WHAT WE'RE READING

The morning read for Friday, Nov. 15

Each weekday, we select a short list of news articles and commentary related to the Supreme Court. Here’s the Friday morning read:

• Lawyer who argued for Trump’s immunity at Supreme Court is tapped for solicitor general (Josh Gerstein, Politico)
• Trump picks lawyer who won his presidential immunity case for solicitor general (Alex Swoyer, The Washington Times)
• Supreme Court Wary of Big Ruling in Nvidia Shareholder Case (Greg Stohr, Bloomberg)
• Supreme Court Justices Discuss Peanut the Squirrel’s Death (James Bickerton, Newsweek)
• The Conservative Justices Bet Dobbs Wouldn’t Hurt Republicans Forever. They Were Right (Jay Willis, Balls & Strikes)

WHAT WE'RE READING

The morning read for Thursday, Nov. 14

Each weekday, we select a short list of news articles and commentary related to the Supreme Court. Here’s the Thursday morning read:

• Supreme Court Seems Ready to Allow Securities Fraud Case Against Nvidia (Adam Liptak, The New York Times)
• Supreme Court whiplash: What Trump’s win means for guns and transgender care (Maureen Groppe, USA Today)
• Under Trump, US government legal stance poised to shift at Supreme Court (John Kruzel and Andrew Chung, Reuters)
• California’s unhoused people protest US supreme court order: ‘Not going to push us out of view’ (Erin Sheridan, The Guardian) 
• Remembering Ted Olson, a titan of the law (Nina Totenberg, NPR)

WHAT WE'RE READING

The morning read for Wednesday, Nov. 13

The world’s most valuable company is before the justices today for oral arguments in NVIDIA Corp. v. E. Ohman J:or Fonder AB. Each weekday, we select a short list of news articles and commentary related to the Supreme Court. Here’s the Wednesday morning read:

• Sparks fly as justices spar with feds over deportation deadlines (Kelsey Reichmann, Courthouse News Service)
• Mafia Case Tests Supreme Court on Crime of Violence Limits (Kimberly Strawbridge Robinson, Bloomberg Law)
• US Supreme Court turns away bid to revive youth climate change lawsuit (Nate Raymond, Reuters)
• Justice Samuel Alito Plans to Remain on Supreme Court (Jess Bravin, The Wall Street Journal)
• Will the Supreme Court Stand Up to Trump? Can It? (Steve Vladeck, The New York Times)

CASE PREVIEW

Court considers dispute over disclosure of NVIDIA sales to crypto miners

NVIDIA, the world’s most valuable company, sells computer graphics processing chips designed primarily for use in video games, which it sells to manufacturers of game devices. As it happens, NVIDIA’s chips also are useful for mining cryptocurrency, and in 2017 many crypto miners started to buy NVIDIA chips for that purpose. As that use increased, NVIDIA’s chip sales increased. But in 2018, when the price of bitcoin went through a period of sharp decline, reducing the incentive for crypto mining, NVIDIA’s sales declined.

Shareholders responded by filing the proposed class action here, alleging that NVIDIA executives (including CEO Jensen Huang) made false and misleading statements about the extent to which use in crypto mining was propping up NVIDIA’s chip sales. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit allowed the action to proceed, and the Supreme Court agreed to review the matter.

SCOTUS NEWS

Supreme Court rejects Mark Meadows’ appeal in 2020 election interference case

The Supreme Court turned down a plea from Mark Meadows, who served as chief of staff to Donald Trump during his first term in office, to transfer his Georgia election interference prosecution to federal court. The announcement came as part of a list of orders released on Tuesday morning from the justices’ private conference last week. The justices did not add any new cases to their docket for the 2024-25 term.

Meadows, along with Trump and 17 others, was indicted in 2023 by a Fulton County grand jury on charges that he had interfered in the 2020 presidential election in Georgia. Meadows sought to move his case to federal court, arguing that he had been acting in his official capacity as chief of staff and could therefore seek immunity from prosecution.

A federal district court rejected his plea, concluding that Meadows had not shown a connection between the conduct for which he had been indicted and his job as chief of staff.