Cases and Controversies

By Bloomberg Law

What's Cases and Controversies about?

Bloomberg Law's Cases and Controversies brings you the latest from the Supreme Court. Each week we preview oral arguments at the Court or feature in-depth interviews. We explore critical legal issues with Supreme Court advocates, judges, law professors, lawyers, and legal journalists. Hosts: Kimberly Robinson and Greg Stohr.

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Cases and Controversies episodes:

04.19.2024
Idaho Abortion Ban Getting Supreme Court Review
The Supreme Court will hear its second abortion case of the term, this time on Idaho’s ban and the reach of federal law in anti-abortion states. The Biden administration argued that the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act requires hospitals...
04.12.2024
US Supreme Court Considers Novel Charges Over Jan. 6
The Supreme Court will consider whether prosecutors went too far in charging Jan. 6 rioters with an Enron-era statute, in a case that could have implications for the criminal prosecution of former President Donald Trump. Former Boston Police officer Joseph Fischer,...
04.05.2024
Homeless Dispute Getting Rare Supreme Court Hearing
A fight over an Oregon city’s attempt to outlaw homelessness would make headlines in any other term. But the case, said to be the first of its kind in decades and set for argument April 22, has flown under the...
03.29.2024
Supreme Court Abortion Pill Argument Light on Merits
Arguments in the challenge to the abortion drug mifepristone suggest the Supreme Court will nix the dispute on technical standing grounds. Justices from across the ideological spectrum suggested the anti-abortion doctors at the center of the case were asking too much. Cases...
03.22.2024
Government Censorship Focus of Supreme Court Disputes
Lower court rulings that largely halted Biden administration communication with social media companies to combat misinformation about Covid and the 2020 election faced skepticism from Supreme Court justices. Cases and Controversies hosts Kimberly Robinson and Lydia Wheeler break down the March...
03.15.2024
Supreme Court Urged to Take Up Fight Over Trans Youth
The Biden administration and others are asking the Supreme Court to weigh in on state bans on gender-affirming care for transgender kids despite its refusal to resolve related disputes over youth sports and student bathroom use. The ACLU’s Li Nowlin-Sohl joins...
03.08.2024
Divide Surfaces in Supreme Court Trump Ballot Ruling
Headlines touting the Supreme Court’s unanimous decision to keep Donald Trump on the Colorado presidential ballot obscured division among the justices over the Constitution’s insurrection clause. UC Davis School of Law professor Ashutosh Bhagwat joins Cases and Controversies to explain what...
03.01.2024
Supreme Court Digs into Guns, Social Media, and Trump Immunity
It was a big week at the Supreme Court with arguments over social media and guns, and a grant on Donald Trump’s bid for immunity from prosecution over alleged election interference. Cases and Controversies hosts Kimberly Robinson and Lydia Wheeler detail...
02.23.2024
Social Media Cases Could Impact Public Discourse Online
The Supreme Court will hear arguments Monday in fights over laws in Florida and Texas that seek to stop social media platforms from censoring conservative speech online. At issue are provisions that require platforms to keep up certain kinds of content...
02.16.2024
Supreme Court Weighs Next Steps on Trump Immunity Bid
Supreme Court justices have a number of things to sort out before deciding whether to take up or reject the question of whether Donald Trump can be prosecuted for election interference. Should the justices give Trump another crack at the DC...
02.09.2024
Historic Trump Ballot Argument Explored Numerous Paths
Supreme Court arguments in Colorado’s bid to remove Donald Trump from the state’s presidential primary ballot tested a number of legal principles and scenarios. The justices dove into the potential impact on their deliberations of a case from the 1860s as...
02.02.2024
High Court ‘Friends’ Urge Caution in Trump Ballot Case
The Supreme Court will hold a special session Feb. 8 to consider whether Colorado can keep Donald Trump off the primary ballot. Notre Dame Law School professor Derek Muller joins Cases and Controversies to explain the legal issues at play and...
01.26.2024
Trump’s Supreme Court Case Raises Security Questions
Supreme Court justices will soon hear argument on Donald Trump’s appeal to stay on the Colorado primary ballot, but another question for the court is whether the former president will attend the proceedings. Trump has done so in other court hearings...
01.19.2024
With Chevron Doctrine Likely to Fall, What Comes Next?
The conservative-led Supreme Court seems primed to nix a bedrock principle governing the relationship between administrative agencies and federal courts. Cases and Controversies hosts Kimberly Robinson and Lydia Wheeler break down the 3 1/2-hour argument on Jan. 17 in Relentless Inc. v....
01.12.2024
Trump, Agency Power Fights Tee-Up Historic Court Term
Big challenges to federal agency regulatory powers at the Supreme Court could end up as a footnote to what’s shaping up to be a momentous term. Hosts Lydia Wheeler and Kimberly Robinson discuss how the court set up a historic sitting...
01.05.2024
No Fly, Property Rights Start Supreme Court New Year
The Supreme Court’s January sitting starts Monday and most of the focus will center on administrative law cases. But important arguments on government gamesmanship and property rights are also on tap. Anastasia Boden of the Cato Institute joins Cases and Controversies...
12.22.2023
Tense Exchanges, Big Supreme Court Argument Moments
Arguing at the Supreme Court is no walk in the park. The justices ask tough questions and give hypotheticals that can trip up even the most prepared advocate. As the year comes to a close, Cases and Controversies hosts Lydia Wheeler...
12.15.2023
Grants in Abortion, Jan. 6 Add to Momentous Term
The Supreme Court added two high profile disputes to its docket and suggested it will fast-track a third involving former President, adding to an already consequential term. Hosts Kimberly Robinson, Lydia Wheeler, and Greg Stohr discuss the new cases on access...
12.08.2023
O’Connor’s Trailblazing Career Marked By Grit, Charisma
Justice Sandra Day O’Connor solidified her legacy as the first female jurist to sit on the Supreme Court. One of her former clerks, Tamarra Matthews Johnson, joins Cases and Controversies to discuss her former boss as a justice and as a...
12.01.2023
Justices Suggest Narrow Ruling on SEC Enforcement
The Supreme Court appeared likely to require the Securities and Exchange Commission to bring certain enforcement actions in federal court, rather than resolve them in-house. The only question appeared to be whether the justices' ruling will ensnare other federal agencies. Cases and...
11.17.2023
Supreme Court’s First Ethics Code Gets Cool Reception
The Supreme Court’s inaugural code of conduct, issued under pressure from transparency advocates and Congress, does little to quell concern over how the justices conduct themselves on ethics, critics say. The Brennan Center’s Jennifer Ahearn joins Cases and Controversies to talk...
11.09.2023
Justices Weigh New Gun Test in Domestic Violence Case
A lopsided Supreme Court appeared ready to side with the Biden administration in a Second Amendment challenge to a federal gun ban for those subject to domestic violence restraining orders. The real issue for the justices is how to apply their...
11.03.2023
Justices Seek Balance for Online Speech Protections
The justices searched for the proper line to balance free speech protections for public officials and their constituents online, in the first of several disputes involving social media this term. The Electronic Frontier Foundation's David Greene joins Cases and Controveries to...
10.20.2023
Barrett Rocks Out As Justices Return to Courtroom
Justice Amy Coney Barrett made news this week when she became the latest justice to back a high court ethics code, but her tale of rocking out to the turn-of-the-century hit "Who Let the Dogs Out" in the stately halls...
10.13.2023
Justices Take Up South Carolina Redistricting Dispute
Fresh off last term’s win in an Alabama redistricting case, civil rights groups returned to the Supreme Court to argue that voting maps drawn by South Carolina Republicans disenfranchise Black voters and should be redrawn. But arguments in Alexander v. South Carolina...
10.06.2023
Barrett, Kavanaugh Could Be Key in CFPB Funding Fight
Whether funding of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is unlawful or not could rest with conservative Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett, one court watcher says. Brennan Center for Justice President and CEO Michael Waldman joins Cases and Controversies to...
09.29.2023
Blockbuster Fallout Looms Over New Supreme Court Term
The Supreme Court kicks off its 2023 term on Monday with guns, abortion, and affirmative action potentially coming back—whether the justices are ready for them or not. Advocates and lower courts are emboldened by the high court’s recent rulings in key...
09.26.2023
Death Row Defendants Find Few Wins at Supreme Court
Death penalty cases are often adjudicated for years, if not decades, before they reach the Supreme Court. But once they do, the justices must make life-or-death decisions in a relatively quick amount of time. Death penalty cases at the Supreme Court...
09.22.2023
'Cases and Controversies': A Dramatic First Decade
From Antonin Scalia’s sudden death, to four new justices, a leaked opinion draft, the overturning of abortion rights, and the pandemic-era introduction of live audio for oral arguments—a lot has happened at the Supreme Court in the past decade and...
07.07.2023
Supreme Court ‘Supersized’ Major Questions Doctrine
Rejection of Joe Biden's student loan forgiveness plan suggests Supreme Court conservatives are going to be more comfortable with second-guessing federal agency determinations even when they fall within a federal statute. UCLA law professor Adam Winkler joins Cases and Controversies to...
06.30.2023
Supreme Court Wraps Up With Conservative Trifecta on Big Cases
Conservative justices asserted themselves in a big way in the final days of the Supreme Court term. The six Republican-appointed justices joined together in striking down affirmative action, rejecting Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan, and supporting religious liberty in a...
06.23.2023
Biggest Cases Loom as Supreme Court Hits Homestretch
The Supreme Court heads into the final week of the term for argued cases with a flurry of opinions on tap, including what could be a blockbuster on affirmative action in higher education and the fate of Joe Biden’s student...
06.16.2023
Tribal Adoption Law Survives Colorblind Challenge
In upholding a landmark measure meant to keep adopted American-Indian children with tribal families, the Supreme Court again declined to embrace a colorblind view of federal law. The conservative argument that race should almost never be a factor in setting and...
06.09.2023
Justices Surprise by Refusing to Remake Voting Rights
The Supreme Court declined to make it harder to bring racial challenges to voting rules, shocking court watchers who expected the majority conservative court to make major changes to the law. Goodwin's William Jay joins Cases and Controversies to discuss the...
06.02.2023
New Jackson Milestone as Supreme Court Term Nears End
Ketanji Brown Jackson continues to draw notice on the Supreme Court, this time writing the first solo dissent from a first-term justice since Clarence Thomas in 1991. Cases and Controversies hosts Kimberly Robinson and Greg Stohr discuss Jackson’s dissent in the...
05.26.2023
Unanimity Doesn’t Mean Supreme Court Agrees Completely
· Court clips EPA authority over clean water · Chides local government on home seizure Although Supreme Court justices were unanimous in backing landowners in a Big EPA case, their reasoning in the latest check on administrative authority shows there is still deep division. Styled...
05.19.2023
Jackson Breaks Mold for New Justices at Oral Argument
Jackson spoke significantly more than any other justice Was joined by other liberals as most talkative Ketanji Brown Jackson made her mark on US Supreme Court arguments like no other new justice in memory. Her historic confirmation as the first Black woman justice...
05.12.2023
High Court Veteran Examines Changing Oral Arguments
The Supreme Court kicked off opinion season with five rulings, leaving 39 more to get out before the term wraps up in June. Hosts Kimberly Robinson and Greg Stohr break down decisions covering immigration, public corruption, and state morality laws. Supreme Court...
05.04.2023
Supreme Court Ethics, Agency Powers Draw Spotlight
The Supreme Court hasn’t released an opinion in weeks, but it did add a major case on May 1 to its docket looking at the power of administrative agencies. A dispute that started over a federal rule for companies fishing for...
05.01.2023
Supreme Court Opinion Season Begins With Big Backlog
With scheduled arguments over for the term, Supreme Court justices now turn their attention to their remaining opinions, and it’s going to be a heavy lift over the next two months. The court has worked at a historically slow pace with...
04.20.2023
Supreme Court Abortion Dispute, Ethics Saga Intensify
The Supreme Court enters its final week of scheduled arguments, rounding out the calendar to date with a property case that plaintiffs say amounts to home equity theft by local governments. Pacific Legal Foundation’s David Deerson joins “Cases and Controversies” to...
04.13.2023
No Opinions or Arguments, But Not Quiet at High Court
Another Texas abortion case headed the justices’ way and a bombshell report on Clarence Thomas and his luxury vacations upended a usual quiet spring break from Supreme Court arguments and opinions. Cases and Controversies host Kimberly Robinson explains the fast-moving district...
04.06.2023
Worker Religious Accommodation Test Set for Top Court
An Evangelical Christian postal carrier in Pennsylvania, who says he was forced out of the job for refusing to work on Sundays, wants the US Supreme Court to do more to accommodate workers’ religious practices. Cases and Controversies explores the issues...
03.30.2023
‘True Threats’ Free Speech Test for US Supreme Court
The US Supreme Court is set to hear a free speech case that tests when statements are considered true threats not protected by the First Amendment. The justices are being asked in Counterman v. Colorado if the government has to show at trial...
03.27.2023
Murder-For-Hire Trial Tests Reach of Sixth Amendment
The Supreme Court is considering an appeal that could force prosecutors to reconsider their tactics in criminal cases. This includes what evidence to introduce and how to try multiple defendants. Cases and Controversies hosts Kimberly Robinson & Greg Stohr will break...
03.20.2023
Supreme Court Faces Growing Calls for Ethics Code
Questions involving their family ties and associations with other powerful people are nothing new for US Supreme Court justices. But now those relationships are generating more attention and criticism, and are partly fueling calls for them to adopt an ethics...
03.10.2023
Jack Daniel's and Bad Spaniels Spat to Hit High Court
The Jack Daniel’s brand is at the heart of the US Supreme Court’s latest intellectual property dispute that pits free speech protections against trademark concerns. Debevoise & Plimpton’s Megan K. Bannigan joins “Cases and Controversies” in search of a middle ground...
03.02.2023
CFPB Challenge Latest in Separation of Powers Remake
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau faces a challenge to its existence in a case the US Supreme Court will take up next term. The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled the agency’s funding mechanism violates separation of powers...
02.23.2023
Minority Borrowers Aim to Influence Court in Loan Case
Genevieve Bonadies Torres, an associate director with the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, joined “Cases and Controversies” podcast to discuss the amicus brief she filed in a pair of cases, Biden v. Nebraska and Dept. of Education v. Brown, set for...
02.16.2023
Internet’s Future Up to Justices in Social Media Cases
Deadly terror attacks behind a pair of cases set for argument at the Supreme Court could change the legal landscape for social media and other online companies. Families of victims in the violence abroad say in separate cases that tech giants...

What's Cases and Controversies about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

Cases and Controversies episodes:

Idaho Abortion Ban Getting Supreme Court Review

US Supreme Court Considers Novel Charges Over Jan. 6

Homeless Dispute Getting Rare Supreme Court Hearing

Supreme Court Abortion Pill Argument Light on Merits

Government Censorship Focus of Supreme Court Disputes

Supreme Court Urged to Take Up Fight Over Trans Youth

Divide Surfaces in Supreme Court Trump Ballot Ruling

Supreme Court Digs into Guns, Social Media, and Trump Immunity

Social Media Cases Could Impact Public Discourse Online

Supreme Court Weighs Next Steps on Trump Immunity Bid

Historic Trump Ballot Argument Explored Numerous Paths

High Court ‘Friends’ Urge Caution in Trump Ballot Case

Trump’s Supreme Court Case Raises Security Questions

With Chevron Doctrine Likely to Fall, What Comes Next?

Trump, Agency Power Fights Tee-Up Historic Court Term

No Fly, Property Rights Start Supreme Court New Year

Tense Exchanges, Big Supreme Court Argument Moments

Grants in Abortion, Jan. 6 Add to Momentous Term

O’Connor’s Trailblazing Career Marked By Grit, Charisma

Justices Suggest Narrow Ruling on SEC Enforcement

Supreme Court’s First Ethics Code Gets Cool Reception

Justices Weigh New Gun Test in Domestic Violence Case

Justices Seek Balance for Online Speech Protections

Barrett Rocks Out As Justices Return to Courtroom

Justices Take Up South Carolina Redistricting Dispute

Barrett, Kavanaugh Could Be Key in CFPB Funding Fight

Blockbuster Fallout Looms Over New Supreme Court Term

Death Row Defendants Find Few Wins at Supreme Court

'Cases and Controversies': A Dramatic First Decade

Supreme Court ‘Supersized’ Major Questions Doctrine

Supreme Court Wraps Up With Conservative Trifecta on Big Cases

Biggest Cases Loom as Supreme Court Hits Homestretch

Tribal Adoption Law Survives Colorblind Challenge

Justices Surprise by Refusing to Remake Voting Rights

New Jackson Milestone as Supreme Court Term Nears End

Unanimity Doesn’t Mean Supreme Court Agrees Completely

Jackson Breaks Mold for New Justices at Oral Argument

High Court Veteran Examines Changing Oral Arguments

Supreme Court Ethics, Agency Powers Draw Spotlight

Supreme Court Opinion Season Begins With Big Backlog

Supreme Court Abortion Dispute, Ethics Saga Intensify

No Opinions or Arguments, But Not Quiet at High Court

Worker Religious Accommodation Test Set for Top Court

‘True Threats’ Free Speech Test for US Supreme Court

Murder-For-Hire Trial Tests Reach of Sixth Amendment

Supreme Court Faces Growing Calls for Ethics Code

Jack Daniel's and Bad Spaniels Spat to Hit High Court

CFPB Challenge Latest in Separation of Powers Remake

Minority Borrowers Aim to Influence Court in Loan Case

Internet’s Future Up to Justices in Social Media Cases