Welcome back, Deadline: Legal Newsletter readers. The Supreme Court wrapped up its November argument sitting this week. The court capped off the two-week session with hearings on criminal sentencing and whether a man whose rights were literally thrown in the trash is able to sue the prison officials who violated them. (The majority appears to think he can’t.) The justices also agreed to hear an election-related appeal over the rules for counting mail ballots, adding to the voting cases the court is poised to decide ahead of the 2026 midterms.
Looking deeper at this week’s docket, two cases shed light on the court and its newest member, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who continues to go her own way. Those cases involved funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program during the government shutdown and an Oklahoma inmate’s bid to halt his execution. In both appeals, the Biden appointee was the lone dissenter.
In the SNAP case, the court considered whether to grant the Trump administration’s request to lift a judge’s orders to fully fund the federal food stamp program. With Congress set to finally end the shutdown, the court entered a temporary order on Tuesday putting off a decision until Thursday night. But Jackson noted that she would have denied the extension and, further, that she would have rejected the administration’s request completely. Before the Thursday deadline came, the government withdrew its appeal, writing that the case became moot with the passage and signing of legislation ending the shutdown.
In the capital case, Tremane Wood asked the justices to stay his execution, which was scheduled for Thursday. He wanted a chance to argue to the high court that he should get a new trial because, he said, the prosecution illegally concealed evidence. The court rejected his request, with only Jackson noting that she would have granted it. Wood still avoided execution because Oklahoma’s Republican governor commuted his sentence to life imprisonment at the last minute.
One might be tempted to wonder: What’s the big deal? The shutdown ended. Wood wasn’t executed. But beyond the particulars of these important cases, they show Jackson standing out, even when her fellow Democratic appointees didn’t feel dissent was warranted — even in matters of life and death. I flagged this solo phenomenon at the end of last term, and it appears to be continuing.
To be sure, there’s not an intractable split among the court’s Democratic appointees. They have different priorities, even if those come into focus at the margins. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who has been a strong voice in capital cases since long before Jackson joined the court, dissented alongside Jackson in another case this week involving immigration. And last week, Justice Elena Kagan and Sotomayor both joined Jackson’s dissent from the majority’s decision to let the Trump administration enforce its passport policy against transgender Americans. Looking ahead to next week, the briefing is set to conclude Monday in President Donald Trump’s bid to deploy troops in Chicago. After that, the court could rule anytime, perhaps over more dissent to come. Have any questions or comments for me? Please submit them through this form for a chance to be featured in the Deadline: Legal Blog and newsletter.
Jordan Rubin is the Deadline: Legal Blog writer. He was a prosecutor for the New York County District Attorney’s Office in Manhattan and is the author of “Bizarro," a book about the secret war on synthetic drugs. Before he joined MS NOW, he was a legal reporter for Bloomberg Law.
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