The Supreme Court vacates a lower court decision that had allowed New York to mandate abortion coverage on health insurance plans, sending the case back down in light of Fulton v. Philadelphia. supremecourt.gov/orders/courtor… 
New York exempts churches from the abortion coverage mandate (obviously), but other religious employers demanded an exemption for their health insurance plans, as well. SCOTUS is pretty clearly signaling that the lower courts should grant it.
https://twitter.com/mjs_DC/status/1455166613087477765
A pretty stunning order from the Supreme Court's six-justice conservative majority: They refuse to vacate a decision upholding a capital sentence even though *the government* asked them to because the defendant is probably intellectually disabled. supremecourt.gov/orders/courtor…
This is how the Supreme Court's conservatives effectively overturn precedents prohibiting capital punishment for intellectually disabled defendants: Just refuse to intervene when an intellectually disabled person is sentenced to death, even if the government concedes it's unjust.
The defendant here is simply asking for the opportunity to demonstrate that he has an intellectual disability that renders him constitutionally ineligible for the death penalty. The government—the prosecution!—agrees that he deserves that chance. SCOTUS conservatives say: Nope.
This is The Game: SCOTUS' conservatives don't have to explicitly overturn every precedent they dislike. They can simply refuse to apply it, and constitutional rights disappear one by one as a result of their inaction. Another recent example: slate.com/news-and-polit…
All that said: Biden can commute this capital sentence, and there's no excuse not to. *His own Justice Department* agrees the defendant was unjustly denied the chance to prove that his execution will be unconstitutional. Clemency is the obvious remedy to what SCOTUS did today.
A very interesting opinion from Gorsuch, joined by Sotomayor, arguing that SCOTUS should decide whether the public has a right to access portions of decisions issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
"If these matters are not worthy of our time, what is?"
"If these matters are not worthy of our time, what is?"
Gorsuch's jurisprudence truly induces whiplash. He has the most idiosyncratic views on civil liberties of any justice sitting today. Terrible on capital punishment, habeas, voting rights, and so much else, but then veers left on public access to surveillance court decisions.
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