct standard.” (Bloomberg Law)

In the News

6.3.24 “High Court Cantero Case Won’t Stem Federal, State Law Conflicts” (Bloomberg Law)

City of Grants Pass v. Johnson

Holding: The enforcement of generally applicable laws regulating camping on public property does not constitute “cruel and unusual punishment” prohibited by the Eighth Amendment.

Cope’s research uses empirical, comparative, and formal theoretical methods to explore issues related to law and political economy. He is co-author of “The New Homelessness,” published in the California Law Review.

Jaffe directs the Environmental Law and Community Engagement Clinic and co-directs PLACE, the Program in Law, Communities and the Environment. He filed an amicus brief in Johnson.

Versteeg’s research and teaching interests include comparative constitutional law, public international law and empirical legal studies. She is co-author of “The New Homelessness,” published in the California Law Review.

Cope: “In Grants Pass v. Johnson, homeless plaintiffs challenged a set of Grants Pass, Oregon, city ordinances that, among other things, prohibited sleeping with one’s belongings in public spaces. A Ninth Circuit panel struck down the ordinance under the Eighth Amendment, holding that it criminalized actions that were ‘involuntary’ for people without shelter access. Today, the Court reversed the Ninth Circuit on moderately broad grounds. The six-justice majority let stand a 1963 Supreme Court decision (Robinson v. California) holding that criminalizing a person’s mere ‘status’ — such as drug addiction — violates the Eighth Amendment. But it rejected the argument — suggested by some justices in 1968 (Powell v. Texas) but never formally adopted — that states may not criminalize ‘involuntary acts.’ Thus, the Grants Pass majority held that, even if public camping is in some sense involuntary for homeless individuals, the Eighth Amendment does not prevent states from enacting laws prohibiting it. Grants Pass therefore reverses not only the Ninth Circuit’s decision in this case, but also overturns its 2019 Martin v. City of Boise decision, which struck down Boise’s even broader anti-sleeping ordinance. Though disappointing for homeless advocates, the court did essentially what a coalition of Democratic local officials asked it to do: restore local authorities’ power to enact and enforce sweeping laws banning sleeping in public spaces. The question now is what officials have learned in the five years since the Ninth Circuit’s 2018 Martin holding, and whether they’ll follow through on their assurances that elected officials are better positioned than courts to tackle the country’s homelessness epidemic.”

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau v. Community Financial Services Association of America

Holding: Congress’ statutory authorization allowing the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to draw money from the earnings of the Federal Reserve System to carry out the bureau’s duties satisfies the appropriations clause.

Ahdout’s research centers on modern uses of judicial power through the lens of federal courts. She clerked for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Ahdout: “The court held that the CFPB’s funding structure comports with the appropriations clause. Congress’ power of the purse is one of its most potent tools, both politically and constitutionally. Part of that authority, the court determined, is the ability to decide how appropriations are structured. Federal courts have generally recognized that Congress’ appropriations power is integral to the constitutional plan and, therefore, is not a power onto which the federal courts lightly interpret additional constraints.”

Hwang’s research and teaching focus on business law, including mergers and acquisitions, corporate contracts and corporate governance. She is co-author of “Business Associations: A Modern Approach.”

Prakash’s scholarship focuses on separation of powers, particularly executive powers. He is the author of “The Living Presidency: An Originalist Argument Against Its Ever-Expanding Powers” and “Imperial from the Beginning: The Constitution of the Original Executive.” He clerked for Justice Clarence Thomas.

In the News

FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine

Holding: Plaintiffs lack Article III standing to challenge the Food and Drug Administration’s regulatory actions regarding mifepristone.

Cahn is an expert in family law, trusts and estates, feminist jurisprudence, reproductive technology, and aging and the law. She co-directs the school’s Family Law Center.

Cahn: “In holding that the plaintiffs lacked standing, the court did not address the merits of the claim. This means that the decision maintains the status quo in terms of FDA regulation of abortion pills. But it is important to emphasize that the opinion did not take on legal questions concerning the validity of the FDA regulations or any other question concerning the FDA’s authority, which means many questions remain unanswered. For example, it is not fully clear to what extent the FDA regulations take precedence over state regulations regarding the prescription of mifepristone, which is at the heart of some of the lower court cases.” (The Conversation, with Sonia Suter)

In the News

Great Lakes Insurance SE v. Raiders Retreat Realty Co.

Holding: Choice-of-law provisions in maritime contracts are presumptively enforceable under federal maritime law, with narrow exceptions not applicable in this case.

Stephan is an expert on international business, international dispute resolution and comparative law. He recently served as special counsel to the general counsel of the U.S. Department of Defense.

Harrington v. Purdue Pharma L.P.

Holding: The bankruptcy code does not authorize a release and injunction that, as part of a plan of reorganization under Chapter 11, effectively seek to discharge claims against a nondebtor without the consent of affected claimants.

Walt teaches contracts, sales/commercial paper, legal philosophy, bankruptcy and secured transactions.

Lindke v. Freed

Holding: A public official who prevents someone from commenting on the official’s social-media page engages in state action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 only if the official both (1) possessed actual authority to speak on the state’s behalf on a particular matter, and (2) purported to exercise that authority when speaking in the relevant social-media posts.

Schauer is a world-renowned expert in the areas of constitutional law, evidence, legal reasoning, freedom of speech, and jurisprudence and the philosophy of law. His expertise has been demonstrated in hundreds of books, book chapters, articles, essays, classes and personal appearances.

Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo

Holding: The Administrative Procedure Act requires courts to exercise their independent judgment in deciding whether an agency has acted within its statutory authority, and courts may not defer to an agency interpretation of the law simply because a statute is ambiguous; Chevron is overruled.

Eichensehr writes and teaches about cybersecurity, foreign relations, national security and international law. She directs the school’s National Security Law Center and is a faculty senior fellow at UVA’s Miller Center.

Jaffe directs the Environmental Law and Community Engagement Clinic and co-directs PLACE, the Program in Law, Communities and the Environment.

Ortiz teaches constitutional law, administrative law, electoral law, civil procedure and legal theory. From 2006-2023 he directed the Law School’s Supreme Court Litigation Clinic. He clerked for then-Judge Stephen G. Breyer and Justice Lewis F. Powell Jr.

Ross teaches and writes in the areas of constitutional law, constitutional theory, election law, administrative law and statutory interpretation. He has served on the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court.

Eichensehr: “How the Court’s decision will play out in many areas of administrative law remains to be seen. The Court [June 28] vacated the two circuit court opinions below in Loper Bright and its companion case, Relentless Inc. v. Dep’t of Commerce, because they applied Chevron to interpret the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and deferred to agency interpretations. But the implications for foreign relations and national security-related cases seem less momentous. As a purely descriptive matter, the renewed primacy of Skidmore seems likely to inure to the executive’s benefit with respect to foreign affairs and national security. Whether that is normatively desirable is a separate — and much debated — question.” (Just Security)

Ortiz: “The case appears to work a big change empowering the judiciary at the expense of the president, who indirectly controls most administrative agencies. The proof, though, is in how the lower courts interpret and apply it. We must remember that before Chevron, courts, including the Supreme Court, often deferred to agencies, and that after Chevron, they, again including the Supreme Court, often just ignored Chevron when it seemingly applied. Today’s move may represent a legal sea-change. Or it may represent a big expressive statement of whether the judiciary or the president has more power but make little difference on the ground. We’ll see.”  

In the News

McElrath v. Georgia

Holding: The jury’s verdict that the defendant was not guilty by reason of insanity of malice murder constituted an acquittal for double jeopardy purposes notwithstanding any inconsistency with the jury’s other verdicts.

Richard J. Bonnie is Harrison Foundation Professor of Medicine and Law Emeritus at the Law School, having retired from teaching in 2023. He formerly served as director of the Institute of Law, Psychiatry and Public Policy at the University of Virginia.

Bonnie: “The Supreme Court’s unanimous ruling rests on a traditional understanding of the insanity defense. The jury found that the 18-year-old defendant killed his mother because he was afraid that she was trying to poison him, a false belief rooted in a serious mental illness. As a result of his psychotic illness, he was unable to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct. The Georgia law jury found him ‘not guilty as a result of insanity’ and the court committed him to a secure hospital from which he will be released only when he is no longer dangerous. The Georgia attorney general had agued that the court could ignore the insanity verdict because the jury was confused by the jury instructions and the state should have a chance to try him again. However, a unanimous Supreme Court said that the insanity verdict was final and that it would violate the ‘double jeopardy’ clause of the Constitution to try him again.”

Moody v. NetChoice LLC

Issue(s): (1) Whether the laws’ content-moderation restrictions comply with the First Amendment; and (2) whether the laws’ individualized-explanation requirements comply with the First Amendment.

Schragger’s scholarship focuses on the intersection of constitutional law and local government law, federalism, urban policy, and the constitutional and economic status of cities. He also writes about law and religion.

Stephan is an expert on international business, international dispute resolution and comparative law. He recently served as special counsel to the general counsel of the U.S. Department of Defense.

In the News

Moore v. U.S.

Holding: The Mandatory Repatriation Tax — which attributes the realized and undistributed income of an American-controlled foreign corporation to the entity’s American shareholders, and then taxes the American shareholders on their portions of that income — does not exceed Congress’s constitutional authority.

Stephan is an expert on international business, international dispute resolution and comparative law. He recently served as special counsel to the general counsel of the U.S. Department of Defense.

NetChoice LLC v. Paxton

Issue(s): Whether the First Amendment prohibits viewpoint-, content-, or speaker-based laws restricting select websites from engaging in editorial choices about whether, and how, to publish and disseminate speech — or otherwise burdening those editorial choices through onerous operational and disclosure requirements.

Schragger’s scholarship focuses on the intersection of constitutional law and local government law, federalism, urban policy, and the constitutional and economic status of cities. He also writes about law and religion.

Stephan is an expert on international business, international dispute resolution and comparative law. He recently served as special counsel to the general counsel of the U.S. Department of Defense.

In the News

O’Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier

Holding: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit’s judgment — that 42 U.S.C. § 1983’s state-action requirement was satisfied because of the “close nexus” between petitioners’ social media pages and their positions as public officials — is vacated, and the case is remanded in light of Lindke v. Freed.

Schauer is a world-renowned expert in the areas of constitutional law, evidence, legal reasoning, freedom of speech, and jurisprudence and the philosophy of law. His expertise has been demonstrated in hundreds of books, book chapters, articles, essays, classes and personal appearances.

Trump v. U.S.

Holding: Under our constitutional structure of separated powers, the nature of presidential power entitles a former president to absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority. And he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts. There is no immunity for unofficial acts.

Ahdout’s research centers on modern uses of judicial power through the lens of federal courts. She clerked for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Ahdout: “The court trifurcates the issue of presidential immunity from criminal liability and provides little clarity on the path forward in this prosecution. First, for ‘official acts’ within ‘core constitutional powers,’ the president enjoys absolute immunity. Only two sets of allegations in the criminal indictment — that President Trump threatened to remove his attorney general to force him to conduct sham election crime investigations into targeted states and that President Trump pressured Vice President Pence to abuse his ceremonial role on Jan. 6 not to certify the election — potentially involve such acts. Second, and by far the least clear aspect of the opinion, for ‘official acts’ within shared zones of power between the president and Congress, the president enjoys ‘presumptive’ immunity. The government bears the burden of rebutting such a presumption, but the court does not clarify how it might do so. Third, for ‘unofficial acts,’ the president has no immunity from criminal liability. Many allegations contained in the indictment involve these unofficial acts. For instance, as Justice Barrett’s concurrence notes, ‘The indictment alleges that the President “asked the Arizona House Speaker to call the legislature into session to hold a hearing” about election fraud claims. The President has no authority over state legislatures or their leadership, so it is hard to see how prosecuting him for crimes committed when dealing with the Arizona House Speaker would unconstitutionally intrude on executive power.’ And the indictment contains many allegations of hybrid official and unofficial acts that the government may be able to argue fall outside of the zone of any presumptive immunity. For example, President Trump using the threat of criminal prosecution — an arguably official act — to pressure Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to ‘“find’ 11,780 votes.’ Indeed, states administer elections under our federal scheme, not the executive branch. In the end, the opinion provides little clarity on the next steps in this case. Perhaps the most significant practical effect is that it adds more process into this time-sensitive separation of powers dispute, where it is unlikely that allegations of election subversion can be dealt with before another election. In effect, the Court avoids the most challenging issues by employing what I have called ‘process avoidance’ in my article ‘Separation-of-Powers Avoidance.’”

Prakash’s scholarship focuses on separation of powers, particularly executive powers. He is the author of “The Living Presidency: An Originalist Argument Against Its Ever-Expanding Powers” and “Imperial from the Beginning: The Constitution of the Original Executive.” He clerked for Justice Clarence Thomas.

Prakash: “Not sure I agree with the rhetoric [in Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s dissent], but I don’t think the president has immunity. Does this make the president a king? I don’t think I would say that. But one can agree with the overall conclusion, even if one doesn’t agree with all the particulars. I think her concern is a legitimate one, which is that presidents will take actions and then not be found liable criminally for them and not be found civilly liable, which sort of just leaves impeachment and of course, impeachment is very hard to successfully conclude in the modern era. It’s easy to impeach a president, it’s very hard to convict them because of the two-thirds requirement. And so the court’s opinions in this area have the cumulative effect of strengthening the presidency by diminishing its accountability to the criminal process and the civil process.” (WTOP Radio)

In the News

U.S. v. Rahimi

Holding: When an individual has been found by a court to pose a credible threat to the physical safety of another, that individual may be temporarily disarmed consistent with the Second Amendment.

Ballenger directs the Appellate Litigation Clinic. In private practice, he has argued three cases in the U.S. Supreme Court and dozens in the courts of appeals and trial courts across the country. Ballenger clerked for Justice Antonin Scalia.

Ballenger: “This is a very significant shift in the law. The court reaffirms Bruen’s history-focused test for gun regulations but makes clear that the lower courts have significantly ‘misunderstood’ that test. The chief justice’s opinion, speaking for eight members of the court, says that the law is not ‘trapped in amber’ and that new firearms regulations are acceptable if they are ‘consistent with the principles that underpin our regulatory tradition’ even if they are not ‘identical to ones that could be found in 1791.’ And the opinion looks at the history in a much broader and more general way than most of the recent lower court opinions. The court pointed to traditional laws that prohibited persons from ‘riding or going armed, with dangerous or unusual weapons’ to terrify the public, and to laws requiring dangerous persons to post a surety bond in order to keep their guns, and inferred a general principle that persons can be temporarily disarmed whenever a judge has determined that they ‘pose[] a clear threat of physical violence to another.’ The lower courts have been rejecting those exact analogies under Bruen, but the Supreme Court has now held that it is not even a close question. The eight-justice majority says that it is ‘common sense’ that a clear threat of physical violence is sufficient to take someone’s guns away, that 18 USC 922(g)(8) ‘fits neatly within the tradition the surety and going armed laws represent,’ and that the court ‘has no trouble’ rejecting Rahimi’s Second Amendment claim. This feels like a strong repudiation of the lower court opinions requiring a very tight historical fit. And on a technical but very important side issue, the court clarifies that Second Amendment cases have to comply with the court’s usual rules about facial and ‘as applied’ challenges. Mr. Rahimi loses because his restraining order included a finding that he was dangerous, and that is enough to temporarily disarm him. The court refuses to decide whether § 922(g)(8) might be unconstitutional in other cases where no such finding was made.”

Solum is an internationally recognized legal theorist who works in constitutional theory, procedure and the philosophy of law. Solum contributes to debates in constitutional theory and normative legal theory.

In the News

Vida​l v. Elster

Holding: The Lanham Act’s names clause — which prohibits the registration of a mark that “[c]onsists of or comprises a name ... identifying a particular living individual except by his written consent” — does not violate the First Amendment.

Schragger’s scholarship focuses on the intersection of constitutional law and local government law, federalism, urban policy, and the constitutional and economic status of cities. He also writes about law and religion.

Wilkinson v. Garland

Holding: Federal courts have jurisdiction to review immigration judges’ determinations of mixed questions of law and fact in removal cases, ensuring that the federal courts to continue to oversee executive branch decisions to deport noncitizens.

Frost writes and teaches in the fields of immigration and citizenship law, federal courts and jurisdiction, and judicial ethics.

Frost: “Wilkinson argued that his deportation would cause ‘exceptional and extremely unusual hardship’ to his 7-year-old U.S. citizen son, qualifying him for relief from removal under federal law. The immigration judge, who is an employee of the Department of Justice, disagreed and ordered his removal. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit refused to review that decision, concluding that federal law, 8 U.S.C. 1252(a)(2)(B)(i), barred federal courts from reviewing a decision that turned on the facts of Wilkinson’s case. The Supreme Court reversed, explaining that federal courts have jurisdiction to review mixed questions of fact and law, which includes the application of the legal ‘exceptional and extremely unusual hardship’ standard to the facts of Wilkinson’s case. The Supreme Court’s decision clarifies that federal courts have the power to review immigration courts’ decisions involving legal standards, even when they require analysis of the facts of individual cases, reinvigorating the federal judicial role in removal cases.”
 

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