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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. I'm June Grosso. Every

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Speaker 1: day we bring you insight and analysis into the most

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Speaker 1: important legal news of the day. You can find more

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Speaker 1: episodes of the Bloomberg Law Podcast on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud

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Speaker 1: and on Bloomberg dot com slash podcasts. This Supreme Court

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Speaker 1: term includes more controversial cases and in prior terms, and

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Speaker 1: cases testing the bounds of presidential powers may be added

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Speaker 1: to the docket. The Court has already heard oral arguments

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Speaker 1: in cases involving LGBT rights, DOCCA and the Clean Water Act.

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Speaker 1: Here with the look at some other hot button cases

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Speaker 1: coming up is Bloomberg New Supreme Court reporter Greg's store. Greg.

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Speaker 1: Let's start with one of the most controversial topics, abortion

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Speaker 1: tell us. About the case the Court is going to hear.

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Speaker 1: It will be the first real sign of how aggressive

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Speaker 1: the Roberts Court wants to be in terms of rolling

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Speaker 1: back abortion rights. This is a case involving hospital admitting privileges,

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Speaker 1: a requirement in louis Insiana that doctors have those if

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Speaker 1: they're going to perform abortions. The Supreme Court struck down

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Speaker 1: a couple of years ago a very similar law in

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Speaker 1: Texas but that was before the composition of the court change,

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Speaker 1: before Brett Kavanar replaced Anthony Kennedy. And there's at least

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Speaker 1: the possibility now that the Supreme Court will go the

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Speaker 1: other way in the Louisiana law, in which case we

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Speaker 1: will be able to say that the Roberts Court is

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Speaker 1: going to allow more restrictions on abortions than the Court

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Speaker 1: had previously greg There are a number of fetal heartbeat

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Speaker 1: abortion bands tied up in lower courts in several states,

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Speaker 1: and recently a federal judge blocked an Alabama abortion band

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Speaker 1: that would have made the procedure of felony in nearly

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Speaker 1: all cases. Is there any chance that the Court might

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Speaker 1: take up another abortion case this term, It seems very unlikely.

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Speaker 1: There was another abortion case that was teed up for

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Speaker 1: them to take this term if they wanted to, that

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Speaker 1: they could have heard alongside the Louisiana case that involves

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Speaker 1: and Indiana law that requires women to wait eighteen hours

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Speaker 1: after they've had an ultrasound before they can get an abortion. Instead,

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Speaker 1: the Court decided it was going to hold that case

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Speaker 1: until it decided the Louisiana case, or at least that's

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Speaker 1: what it appears the Court has done so. The indications

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Speaker 1: are that the Court is not especially eager to take

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Speaker 1: up a lot of abortion cases, and certainly not one

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Speaker 1: that is as big as what you just described. Their

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Speaker 1: one that would call in the question the core abortion

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Speaker 1: right and the review weight and casey rulings that said

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Speaker 1: that the Constitution does protect abortion rights. Now, the Court

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Speaker 1: is going to hear its first Second Amendment case since

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Speaker 1: it throughout Chicago handgun ban in It seems as if

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Speaker 1: the justices, or at least some of them, really wanted

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Speaker 1: to hear this case since New York argued it was moved. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is a New York set of restrictions on where

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Speaker 1: you can take your license can gun, even if it's

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Speaker 1: unloaded and locked. New York City has barred people from

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Speaker 1: taking that anywhere except to a license shooting range within

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Speaker 1: the city, and some people sued saying, hey, we want

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Speaker 1: to be able to take our gun to our shooting

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Speaker 1: range outside the city. We want to take it to

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Speaker 1: a second home somewhere else. The Supreme Court agreed to

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Speaker 1: hear of the case, and then the city changed its

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Speaker 1: rules and is arguing the Court should just dismiss the

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Speaker 1: case because it's no longer alive controversy. The Court has

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Speaker 1: refused so far to dismiss it. It said it will

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Speaker 1: consider arguments about whether it should when it hears arguments

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Speaker 1: in the case December two. All in the cases are

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Speaker 1: though that the Court is probably going to issue a ruling.

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Speaker 1: It could end up being a narrow ruling. This is

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Speaker 1: a particular type of law, not one that is in

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Speaker 1: effect elsewhere in the country. But because it's been so

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Speaker 1: long since they've ruled on the Second Amendment, it could

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Speaker 1: still be very important. Tuition at religious schools is going

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Speaker 1: to come up, and that's always a controversial topic. It is.

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Speaker 1: It's a case from Montana, and it's actually kind of

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Speaker 1: kind of complicated. I'll try to make it as simple

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Speaker 1: as I can. Montana has a program that allows tax

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Speaker 1: credits for people who donate the organizations that give scholarships

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Speaker 1: the private schools, and the controversy is over whether that

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Speaker 1: money can be used at religious schools. Some parents sued

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Speaker 1: saying we ought to be able to use that money

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Speaker 1: at religious schools. And what happened was the Montana Supreme

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Speaker 1: Court looked at its own state constitution and said our

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Speaker 1: constitution bans that money from going to religious schools. So

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Speaker 1: we're going to throw out the entire program. And now

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Speaker 1: the Supreme Court has the case, and one of the

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Speaker 1: big questions is whether Montana is violating the Constitution with

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Speaker 1: that provision in its state constitution, whether that discriminates against religion.

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Speaker 1: If the Court were to say that does discriminate against religion,

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Speaker 1: it could have a very big effect on other states

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Speaker 1: that have similar provisions in their constitution and are trying

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Speaker 1: to limit public money going to religious organizations. The Court

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Speaker 1: has fairly recently said that it will take up a

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Speaker 1: case involving the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the consumer watchdog

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Speaker 1: of a country. What's at stake there, Yeah, that in

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Speaker 1: theory could abolish the entire CFPB. More likely, what's really

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Speaker 1: at stake is what the Trump administration is arguing, which

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Speaker 1: is that the director the cfp B, who, as it's

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Speaker 1: originally set up, could only be fired for specified reasons

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Speaker 1: for cause according to the statute. The Trump administration wants

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Speaker 1: the president to be able to fire the director for

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Speaker 1: any reason. They argue that it was it's unconstitutional to

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Speaker 1: violation of separation of powers not to have that level

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Speaker 1: of accountability. That's the sort of relatively narrow approach to

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Speaker 1: the Supreme Court in John Roberts in particular, has taken

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Speaker 1: in a variety of other contexts where they see a

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Speaker 1: constitutional problem but try to fix it without throwing out

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Speaker 1: an entire major statute that Congress has passed. That's what

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Speaker 1: the Trump administration is asking to do in this case.

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Speaker 1: Will the Court take up a case involving President trump

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Speaker 1: accounting firm being required to turn over tax records because

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Speaker 1: President Trump's attorney has said they're going to appeal the

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Speaker 1: Second Circuit decision that the accounting firm has to turn

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Speaker 1: over his financial records. Is the Court likely to take

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Speaker 1: that case. It's certainly possible. There's a lot that still

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Speaker 1: remains to be seen. There is an agreement between New

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Speaker 1: York officials and President Trump's attorneys that the state says

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Speaker 1: it won't try to enforce the subpoena for a little while,

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Speaker 1: giving the President time to ask the Supreme Court to

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Speaker 1: review it. The Supreme Court undoubtedly will recognize that that

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Speaker 1: case is more urgent than the average one, that there

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Speaker 1: needs to be some sort of resolution. On the other hand,

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Speaker 1: it's entirely possible the Court will recognizing what a hot

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Speaker 1: political case. It is, you know, may not be eager

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Speaker 1: to take it up, even though it is the president.

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Speaker 1: It's him and his private capacity, and we don't yet

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Speaker 1: know whether the Trump administration the Justice Department will also

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Speaker 1: ask the Supreme Court to take it up. So there

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Speaker 1: may be ways in which the Court can say, you know,

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Speaker 1: we don't need to jump into the middle of this.

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Speaker 1: It is more politically challenging then we want to get

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Speaker 1: into right now, and so we just won't take it.

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Speaker 1: It seems this term has more than the ordinary number

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Speaker 1: of hot button issues and cases, cases that involve controversies

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Speaker 1: at the country is divided on does it seem to

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Speaker 1: you as if this is a more controversial term than others.

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Speaker 1: It does to a large degree. There are a couple

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Speaker 1: of cases that have been argued early in the term

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Speaker 1: that add to that. A case involving whether settle job

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Speaker 1: discrimination law covers LGBT employees, a case involving whether Donald

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Speaker 1: Trump can resend the DACCA program defer deportation program. Those

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Speaker 1: are ones that the Court could have taken up last

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Speaker 1: term if it wanted to, but sort of pick the

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Speaker 1: can down the road to put him into this term.

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Speaker 1: And then you add on top of it, all the

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Speaker 1: other cases we've been talking about. You know, even if

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Speaker 1: the Court likes to defer some hot button issues, sometimes

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Speaker 1: it's really hard for them to do that. And it

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Speaker 1: just so happens that this term, it seems to be

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Speaker 1: an awful lot of them, Many of them will be decided,

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Speaker 1: you know, right in the middle of the presidential campaign,

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Speaker 1: and that just can't be avoided. Thanks Gregg, that's Bloomberg

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Speaker 1: New Supreme Court reporter Greg Store. Thanks for listening to

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Speaker 1: the Bloomberg Law podcast. You can subscribe and listen to

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Speaker 1: the show on Apple podcast, SoundCloud, and on Bloomberg dot

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Speaker 1: com slash podcast. I'm June Brasso. This is Bloomberg. Yeah,