When the Supreme Court is not impressed

There were two instances in the last week when the U.S. Supreme Court gave none too subtle indications what they thought.

The first concerned yet another California case that challenged the indoor church ban. Even after the Supreme Court had issued an injunction against the ban earlier in the month, the Ninth Circuit in a different case allowed the ban to continue. Within less than two weeks of the Ninth Circuit ruling, the Supreme Court overturned them. The slap down on the Ninth Circuit decision made it clear that the technical distinctions between the cases were not enough to reach a different decision. As one pundit put it, these were distinctions without a difference.

As an aside, the lawyer for Santa Clara County took a head scratching approach. One day after filing their reply brief with the court, the attorneys announced that the ban would be lifted within a week. As a practice pointer, if you’re going to basically concede the issue, don’t waste the Court’s time by making them start working on reading your brief. To state the obvious: justices don’t appreciate that.

The second time in a week where the Court showed they were not impressed concerned the two remaining “release the Kraken” suits by Sidney Powell questioning the election results. Here, the Court didn’t even bother with a smackdown. The order simply said, without further explanation, that the petitions were denied.

This action by the Court is analogous to how you deal with a fly. You can either give it your attention and swat it or you can decide that it isn’t even worth bothering with it and simply wave your hand to make it go away.

When Lawsuits Don't Change Anything

 I am still asked if the election lawsuits might still change the result of the election or if the US Supreme Court will get involved. The answer is no, especially after two election cases got resolved in Pennsylvania within the last two days.

Judge Patricia McCullough ordered Wednesday that the state must halt certification "to the extent that there remains any further action to perfect the certification." That order lasted exactly four days. The seven-member Pennsylvania Supreme court unanimously removed the injunction. But they went a step further and dismissed the entire complaint with prejudice. This slap down was the equivalent of saying GTFO and don’t come back. That was the state court.

In the Federal Court, the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals eviscerated the Trump campaign appeal. They also went beyond the only question raised on appeal by restructuring some truly incoherent arguments and dismantling them as well.

One also shouldn’t be concerned about Sidney Powell’s new cases filed in Michigan and Georgia. Not only are they incoherent and riddled with typographical errors (which courts despise), they were filed way, way too late to be given serious consideration. It’s really hard to explain just how bad these lawsuits are. [Written November 29, 2020]