Closing summary
The supreme court handed down three rulings on Friday, with further rulings expected on Monday. Here’s a recap of the latest developments:
The court overturned one of its own most important precedents, the Chevron doctrine, delivering a major blow to the regulatory powers of federal agencies. Voting as a block, the six rightwing justices threw out the court’s own 1984 opinion in Chevron USA Inc v Natural Resources Defense Council, which has required the courts to defer to the knowledge of government experts in their reasonable interpretation of ambiguous laws.
The court narrowed the statute that prosecutors have relied in the cases of hundreds of rioters who took part in the January 6 Capitol attack for obstruction of an official proceeding. The 6-3 ruling could have profound implications for participants on that day in 2021, and could also affect the federal criminal case against Donald Trump, who is charged with similar offences in special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the assault.
The court ruled 6-3 that cities in the US west can criminalize unhoused people sleeping outside even when they lack access to shelter. The ruling is a victory for Grants Pass, Oregon, which in 2019 passed ordinances prohibiting sleeping and camping in its public parks and on its streets, banning unhoused people from “using a blanket, pillow, or cardboard box for protection from the elements”.
The court will issue the final opinions of its terms on Monday, including Donald Trump’s claim of absolute immunity. The justices have yet to issue rulings in four cases that were argued during the term, including Trump’s claim of immunity from prosecution for trying to undo his 2020 election loss.
Earlier this week, the court ruled to allow emergency abortions in Idaho, for now. It rejected Purdue Pharma’s bankruptcy settlement plan, stripped the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of a major tool in fighting securities fraud, and put a hold on an attempt by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to reduce harmful air pollution that drifts across state lines.
The lawyer for Joseph Fischer, a former Pennsylvania police officer who is accused of storming the Capitol on January 6, has responded to the court’s ruling.
“On behalf of Mr Fischer, our team is ecstatic,” Jeffrey Green said in a statement reported by CNN. He added:
The various opinions offer a particularly clear window into different statutory interpretation modalities among the Justices on today’s Court.
Green said he would be watching the ruling’s effect on other prosecutions but said “we are happy to have driven this criminal statute back to its proper evidence tampering turf.”
Donald Trump declared a “BIG WIN” after the supreme court’s ruling that made it harder to charge January 6 Capitol riot defendants with obstruction.
Trump, posting to his Truth Social platform shortly after the decision, also shared a post that described the ruling as a “massive victory” for “J6 political prisoners”.
The 6-3 ruling in the case of Fischer v United States could also affect the federal criminal case against Donald Trump, who is charged with similar offences in special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the assault.
Trump faces four criminal charges in the case, one of which is a violation of 18 USC section 1512(c)(2). He is also charged with conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. His lawyers could now argue that those two charges under the narrower standard the supreme court announced Friday.
Some experts have argued that the evidence against Trump would allow the charges to stick even under a narrower standard.
Court's ruling to have profound implications for hundreds of January 6 rioters
The supreme court has ruled to narrow the statute that prosecutors have relied in the cases over hundreds of rioters who took part in the January 6 Capitol attack for obstruction of an official proceeding.
The decision stems from the conviction of Joseph Fischer, a former Pennsylvania police officer, who took part in Trump’s so-called “Stop the Steal” rally on the morning of January 6 before then entering the Capitol with the mob.
Fischer was one of about 350 people federal prosecutors charged under a federal statute, 18 USC section 1512(c)(2), which says any person who “otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding, or attempts to do so” can be fined with up to 20 years in prison. The 350 people charged with the crime represent about a quarter of all those charged in connection to the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
The central question in the case was what kind of conduct exactly the language prohibited. The previous section of the law, 18 USC section 1512(c)(1), is more specific, saying anyone is guilty of a crime who “alters, destroys, mutilates, or conceals a record, document, or other object, or attempts to do so, with the intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding”.
Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts zeroed in on the word “otherwise” in the second part of the statute.
“Complex as subsection (c)(1) may look, it simply consists of many specific examples of prohibited actions undertaken with the intent to impair an object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding: altering a record, altering a document, concealing a record, concealing a document, and so on,” he wrote.
Guided by the basic logic that Congress would not go to the trouble of spelling out the list in (c)(1) if a neighboring term swallowed it up, the most sensible inference is that the scope of (c)(2) is defined by reference to (c)(1). To prove a violation of Section 1512(c)(2), the Government must establish that the defendant impaired the availability or integrity for use in an official proceeding of records, documents, objects, or as we earlier explained, other things used in the proceeding, or attempted to do so.
While the statute has been used to charge hundreds of people in January 6 cases, it rarely is the sole charge they face. The charge against Fischer, for example, was one of seven criminal charges filed against him.
Environmental, health advocacy groups, civil rights organizations and labor organizations have warned that undoing the Chevron decision would roll back a regulatory framework that for four decades has improved the health, safety and welfare of Americans.
It would also unravel efforts to protect the environment and fight the climate crisis.
The supreme court is “pushing the nation into uncharted waters as it seizes it seizes power from our elected branches of government to advance its deregulatory agenda,” Sambhav Sankar, a lawyer with the environmental group Earthjustice, said in a statement reported by AP. The statement continued:
The conservative justices are aggressively reshaping the foundations of our government so that the President and Congress have less power to protect the public, and corporations have more power to challenge regulations in search of profits. This ruling threatens the legitimacy of hundreds of regulations that keep us safe, protect our homes and environment, and create a level playing field for businesses to compete on.
Adam Schiff, the Democratic congressman for California, has criticized the supreme court’s decision to overturn the Chevron decision.
Schiff, in a post to X, warned that “our people and our planet will feel the consequences” of the court’s ruling today. He wrote:
This partisan Supreme Court just shredded another precedent, overturning the Chevron decision and weakening our ability to combat the climate crisis, hold corporations accountable, and much more.
This partisan Supreme Court just shredded another precedent, overturning the Chevron decision and weakening our ability to combat the climate crisis, hold corporations accountable, and much more.
— Adam Schiff (@RepAdamSchiff) June 28, 2024
Our people and our planet will feel the consequences.
Attorney general Merrick Garland, in his statement, said the court’s ruling would not affect the “vast majority” of the more than 1,400 defendants charged for their involvement in the January 6 Capitol attack.
There are no cases in which the Department charged a January 6 defendant only with the offense at issue in Fischer. For the cases affected by today’s decision, the Department will take appropriate steps to comply with the Court’s ruling.
Garland went on:
We will continue to use all available tools to hold accountable those criminally responsible for the January 6 attack on our democracy.
Merrick Garland 'disappointed' by court's January 6 ruling
Attorney general Merrick Garland has issued a statement following the supreme court’s ruling on an obstruction charge used in prosecutions of individuals involved in the January 6 Capitol attack.
The court’s decision “limits an important federal statute that the department [of justice] has sought to ensure that those most responsible for that attack face appropriate consequences, Garland’s statement reads.
From the Washington Post’s Aaron Blake:
Attorney General Garland on SCOTUS Jan. 6 ruling:
— Aaron Blake (@AaronBlake) June 28, 2024
"I am disappointed by today’s decision."
"The vast majority of the more than 1,400 defendants charged for their illegal actions on January 6 will not be affected by this decision." pic.twitter.com/q6eYccju4j
The Biden administration has previously warned that overturning the Chevron doctrine could have a “convulsive” impact on the functioning of government.
Voting as a block, the six rightwing justices who wield the supermajority threw out the supreme court’s own 1984 opinion in Chevron USA Inc v Natural Resources Defense Council, which has required the courts to defer to the knowledge of government experts in their reasonable interpretation of ambiguous laws.
In recent years, the Chevron doctrine has become a central target of rightwing groups that blame it for what they see as a proliferation of government regulations executed by unelected bureaucrats in the so-called “deep state”.
A key group behind the supreme court challenge, the New Civil Liberties Alliance, was founded with seed money from the oil billionaire Charles Koch.
In a raft of amicus briefs to the court, alliances of scientists, environmentalists and labor organizations warned that undoing Chevron would roll back a regulatory framework that for four decades has improved the health, safety and welfare of Americans. It would also unravel efforts to protect the environment and fight the climate crisis.
Chief justice John Roberts, in the ruling to overturn the historic Chevron decision, wrote:
Courts must exercise their independent judgment in deciding whether an agency has acted within its statutory authority.
Roberts wrote that the decision does not call into question prior cases that relied on the Chevron decision.
Justice Elena Kagan, writing in the dissent, said the ruling is “yet another example of the Court’s resolve to roll back agency authority, despite congressional direction to the contrary.” Kagan wrote:
A rule of judicial humility gives way to a rule of judicial hubris. In recent years, this court has too often taken for itself decision-making authority Congress assigned to agencies.
Jim Jordan, chair of the House judiciary committee, has issued a statement following the supreme court’s ruling that overturned the Chevron doctrine that for the past 40 years has guided the work of federal government in critical areas of public life.
Jordan’s statement reads:
Today’s decision fixes the decades-long error of handing vague and broad powers to unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats. The Supreme Court’s decision restores the Constitutional power to write the law to where it should be—with the elected representatives of the American people.
Supreme court to rule on Trump immunity claim on Monday
Chief justice John Roberts has announced that the court will issue the final opinions of its terms on Monday.
Four cases remain to be decided, including Donald Trump’s claim of immunity from criminal prosecution.
Here’s how the justices voted in the Fischer case, overturning a lower court ruling that had allowed a charge of corruptly obstructing an official against the former Pennsylvania police officer.
Court rules for January 6 rioter challenging obstruction charge
The supreme court has ruled in favor of a man who challenged an obstruction charge brought against him concerning the January 6 2021 attack on the Capitol, in a ruling that has potential implications for Donald Trump.
The justices ruled 6-3 to throw out a lower court’s decision that had allowed a charge of corruptly obstructing an official proceeding against defendant Joseph Fischer, a former Pennsylvania police officer. The justice directed the lower court to reconsider the matter.
The court’s ruling comes after homelessness in the US rose by 12% last year to its highest reported level.
The national 2023 homeless count, a rough estimate from a single day last year, found there were more than 653,000 people experiencing homelessness across the country. The figures are considered undercount.
The emergency is particularly acute in the west, where many of those without housing were counted living outside in makeshift shelters and cars, instead of in indoor shelter programs.
California counted more than 123,400 people living outside, accounting for nearly half of all unsheltered people in the US. California, Oregon, Hawaii, Arizona and Nevada had the highest rates of their homeless populations living outdoors.
Here is the supreme court’s full opinion on the decision that Grants Pass can fine and jail people sleeping outside even when they have no access to shelter.
The court ruled 6-3 that it is not “cruel and unusual punishment” under the eighth amendment to ban unhoused people from camping outside when they have nowhere else to go.
“Sleep is a biological necessity, not a crime. For some people, sleeping outside is their only option,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in the dissent.
The City of Grants Pass jails and fines those people for sleeping anywhere in public at any time, including in their cars, if they use as little as a blanket to keep warm or a rolled-up shirt as a pillow. For people with no access to shelter, that punishes them for being homeless. That is unconscionable and unconstitutional. Punishing people for their status is ‘cruel and unusual’ under the Eighth Amendment.
Here’s how the justices voted in the decision that overturns the Chevron doctrine, a move that deals a major blow to the regulatory powers of federal agencies.
Court overturns historic rule requiring it to consult experts
The supreme court has overturned one of its own most important precedents, the Chevron doctrine, that for the past 40 years has guided the work of federal government in critical areas of public life, from food and drug safety to environmental protection.
The decision throws out the supreme court’s own 1984 opinion in Chevron USA Inc v Natural Resources Defense Council, which has required the courts to defer to the expertise of government experts in their reasonable interpretation of ambiguous laws.
Updated
The Grants Pass case originated with a challenge by Debra Blake, a woman convicted of illegal camping in the small Oregon mountain town, where rents are rising and there is only one overnight shelter for adults.
Blake became the lead plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit that ultimately was decided in her favor by the ninth-circuit of appeals in 2022.
The court ruled that Grants Pass could not enforce its camping ban if it didn’t provide shelter, saying that criminalizing sleeping outside when shelter is unavailable constituted “cruel and unusual punishment”.
The decision applied to the western states of Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington. The Oregon town appealed to the supreme court.
Justice Neil Gorsuch, who authored the ruling, wrote:
Homelessness is complex. Its causes are many. So may be the public policy responses required to address it. The question this case presents is whether the Eighth Amendment grants federal judges primary responsibility for assessing those causes and devising those responses.
Gorsuch continued:
A handful of federal judges cannot begin to ‘match’ the collective wisdom the American people possess in deciding ‘how best to handle’ a pressing social question like homelessness.
Here’s how the justices voted in the supreme court’s ruling in favor of the city of Grants Pass in Oregon.
In a 6-3 decision, the court reversed a ruling by an appeals court that found outdoor sleeping bans amount to cruel and unusual punishment.
The justices voted on ideological lines:
Court rules unhoused people sleeping outside can be punished
The supreme court has ruled that a town in Oregon can fine and jail people sleeping outside even when they have no access to shelter, in a decision that stands to impact the approach to homelessness in cities across the US.
The justices ruled in favor of the city of Grants Pass, which in 2019 passed ordinances prohibiting sleeping and camping in its public parks and on its streets, banning unhoused people from “using a blanket, pillow, or cardboard box for protection from the elements”.
Supreme court releases decisions with Trump immunity case still outstanding
The US supreme court on Friday is poised to release more decisions. One of the major cases still outstanding involves whether Donald Trump is shielded from criminal charges related to his efforts to subvert the 2020 election.
The court term – which would typically end today – will continue until at least Monday, with the court announcing 1 July as an additional decision day.
We’re covering the action here and will bring you live updates as they happen.
