Yesterday, during an oral argument spanning nearly two and a half hours, the Supreme Court justices grilled the newly installed Solicitor General D. John Sauer over the Trump administration’s request that it be allowed to enforce a flagrantly unconstitutional executive order ending birthright citizenship. Sauer repeatedly refused to say how the case could be swiftly resolved.
In three decisions late this week, the Supreme Court upended American administrative law—the legal field that governs how government agencies interpret and implement legislation.
Administrative law is notoriously arcane and technical. But these cases will have enormous consequences for governmental functions as disparate as regulating pollution, guaranteeing safe workplaces, and administering Medicare.
Last Wednesday, over the course of three and a half hours of arguments, the conservative and liberal justices on the U.S. Supreme Court jousted over whether to overrule a 40-year-old case called Chevron v. National Resources Defense Council.
The Chevron case is famous among lawyers—it’s among the most cited cases of all time—because it established the principle that the courts should defer to federal agencies when they interpret the law in the course of carrying out their duties.
Updated at 4:37 p.m. ET on October 24, 2020.“I’d like to terminate Obamacare,” President Donald Trump said at Thursday night’s debate. He said he hoped that the Supreme Court, flush with six conservative justices after Judge Amy Coney Barrett’s likely confirmation, would take care of the job for him. “Now it’s in court, because Obamacare is no good.