The Supreme Court will grapple with a sizable number of politically significant cases as the presidential election season heats up over the next few months, touching on abortion rights, gun control and the fate of criminal charges against the leading Republican candidate, Donald Trump.
The choices justices make this term could ripple through the election and the nation’s politics, experts said. That’s not just in terms of its decisions, but whether they take up a case, or the timing of their actions, could have immediate consequences.
“I can’t remember a time when there were so many hot-button and significant issues pending before the court right before an election,” Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn said. “This seems unique in that regard.”
The court’s docket includes a case about whether Idaho’s six-week abortion ban should extend to emergency rooms, and another about access to medication abortion nationwide. There are also looming decisions on whether the government can ban an attachment that makes a gun fire as rapidly as an automatic weapon, and how much leeway government agencies get for regulations when a law is unclear.
And there are several cases that could determine whether Trump can be tried on federal charges tied to an attempt to overturn the 2020 election. On Thursday, the justices will hear oral arguments about whether that attempt is an insurrection that allows states to keep him from appearing on primary ballots.
This will be the first presidential election season where the current conservative-controlled Supreme Court will issue decisions, as the justices already are more in the public spotlight because of decisions that sided with Republican policy goals, such as wiping out the constitutional right to abortion.
They are expected to issue rulings before the conclusion of the term at the end of June. At the same time, the court has also seen a dip in public approval and had…
Read the full article here
