The U.S. Supreme Court has finished its latest term with many blockbuster decisions, touching on everything from healthcare coverage to school reading lists.
On Friday, the court issued a final decision for its 2024 term of office before it took several months off. The nine justice on that bench will be reconvened in October.
But before they left, the judge made a headline. Amid a major victory over President Donald Trump’s administration, the six conservative majority have decided to limit the court’s ability to issue universal injunctions that would hinder enforcement actions across the country.
Trump has long accused court injunctions of attacks on his administrative authorities.
In the other two rulings, the conservative majority of the Supreme Court was once again united. One decision allowed parents to opt out of school material that includes LGBTQ themes, while the other gave Indigenous people to Texas to place barriers to prevent young people from watching online porn.
However, decisions on healthcare access made some conservative justice consistent with three left-wing colleagues. This is an overview of the final ruling for 2024.
The court upholds the requirements for preventive care
In the case of Kennedy v Braidwood Management, the Supreme Court saw a normal ideological schizophrenia.
Three Conservative Justice – Amy Coney Barrett, Brett Kavanaugh and John Roberts joined the court’s liberal branch represented by Sonia Sotomayor, Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elena Kagan.
What is at stake was the government’s task force’s ability to determine what kind of preventive care the country’s insurance providers must cover.
This was the latest incident that challenged the constitutionality of affordable care laws. This is a law passed under former President Barack Obama to expand access to healthcare.
This case focused on a section of the law that allowed a panel of health experts under the Department of Health and Human Services to decide which preventive services should be covered for free.
However, groups of individuals and Christian-owned businesses were challenging the legality of their task force.
They argued that the panel of experts was a violation of the appointment clause, part of the constitution, and part of the constitution requiring that certain political appointees be elected by the president and approved by the Senate.
The group had previously secured an injunction against the task force’s decision to cover HIV preventive medications as preventive care.
That particular injunction was not weighted in the Supreme Court decision. But writing for the majority, Judge Kavanaugh declared that the task force was a constitution because it consisted of “underrepresented officers” who did not require Senate approval.
Court nods to age restrictions for porn in Texas
Several states, including Texas, require users to verify their age before visiting porn websites, with the aim of protecting minors from inappropriate material.
But Texas law is based on a Supreme Court microscope on Friday in a case called Free Speech Coalition v Ken Paxton.
The Free Speech Union is a nonprofit organization representing workers in the adult entertainment industry. They sued Paxton, Texas Attorney General, and argued that the Aging Act attenuates the initial right to amendments protecting the right to free expression, free associations and privacy.
The plaintiffs noted the risks raised, including the possibility of identifying information such as date of birth and sensitive data, as well as the possibility of leaking the risk of personally identifying information online. For example, the American Civil Liberties Union warned that Texas laws “take anonymous people away.”
Judge Clarence Thomas, who wrote for the conservative majority of the Supreme Court, acknowledged that “submission to verify age is a burden on exercise of the first amendment.”
However, he added completely that “adults have no first amendment rights to avoid age verification.” The majority supported Texas law.
The court declares that children can withdraw from LGBTQ school materials
The conservative supermajority of the Supreme Court also continued their winning streak of religious freedom victory, with the decision at Mahmoud v Taylor.
The case was centered around the Montgomery County Board of Education in Maryland, and a book about LGBTQ themes was approved for use in the elementary school curriculum.
For example, one text was a picture book called Love, Violet. It told the story of a young girl calling the courage to give her female classmates Valentine’s Day. Another book entitled Pride Puppy follows a child searching for her lost dog during the annual parade to celebrate LGBTQ Pride.
Parents of children in the school district opposed the material on religious reasons, and some books, such as Pride Puppy, eventually retreated.
However, the board ultimately announced that it would refuse to allow parents to opt out of approved material based on the disruption of the learning environment.
Some educators also argued that allowing children to opt out of LGBTQ materials would stigmatize those identified as part of their community, and that LGBTQ people are simply facts of life.
In the majority decision, Judge Samuel Alito argued that the board’s policies “a “completely inclusive environment” that the board argues will nurture and the religious views of parents are not welcome.”
“The curriculum itself also betrays attempts to impose ideological conformance on certain views on sexuality and gender,” writes Alito.
The court has restricted the use of national injunctions
Perhaps the biggest decision of the day was another decision decided by the conservative supermajority of the Supreme Court.
In the case of Trump v. Casa, the Trump administration appealed the use of a national injunction to the highest court on the land.
At risk was the executive order that Trump signed on his first day in his second term. The order sought to curb the notion of birthright citizenship, which is the right, approved under the amendment to Article 14 of the US Constitution.
Previously, birthright citizenship was applied to almost anyone born in the soil of the United States. Children receive US citizenship regardless of their parents’ nationality.
But Trump accused the application of birthright citizenship of being too broad. On his executive order, he placed restrictions on birthright citizenship depending on whether his parents were undocumented immigrants.
Legal challenges erupted as soon as the executive order was made public, citing the Supreme Court’s precedent that upheld citizenship, regardless of parental nationality. Federal courts in states such as Maryland and Washington quickly issued nationwide injunctions to prevent the executive order from coming into effect.
The Supreme Court on Friday did not assess the merits of Trump’s order on birthrights. But it evaluated the Trump administration’s petition claiming that the national injunction is a case of judicial overreach.
The conservative supermajority is on his side with Trump, saying that injunctions are not generally universal and should instead focus on the relief of certain plaintiffs at hand. However, one possible exception is a class action lawsuit.
The court’s latest addition and Trump appointee, Amy Connie Barrett, wrote the majority decision.
“No one objectes to the executives’ obligation to comply with the law,” she wrote. “However, the judiciary does not have the unlimited power to enforce this obligation. In fact, sometimes laws prohibit the judiciary from doing so.”
