Thread by @mjs_DC

The Supreme Court takes up three new cases: one about sovereign immunity, one about arbitration, and one about trains.

The arbitration case worries me—it's Paul Clement's effort to crush Private Attorneys General Act workarounds to mandatory arbitration. supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/20/2…

https://twitter.com/AHoweBlogger/status/1471125664661188610

Basically, after the Supreme Court barred states from limiting mandatory arbitration and class action waivers outright, some blue states passed Private Attorneys General Acts (PAGAs) to let plaintiffs file "representational litigation" on behalf of the state—a neat workaround.

Thanks to Private Attorneys General Acts, employees forced to accept mandatory arbitration and class action waivers can step into the state's shoes to file a "representative" lawsuit on behalf of themselves and other wronged employees.

Paul Clement wants to destroy that bypass.

Now the Supreme Court will decide whether plaintiffs can use Private Attorneys General Acts to vindicate their rights in court.

This should, in theory, be an easy case, since SCOTUS just blessed a MUCH more radical private enforcement mechanism ...

https://mobile.twitter.com/pulvinator/status/1471127981619920907

Indeed, Gorsuch explicitly analogized Texas' S.B. 8 to Private Attorneys General Acts, which is an unfair comparison since PAGAs do not attempt to nullify a constitutional right or empower vigilantes to collect bounties.
supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf…

But if the ultraconservative justices decide to be hypocrites and quash Private Attorneys General Acts, employees who suffered wage theft, discrimination, and other wrongs will be locked out of court and forced into expensive and biased individual arbitration.

So I'm worried.

SCOTUS this term (sorry)