Supreme Court of the United States

9-453 CARGILL, INC V. DOE I

QUESTION PRESENTED:

Petitioner Cargill, Incorporated, purchases cocoa beans grown in Cote d'Ivoire. Respondents are Malian citizens who allege that, when Respondents were under the age of fourteen, Ivorian cocoa farmers subjected them to forced labor and other abuses in violation of international law. Respondents filed this putative class action under the Alien Tort Statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1350, claiming that Cargill aided and abetted the farmers' violations of international law by purchasing cocoa from and providing financial assistance to Ivorian cocoa farmers.

 19-416 NESTLE USA V. DOE I

 QUESTION PRESENTED:

1. Whether an aiding and abetting claim against a domestic corporation brought under the Alien Tort Statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1350, may overcome the extraterritoriality bar where the claim is based on allegations of general corporate activity in the United States and where plaintiffs cannot trace the alleged harms, which occurred abroad at the hands of unidentified foreign actors, to that activity.

2. Whether the Judiciary has the authority under the Alien Tort Statute to impose liability on domestic corporations.

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Date                 | Proceedings and Orders
Sep 25 2019 | Petition for a writ of certiorari filed. (Response due October 28, 2019)
Oct 23 2019 | Blanket Consent filed by Respondents, John Doe I, et al. VIDED
Oct 25 2019 | Waiver of right of respondents John Doe I, et al. to respond filed.
Oct 28 2019 | Brief amicus curiae of The Coca-Cola Company filed. VIDED.
Oct 28 2019 | Brief amicus curiae of Washington Legal Foundation filed. VIDED.
Oct 28 2019 | Brief amicus curiae of Chevron Corporation filed. VIDED.
Oct 28 2019 | Brief amici curiae of The Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America, et al. filed. VIDED.
Oct 28 2019 | Brief amici curiae of The National Confectioners Association, the World Cocoa Foundation, and the European Cocoa Association filed. VIDED.
Oct 28 2019 | Brief amicus curiae of CATO INSTITUTE filed. (Distributed)
Oct 30 2019 | DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 11/15/2019.
Nov 04 2019 | Response Requested. (Due December 4, 2019)
Nov 14 2019 | Motion to extend the time to file a response from December 4, 2019 to December 12, 2019, submitted to The Clerk.
Nov 19 2019 | Motion to extend the time to file a response is granted and the time is extended to and including December 12, 2019.
Dec 12 2019 | Brief of respondents John Doe I, et al. in opposition filed.
Dec 13 2019 | Letter waiving the 14-day waiting period for the distribution of the petition pursuant to Rule 15.5 filed.
Dec 23 2019 | DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 1/10/2020.
Dec 23 2019 | Reply of petitioner Nestlé USA, Inc. filed. (Distributed)
Jan 13 2020 | The Solicitor General is invited to file a brief in this case expressing the views of the United States.
May 26 2020 | Brief amicus curiae of United States filed. VIDED.
Jun 04 2020 | Supplemental brief of petitioner Nestlé USA, Inc. filed. (Distributed)
Jun 09 2020 | DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 6/25/2020.
Jun 29 2020 | DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 7/1/2020.
Jul 02 2020 | Petition GRANTED. The petition for a writ of certiorari in No. 19-453 is granted. The cases are consolidated, and a total of one hour is allotted for oral argument. VIDED.
Jul 02 2020 | Because the Court has consolidated these cases for briefing and oral argument, future filings and activity in the cases will now be reflected on the docket of No. 19-416. Subsequent filings in these cases must therefore be submitted through the electronic filing system in No. 19-416. Each document submitted in connection with one or more of these cases must include on its cover the case number and caption for each case in which the filing is intended to be submitted. Where a filing is submitted in fewer than all of the cases, the docket entry will reflect the case number(s) in which the filing is submitted; a document filed in all of the consolidated cases will be noted as “VIDED.”
Jul 22 2020 | Motion for an extension of time to file the briefs on the merits filed. VIDED.
Jul 22 2020 | Motion to extend the time to file the briefs on the merits granted. The time to file the joint appendix and petitioners' briefs on the merits is extended to and including August 31, 2020. The time to file respondents' brief on the merits is extended to and including October 14, 2020. VIDED.
Aug 26 2020 | Blanket Consent filed by Respondent, John Doe I, et al. VIDED.
Aug 27 2020 | Blanket Consent filed by Petitioner, Nestlé USA, Inc.
Aug 31 2020 | Joint appendix filed. VIDED.
Aug 31 2020 | Brief of petitioner Nestlé USA, Inc. filed. VIDED.
Aug 31 2020 | Brief of petitioner Cargill, Inc. filed. VIDED.
Sep 08 2020 | Brief amici curiae of The Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America, et al. filed. VIDED.
Sep 08 2020 | Brief amicus curiae of The Coca-Cola Company filed. VIDED.
Sep 08 2020 |

QUESTION PRESENTED:

1. Whether a group of states and local governments have standing under Article III of the Constitution to challenge a July 21, 2020, memorandum by President Donald Trump instructing the secretary of commerce to include in his report on the 2020 census information enabling the president to exclude noncitizens from the base population number for purposes of apportioning seats in the House of Representatives; and 
2. whether the memorandum is a permissible exercise of the president’s discretion under the provisions of law governing congressional apportionment.

   
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QUESTION PRESENTED:

Whether a person who is authorized to access information on a computer for certain purposes violates Section 1030(a)(2) of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act if he accesses the same information for an improper purpose.

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QUESTION PRESENTED:

As part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), Congress adopted 26 U.S.C. § 5000A. Section 5000A provided that "applicable individual[s] shall" ensure that they are "covered under minimum essential coverage," 26 U.S.C. § 5000A(a); required any "taxpayer" who did not obtain such coverage to make a "[s]hared responsibility payment," id.§ 5000A(b); and set the amount of that payment, id. 

§ 5000A(c). In National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, 567 U.S. 519, 574 (2012), this Court held that Congress lacked the power to impose a stand-alone command to purchase health insurance but upheld Section 5000A as a whole as an exercise of Congress's taxing power, concluding that it affords individuals a "lawful choice" between buying health insurance or paying a tax in the amount specified in Section 5000A(c). In 2017, Congress set that amount at zero but retained the remaining provisions of the ACA. 

The questions presented are: 

1. Whether the individual and state plaintiffs in this case have established Article III standing to challenge the minimum coverage provision in Section 5000A(a). 
2. Whether reducing the amount specified in Section 5000A(c) to zero rendered the minimum coverage provision unconstitutional. 
3. If so, whether the minimum coverage provision is severable from the rest of the ACA. 

 19-1019 TEXAS V. CALIFORNIA

QUESTION PRESENTED: 

Congress passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ("ACA"), Pub. L. No. 111-148, 124 Stat. 119 (Mar. 23, 2010), with the express goal of achieving near universal health-insurance coverage. To achieve that goal, Congress found it was "essential" to require healthy Americans to ensure that they have what Congress considered minimum essential coverage. In 2012, this Court held that "[t]he Federal Government does not have the power to order people to buy health insurance." Nat'l Fed'n of Indep. Bus. v. Sebelius ("NFIB"), 567 U.S. 519, 575 (2012) (op. of Roberts, C.J.). The Court upheld the minimum-essential-coverage requirement, however, because it was "fairly possible" to construe the mandate as a tax. Id. at 574. In 2017, Congress eliminated that alternative construction by zeroing out any penalty. That legislative act rendered the individual mandate unconstitutional, as the court below correctly held. 

The Court should deny the petitions in Nos. 19-840 and 19-841. But if it grants them, it should grant this conditional cross-petition, as well, which presents the following questions: 

1. Whether the unconstitutional individual mandate to purchase minimum essential coverage is severable from the remainder of the ACA. 
2. Whether the district court properly declared the ACA invalid in its entirety and unenforceable any-where. 

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 QUESTION PRESENTED:

The Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), 28 U.S.C. 1346(b), 2671 et seq., waives the sovereign immunity of the United States and creates a cause of action for damages for certain torts committed by federal employees "under circumstances where the United States, if a private person, would be liable to the claimant in accordance with the law of the place where the act or omission occurred." 28 U.S.C. 1346(b)(1). The FTCA also imposes a judgment bar, which provides that "[t]he judgment in an action under section 1346(b) of this title shall constitute a complete bar to any action by the claimant, by reason of the same subject matter, against the employee of the government whose act or omission gave rise to the claim." 28 U.S.C. 2676.

The question presented is whether a final judgment in favor of the United States in an action brought under Section 1346(b)(1), on the ground that a private person would not be liable to the claimant under state tort law for the injuries alleged, bars a claim under Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388 (1971), that is brought by the same claimant, based on the same injuries, and against the same governmental employees whose acts gave rise to the claimant's FTCA claim.

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QUESTION PRESENTED:

The Attorney General can cancel removal of certain immigrants under 8 U.S.C. § 1229b (a) and (b). To be eligible for cancellation of removal, a non-permanent resident must have ten years of continuous presence in the United States, and a permanent resident must have seven years of continuous residence. Id. § 1229b(a)(2), (b)(l)(A). Under the "stop-time rule," the government can end those periods of continuous residence by serving "a notice to appear under section 1229(a)," which, in turn, defines "a 'notice to appear"' as "written notice ... specifying" specific information related to the initiation of a removal proceeding. Id. §§ 1229b (d)(l), 1229(a)(l). In Pereira v. Sessions, 138 S. Ct. 2105, 2117 (2018), this Court held that only notice "in accordance with'' section 1229(a)'s definition triggers the stop-time rule.

 The question presented in this case is:   

Whether, to serve notice in accordance with section 1229(a) and trigger the stoptime rule, the government must serve a specific document that includes all the information identified in section 1229(a), or whether the government can serve that information over the course of as many documents and as much time as it chooses.

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QUESTION PRESENTED: 

The City of Philadelphia chose to exclude a religious agency from the City's foster care system unless the agency agreed to act and speak in a manner inconsistent with its sincere religious beliefs about marriage. The Third Circuit upheld that action under Employment Division v. Smith. 

The questions presented are: 

1. Whether free exercise plaintiffs can only succeed by proving a particular type of discrimination claim-namely that the government would allow the same conduct by someone who held different religious views-as two circuits have held, or whether courts must consider other evidence that a law is not neutral and generally applicable, as six circuits have held? 
2. Whether Employment Division v. Smith should be revisited? 
3. Whether a government violates the First Amendment by conditioning a religious agency's ability to participate in the foster care system on taking actions and making statements that directly contradict the agency's religious beliefs? 

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 QUESTION PRESENTED:

Whether the Eighth Amendment requires the sentencing authority to make a finding that a juvenile is permanently incorrigible before imposing a sentence of life without parole.

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 QUESTION PRESENTED:

1. Does the "use of force" clause in the Armed Career Criminal Act (the "ACCA"), 18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(2)(B)(i) encompass crimes with a mens rea of mere recklessness? 
2. Did the district court violate Mr. Borden's due process rights when it applied to his sentencing a newer, more punitive interpretation of law than that which was in force at the time of his federal offense, such that his guidelines were enhanced from 77 to 96 months to a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years to life in prison? 

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