06 27 24 DU Law Prof Ian Farrell talks about recent and pending SCOTUS rulings

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
It is Colorado's Morning News. MartyLenz Ginagande, Good morning. We're waiting
more Supreme Court decisions and opinions tobe released here and the next we should
say, few moments or so.And of course there were some significant opinions
released yesterday. Yeah, and joiningus now on the Kawa Common Spirit Health
hotline is do you Constitutional Law?Professor Ian Ferrell. Professor Ferrel, thank
you so much for your time,as always are You're welcome to always a

(00:22):
pleasure to be on with you.Hey, it's only been maybe fifteen minutes
after several issues have already been opinionshave already been issued by the US Supreme
Court. We don't expect you toread ninety eight pages of a ruling in
just a matter of minutes. However, looking at the ones that we've seen
so far, do any stand outto you at this time? Sofa,
None of the opinions released today seemedto be the blockbuster cases that we're really

(00:46):
waiting for, and so three orfour jumped to my jump to mind.
One was a case in which thecourt temporarily blocked an EPA rule to limit
air pollution. And that's just becausethe case is continuing in the lower court,
so that isn't a huge issue.Another one is interesting in that it

(01:07):
relates to the opioid crisis and itdeals with the situation where the federal government
had reached an agreement in bankruptcy thatwould have released the family that owns the
Purdue Foumer Company from future liability andso forth. The court rejected that,

(01:30):
I guess the decision that the oragreement that was made between the parties as
saying that the Bankruptcy Act didn't allow. And then there's also an opinion saying
that the Seventh Amendment requirement of ajury trial applies to certain sec rulings.
So all of those are important intheir own respect, but not the ones

(01:53):
we really are waiting for at themoment. Let's talk about one of the
ones from yesterday, and that wasessentially the government has the right to remove
or ban social media posts that theybelieve our fake are inaccurate kids along those
lines of free speech and information.Anything about that decision shurprise you, disappoint
you, shock you, you know, make you feel uncomfortable with I know

(02:19):
the case you're referring to is acase called murthy, evensory and it was
really about the standing the of theplaintiffs. And so the plaintiffs were complaining
as a first Amendments challenge to thefederal government informally communicating with social media companies
about their social media policies, andthe majority rule that, look, you

(02:43):
have these certain policies that you're complainingabout, but you haven't demonstrated that there's
any connection between these informal discussions,informal communications and the policies themselves. Therefore,
you don't have any essentially lead tostand on in terms of even making
a claim on this. There's anumber of major opinions that we're still waiting

(03:05):
for, which really just leads upto tomorrow morning at this point, one
being that ruling allowing emergency abortions.However, it looked like we almost had
a preview of how the Supreme Courtmay be leaning in favor of the emergency
abortions in this Idaho abortion case.Is it pretty cut and dry that that
would be the ruling or is aleak a leak and you can only speculate.

(03:27):
Yeah, there was a really bizarresituation in which an opinion in that
case was quote unquote inadvertently uploaded tothe Supreme Court website. I can't imagine
that they would have accidentally uploaded anopinion that was like a draft from earlier
in the process. So and theycertainly didn't say that, And so I
think that we could be pretty confidentthat that version of the opinion is in

(03:51):
fact the final opinion. And ifthat's the case, it's a win for
people who believe in in abortion rightsbecause it ruled that emergency abortions could go
ahead in the state of Idaho despitethat state's very strict anti abortion laws,
because the state laws are preempted bya federal law that requires hospitals to provide

(04:16):
emergency medical care. I am nota conspiracy theorist, and maybe it's coincidence,
But if I recall Professor, wasn'tthere a similar leak regarding Roe v.
Wade that got out there in away to pre signal maybe what's coming
down so to me, to signalto both sides they and what they can
anticipate from the court similar stance onthe similar issue, though you know,

(04:38):
more specific case. Is one morebriade than the other. Yeah, that's
a really interesting connection. I'm alsonot a conspiracy theorist, and there are
some differences between the situations. Inthe first case, in the case that
Dobbs that overruled the ro v.Wade, the leak was done by somebody

(04:59):
into giving it to a media individual, whereas this is just uploaded to the
Supreme Court's website. And the opinionin Dobs was clearly a draft opinion,
and it was leaked a long timebefore the opinion was actually going to be
released, And some of the speculationhas been that it was potentially released by

(05:26):
one of the Conservative justices to tryand pressure the other Conservative justices to come
on board. I don't see thatas happening, mainly because of the timeline
here, but you're right it wouldat least be a very strange coincidence,
and Professor Ferrell not putting you onthe spot at this moment. But it
seems like we just got the rulingof the Moyle versus us, which is

(05:48):
that emergency abortions one, and itsounds like it probably will be similar to
what we saw in that abortion leak. But in wrapping up with you and
more looking at what we could seetomorrow, which it could be a news
dump of a lot of major opinions. What are some of the ones that
listeners should have their eyes on.Yeah, you guys are clearly better at
uploading your websites than I. Well, but yeah, So there's still at

(06:14):
least ten more cases to be releasedtomorrow, and the most important of that,
obviously is the presidential immunity case trumpBus, But there are a couple
of other cases that I think you'reinteresting as well. One is sort of,
sort of less exciting to the generalpublic, but it's a couple of
cases involving Chevron deference, and thatcase requires courts at the moment to defer

(06:40):
to federal agencies about the extent ofthose agencies authorities. And so this has
been something that conservatives have long triedto overturn because it gives a lot of
power to federal agencies that they wouldn'thave if the case wasn't there. And
then another case that I think isespecially interesting with respect to Colorado is a

(07:01):
case called Grant's Path, and thatlooks at whether anti camping wars, so
called our own constitutional if there aren'tenough shelter beds available for everyone experiencing homelessness,
and so, depending on how thatdecision plays out, that could have

(07:21):
consequences for laws in various municipalities inColorado. I'm going to fit in one
more question. I know we're runningalong with you, and I appreciate your
time, professor, but I dohave to ask about the immunity case.
Is there intent on the Court tonot release it, say, this morning
today before the presidential debate. Arethey waiting to do it on a Friday
news dump? Specifically, is thereany connection correlation with that at all because

(07:43):
of the time we're in and becauseof the events of this evening that they
would wait with the immunity decision.I mean, that wouldn't surprise me.
But I think it's also not uncommonfor the Court to wait till the very
last day to issue its most controversialopinions in anything. Do you constitutional law,

(08:05):
professor, it's Ian Ferrell. ProfessorFerrell, thank you so much for
your insight on this. As always, jeez, and as expected. The
final opinion handed down today is theUS Supreme Court allowing emergency abortion access in
Idaho when a woman's health is atrisk. That was the one that was
leaked in some fashion yesterday. They'restill comparing the two because there's dozens of
documents to see how similar they are, but the ruling is the same.