SCOTUS rulings, airplane stowaway, Brazil's capybaras
Plus: The latest from Diddy's criminal trial in New York City.
The Supreme Court split along ideological lines as it ruled, contrary to 90 years of precedent, that President Donald Trump can fire top officials of the National Labor Relations Board and Merit Systems Protection Board.
“Because the Constitution vests the executive power in the president, he may remove without cause executive officers who exercise that power on his behalf, subject to narrow exceptions recognized by our precedents,” the majority wrote.
Joined by her two liberal colleagues, Justice Elena Kagan wrote in dissent that the order “favors the president over our precedent; and it does so unrestrained by the rules of briefing and argument.”
That wasn’t the president’s only win at the high court. As Kelsey Reichmann reports, SCOTUS also stripped protected status from nearly 350,000 Venezuelan migrants in a boon to Trump’s mass deportation scheme.
Chief Justice John Roberts also paused discovery in a FOIA case against the Department of Government Efficiency, allowing the administration to stave off any obligation to hand over records of its controversial cost-cutting methods to an ethics watchdog.
In California, however, the administration took a hit via preliminary injunction halting Trump’s move to fire thousands of federal agency employees, Edvard Pettersson reports. The administration signaled it will appeal to the Ninth Circuit.
Before the long weekend, here’s some more Courthouse News.
Here’s what else happened in court this week:
At Sean “Diddy” Combs’ federal trial, rapper Kid Cudi testified that his Porsche was intentionally set on fire with a homemade Molotov cocktail a month after Combs broke into his Hollywood Hills house. His reaction, he told prosecutors: “What the fuck?”
Trial this week also featured testimony from Danity Kane singer Dawn Richard and a special agent who searched Combs’ mansion. [Josh Russell]
U.S. education: A federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration from revoking Harvard University’s ability to enroll international students. Another judge blasted the administration’s efforts to shutter the Education Department. [Erik Uebelacker]
Genocide: Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez called Israel a “genocidal state” as the U.K., France and Canada threatened “concrete actions” over Israel's invasion of Gaza and its 11-week blockade of humanitarian aid while Palestinians suffer and starve to death. [Cain Burdeau]
Pregnant Workers Fairness Act: A Trump-appointed judge in Louisiana struck down a federal rule requiring employers to accommodate abortions. [Christina Van Waasbergen]
Mob arrests: Federal prosecutors in LA charged 13 members of the so-called Armenian Mafia with murder, kidnapping and stealing more than $83 million in Amazon shipments. [Edvard Pettersson]
Prison break: A New Orleans jail maintenance worker was charged with helping 10 prisoners escape by cutting off water to a cell. [Sabrina Canfield]
No flying free: It took jurors less than an hour to convict a 57-year-old woman who snuck onto a full Delta flight from NYC to Paris last year without a boarding pass or passport. [Nina Pullano]
Robot speech: AI chatbots are not protected by the First Amendment. [Alex Pickett]
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Top 8: What you’ve been reading
Jury in Diddy trial sees frames of videos from ‘freak off’ sex parties
13 ‘Armenian Mafia’ members arrested in connection to murder, $83M Amazon cargo theft
Wife of ‘Ghost Adventures’ star pleads guilty to plotting husband’s murder
Supreme Court finds Trump violated migrant due process rights with speedy deportations
Feds push Third Circuit for power to revoke green cards at any time
Trump-appointed judge blocks $11 billion in cuts to public health funding
Supreme Court nixes protective status for Venezuelan migrants
Florida judge rules AI chatbots not protected by First Amendment
As the southern Brazilian city of Florianópolis faces a rapid increase in the population of capybaras, clear legal guidelines are needed to manage risks to humans and other animals.
“The law protects capybaras, and that’s becoming a challenge for cities," an environmental lawyer told reporter Marília Marasciulo.
Rulings on our radar 📡
» Missouri Court of Appeals: The court upheld a $74 million judgment against UPS after one of its drivers missed a stop sign, causing an accident that resulted in a brain injury to an expecting mother’s two-month-old fetus.
» Louisiana Court of Appeal: A criminal defendant’s two counts of justice obstruction are reversed; he fidgeted with a digital voice recorder between investigator interviews but was not tampering with the device, and did not in fact erase any recordings.
» Northern District of California: Tesla lost a motion for judgment in misrepresentation claims filed by a family whose loved one was killed when the company’s Autopilot system failed and caused the car to crash into a parked fire truck.