For the first time in its 231-year history, the Supreme Court justices heard oral arguments remotely by phone and made the audio available live. The new setup went off largely without difficulties, but produced some memorable moments, including one justice forgetting to unmute and an ill-timed bathroom break. Here are the top five can't-miss moments from this week's history-making oral arguments. A second week of arguments begin on Monday at 10 a.m. ET. Here's a rundown of the cases and how to listen. 1. Justice Clarence Thomas speaks ... a lot Supreme Court oral arguments are verbal jousting matches. The justices pepper the lawyers with questions, interrupting counsel repeatedly and sometimes even interrupting each other. Justice Clarence Thomas, who has sat on the bench for nearly 30 years, has made his dislike of the chaotic process well known, at one point not asking a question for a full decade. But with no line of sight, the telephone arguments have to be rigidly organized, and

For the first time in its 231-year history, the Supreme Court justices heard oral arguments remotely by phone and made the audio available live. The new setup went off largely without difficulties, but produced some memorable moments, including one justice forgetting to unmute and an ill-timed bathroom break. Here are the top five can't-miss moments from this week's history-making oral arguments. A second week of arguments begin on Monday at 10 a.m. ET. Here's a rundown of the cases and how to listen. 1. Justice Clarence Thomas speaks ... a lot Supreme Court oral arguments are verbal jousting matches. The justices pepper the lawyers with questions, interrupting counsel repeatedly and sometimes even interrupting each other. Justice Clarence Thomas, who has sat on the bench for nearly 30 years, has made his dislike of the chaotic process well known, at one point not asking a question for a full decade. But with no line of sight, the telephone arguments have to be rigidly organized, and

Jeff Sessions, then the Attorney General, announced in 2017 the cancellation of the Obama-era policy known as DACA—Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. A number of plaintiffs sued, and their case goes to the Supreme Court next week. The New Yorker’s Jonathan Blitzer spoke with two of the attorneys who will argue for it. The noted litigator Ted Olson is generally a champion of conservative issues, but he is fighting the Trump Administration on this case. He told Blitzer, “It’s a rule-of-law case—not a liberal or conversative case—involving hundreds of thousands of individuals who will be hurt by an abrupt and unexplained and unjustified change in policy.” And Blitzer also spoke with Luis Cortez, a thirty-one-year-old from Seattle who is arguing his first Supreme Court case. Cortez is an immigration lawyer who is himself an undocumented immigrant protected by DACA status; if he loses his case, he will be at risk of deportation. 

The Supreme Court has temporarily put on hold the release of redacted grand jury material from the Russia investigation to a House panel. The Trump administration is trying to block the release. Last October, a district court judge ruled the Justice Department had to turn over the materials, which were blacked out, from former special counsel Robert Mueller's report into Russian interference in the 2016 election. An appeals court upheld the decision , but the Trump administration, hoping to keep the evidence secret, appealed to the Supreme Court. Chief Justice John Roberts' order temporarily stops the process. Lawyers for the House Judiciary Committee have until May 18 to file their response to the Justice Department's attempts to keep the materials from the House panel. The Justice Department had until Monday to turn over the material following the appeals court order. But on Thursday, the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to block Congress from seeking it, saying, "The

For the first time in its 231-year history, the Supreme Court justices heard oral arguments remotely by phone and made the audio available live. The new setup went off largely without difficulties, but produced some memorable moments, including one justice forgetting to unmute and an ill-timed bathroom break. Here are the top five can't-miss moments from this week's history-making oral arguments. A second week of arguments begin on Monday at 10 a.m. ET. Here's a rundown of the cases and how to listen. 1. Justice Clarence Thomas speaks ... a lot Supreme Court oral arguments are verbal jousting matches. The justices pepper the lawyers with questions, interrupting counsel repeatedly and sometimes even interrupting each other. Justice Clarence Thomas, who has sat on the bench for nearly 30 years, has made his dislike of the chaotic process well known, at one point not asking a question for a full decade. But with no line of sight, the telephone arguments have to be rigidly organized, and

Karen announces her new job, and Bradley and Karen discuss the recent USA Supreme Court decisions on patents.

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Show Notes:

Segment 0 (00:37)

• If you have not moved your RSS feed already away from softwarefreedom.org, and to faif.us, you should do that now! Here's links to the ogg RSS feed and mp3 RSS feed. New FaiF shows won't appear on softwarefreedom.org.
• Karen is now the Executive Director of the GNOME Foundation. (04:30)
• Bradley served on the GNOME Foundation Executive Director Hiring Committee, but resigned when Karen became a serious candidate. (05:13)
• Karen will continue as General Counsel of Question Copyright, and pro-bono counsel to Software Freedom Conservancy, and will also continue pro bono on some matters for SFLC. (06:30)
• Bradley has been working on GNU Bash. (07:34)
• Berlin's Tegel airport is closing soon. (14:40)
• Bradley mentioned that he incorrectly said in 0x11 that Red Hat doesn't provide sources publicly for RHEL. The RHEL SRPMS are actually on Red Hat's FTP site. (18:20)
• There are various identica threads on the RHEL issue from 0x11.(18:47)
• Bradley has previously explained the history of the term “punditocracy” in episode 0x0A. (27:46)

Segment 1 (28:58)

• Bradley and Karen discuss the USA Supreme Court decision in the Global-Tech Appliances, Inc. v. SEB S. A. case, on which SFLC submitted an amicus brief, which was previously discussed in FaiF Episode 0x05. (29:55)
• Bradley and Karen discuss the USA Supreme Court decision in the Microsoft Corp. v. i4i Ltd. Partnership case, on which the EFF submitted an amicus brief. (40:11)

Send feedback and comments on the cast to <oggcast@faif.us>. You can keep in touch with Free as in Freedom on our IRC channel, #faif on irc.freenode.net, and by following Conservancy on on Twitter and and FaiF on Twitter.

Free as in Freedom is produced by Dan Lynch of danlynch.org. Theme music written and performed by Mike Tarantino with Charlie Paxson on drums.

The content of this audcast, and the accompanying show notes and music are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike 4.0 license (CC BY-SA 4.0).

BLANTYRE, Malawi (AP) — Malawi’s Supreme Court confirmed Friday that last year’s presidential elections remain nullified and a fresh vote held in July. The Supreme Court upheld an earlier ruling by the southern African nation’s Constitutional Court that President Peter Mutharika’s 2019 election was invalid because of widespread irregularities. Mutharika, who leads the Democratic Progressive […]

The order from the state Supreme Court sets deadlines for parties in the case to file documents with the court throughout May and June, meaning a final decision might come this summer.

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — The Alaska Supreme Court rules an effort to recall Gov. Mike Dunleavy can move forward.

Passed by the City Council in 2016, the pioneering Seattle law requires landlords to publicize their criteria for prospective renters and to accept the first qualified applicant.

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court held Day Three of arguments by telephone with the audio available live to audiences around the world. The higher profile case of the two heard by the justices on Wednesday dealt with Trump administration rules that would allow more employers who cite a religious or moral objection to opt out […]

Jailed Cardinal George Pell will front Victoria's highest court today to appeal against his child sex abuse convictions, arguing proper process wasn't followed at trial and a reasonable jury could not have found him guilty of the crimes.

RBG is the oldest justice on the Supreme Court bench and her return to work will allay fears of a vacancy that would have allowed President Donald Trump to appoint another conservative judge.

Don't like that Facebook deleted your post? You can soon appeal to Facebook's oversight board.

South Australia's Chief Justice accuses the Attorney-General of undermining the administration of justice by failing to appoint two replacement judges to the Supreme Court.

The man accused of leaking The Afghan Files to the ABC speaks outside the ACT Supreme Court after making his first appearance since being committed for trial.

The Supreme Court of Victoria dismisses a bid by union boss John Setka to stop a vote to have him expelled from the Australian Labor Party, with the court ruling it does not have the jurisdiction to decide the matter.

A Facebook post offers what appears to be a fictitious excerpt from a real Supreme Court ruling to claim that COVID-19 emergency measures are illegal.

The Colorado Supreme Court on Monday overturned a lower court decision to put Senate candidate Michelle Ferrigno Warren's name on the June 30 Democratic primary ballot, siding with the Secretary of State's Office.

A unanimous Supreme Court on Thursday threw out the convictions of two political insiders involved in the “Bridgegate” scandal that ultimately derailed the 2016 presidential bid of then-New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. The justices found evidence of deception, corruption and abuse of power in the scheme, but said “not every corrupt act by state or local officials is a federal crime.”

Colorado lawmakers don't have to meet for 120 consecutive days during a declared public health emergency, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled in a narrow decision Wednesday.

A unanimous Supreme Court on Thursday threw out the convictions of two political insiders involved in the “Bridgegate” scandal that ultimately derailed the 2016 presidential bid of then-New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. The justices found evidence of deception, corruption and abuse of power in the scheme, but said “not every corrupt act by state or local officials is a federal crime.”

On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will consider yet another case regarding whether employers can decline to cover contraceptives in their health care plans. Reproductive rights groups warn that depending on the outcome of the case, tens of thousands of American women could lose vital contraceptive coverage. The case, Little Sisters of the Poor and Paul Home v. Pennsylvania, involves a 2017 Trump administration rule change that significantly broadened who can claim an exemption to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) contraceptive coverage mandate. The 2017 rule change, issued without a notice of proposed rulemaking or public comment opportunity, expanded the scope of religious exemptions and added an additional moral exemption claim. States had successfully challenged the rule, calling it a violation of the constitution, federal anti-discrimination law, and the Administrative Procedures Act (APA). A federal appeals court issued an injunction, preventing the Trump administration from enforcing the rule until the case was decided. Both the district court and the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed that states were likely to succeed on their APA claim. The court will now consider whether the Little Sisters of the Poor have standing and whether the Trump administration lawfully exempted religious objectors from the […]

The employee, who works at 320 Jay St. in Downtown Brooklyn, tested positive for the illness Thursday night, prompting the Vera Institute to tell a majority of their employees to work from home.

The justices give police the OK to stop drivers with nothing more than the barest fig leaf of a reason: that the car owner's license has been revoked.

The Supreme Court allows livestreaming of oral arguments. The next step should be cameras.

The court's slapdash intervention didn't serve the Constitution, just the GOP's chances in one election. Sound familiar?

Supreme Court arguments are broadcast live for the first time in history, via a phone hook-up to allow justices to hear cases during the pandemic's stay-at-home orders.

The New Jersey case involving aides to Gov. Chris Christie may have been a political scandal, but it was not a crime, justices say.

From a mysterious toilet flush to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg speaking from the hospital, here are the highlights — including audio clips — from a historic week for the high court.

The Bridgegate scandal was no crime, the Supreme Court ruled, tossing the convictions of two officials who caused a traffic jam as political punishment to then-Gov. Chris Christie’s enemies.

The court should livestream arguments even after the coronavirus crisis ends.

If employers aren't providing contraceptive coverage, there is no burden on their religious beliefs.

The Supreme Court is allowing the Republican Party to suppress the vote. This bodes very poorly for democracy in America.

Airport chief told MPs earlier this week that expansion might not be back on the agenda for a decade

The federal government said millions will receive payouts. But some Indiana residents worried that their money could be taken by debt collectors.

3 October 2019

3 October 2019

The fate of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program has ping ponged between all three branches of government. But with the Supreme Court poised to decide DACA's future in spring 2020, Congress may finally be forced to act to resolve the status of DREAMers after nearly two decades of considering various DREAM Act bills. Could this break the long stalemate Congress has had on passing substantive immigration legislation, and pave the way for other actions?

The Supreme Court on Friday granted a Justice Department request to temporarily block release of secret grand jury material from special counsel Robert Mueller's probe to Congress.

A pair of cases being heard by the high court will likely determine whether job-discrimination laws apply to tens of thousands of teachers at religious schools.

A pair of cases being heard by the high court will likely determine whether job-discrimination laws apply to tens of thousands of teachers at religious schools.

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review a decision by Montana's highest court that struck down a tuition tax-credit program allowing tuition scholarships to benefit students at private religious schools.

In a case from Montana, conservative justices suggested they were inclined to rule for parents who seek to reinstate a state tax credit funding scholarships for use at religious schools.

The U.S. Supreme Court will arguments in Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, a case that's been closely watched by both friends and opponent of private school vouchers and tax-credit scholarship programs.

Gov. Christie has pushed to flatten the state's funding formula so that the state's impoverished urban districts would get the same amount of money wealthy suburban districts get.

Six school systems, the Pennsylvania Association of Rural and Small Schools, and the NAACP Pennsylvania State Conference want to change the state's school-funding system, which allows for wide spending gaps between low- and high-income districts.

The state's highest court allowed some claims brought on behalf of relatives of victims of the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School to proceed against the firearms industry.