June 30 (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court decided a series of important cases during its current term involving issues such as President Donald Trump's powers, birthright citizenship, immigration, voting rights, tariffs, guns, race, transgender athletes, campaign finance law and LGBT "conversion therapy."
Here is a look at some of the argued cases that were decided during the term, which began in October and ended on June 30.
BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP
The court on June 30 rejected Trump's attempt to restrict
birthright citizenship in the United States — a right long woven into the fabric of American society — scuttling one of his top priorities in his crackdown on immigration. Trump's executive order had directed U.S. agencies not to recognize the citizenship of children born in the United States if neither parent is an American citizen or legal permanent resident, also called a "green card" holder. The court said Trump's directive violated language in the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment that guarantees citizenship to virtually anyone born in the United States, with a few narrow exceptions.
TRUMP'S FIRING OF FED OFFICIAL
The court on June 29 refused to let Trump fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook as it stood firm to preserve the central bank's cherished independence against an unprecedented challenge by the president. The court blocked Trump from removing Cook for now, providing a safeguard for the Fed specifically. No other president since the central bank's founding in 1913 had sought to oust a Fed governor. Trump cited unproven mortgage fraud allegations — which Cook denied — as justification for the firing. Cook called the allegations a pretext to fire her over monetary policy differences as Trump presses the Fed to cut interest rates.
FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION FIRING
The court on June 29 backed Trump's firing of a Democratic Federal Trade Commission member, expanding his powers over the government and overturning its 1935 precedent that had recognized the authority of Congress to protect leaders of certain regulatory agencies from presidential removal at will. The justices invalidated tenure protections for FTC members enacted by Congress more than a century ago. In doing so, the justices overruled the court's pivotal decision in a case called Humphrey's Executor v. United States. Trump last year dismissed the FTC's Rebecca Slaughter over policy differences.
VOTING RIGHTS ACT
The court on April 29 gutted a key provision of the Voting Rights Act, making it harder for minorities to challenge electoral maps as racially discriminatory under the landmark civil rights law. The court blocked an electoral map that had given Louisiana a second Black-majority U.S. congressional district. The ruling severely undermined Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which Congress enacted to bar electoral maps that would result in diluting the clout of minority voters. The ruling opened the door for Republican-led Southern states to dismantle Democratic-held majority-Black and majority-Latino districts ahead of the November midterm elections. Section 2 had gained greater significance as a bulwark against racial discrimination in voting after the Supreme Court in 2013 gutted a different part of the Voting Rights Act. Black and Latino voters tend to support Democratic candidates.
TRUMP'S TARIFFS
The justices on February 20 struck down Trump's sweeping tariffs that he pursued under a law meant for use in national emergencies in a ruling with major implications for the global economy. The 6-3 ruling upheld a lower court's decision that Trump's use of this 1977 law exceeded his authority. The justices ruled that the law at issue — the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA — did not grant Trump the power he claimed to impose tariffs. The U.S. Constitution grants Congress, not the president, the authority to issue taxes and tariffs. Tariffs have been central to a global trade war that Trump initiated after he began his second term as president, one that has alienated trading partners, affected financial markets and caused global economic uncertainty.
PROTECTED STATUS FOR IMMIGRANTS
The court on June 25 cleared the way for the Trump administration to strip hundreds of thousands of Haitian and Syrian immigrants of a humanitarian status that protects them from deportation. It overturned decisions by federal judges that had halted the administration's actions terminating Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, for more than 350,000 people from Haiti and 6,100 from Syria. The State Department warns against traveling to either Haiti or Syria, citing widespread violence, crime, terrorism and kidnapping. TPS is a designation that lets migrants from countries stricken by war, natural disaster or other catastrophes live and work in the United States while it is unsafe for them to return to their home countries.
TRANSGENDER SPORTS PARTICIPATION
The court on June 30 cleared the way for states to impose restrictions on transgender student athletes, upholding laws in West Virginia and Idaho banning them from female sports teams. The justices overturned decisions by lower courts siding with transgender students who challenged the bans in the two states as violating the U.S. Constitution and a federal anti-discrimination law. The Idaho and West Virginia laws designate sports teams at public schools including universities according to "biological sex" and bar "students of the male sex" from female teams. Idaho and West Virginia said the laws preserve fair and safe competition for women and girls, while critics see the measures as part of a broader assault on the rights of transgender Americans.
LGBT 'CONVERSION THERAPY'
The court on March 31 rejected a Democratic-backed Colorado law that banned psychotherapists from using "conversion" talk therapy intended to change an LGBT minor's sexual orientation or gender identity. The 8-1 ruling sided with a Christian licensed counselor, casting the prohibition as an intrusion on free speech rights. The court rejected Colorado's argument that its law regulated professional conduct, not protected speech. The justices reversed a lower court's decision that had upheld the law in a case brought by counselor Kaley Chiles, who argued that it violated the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment protections against government abridgment of free speech.
HAWAII GUN LAW
The justices on June 25 struck down a Hawaii law restricting the carrying of handguns on private property open to the public, like most businesses, without the owner's permission in the latest ruling by the justices expanding gun rights. They found that Hawaii's measure violated the U.S. Constitution's Second Amendment right to "keep and bear arms." The justices overturned a lower court's decision that Hawaii's Democratic-backed measure likely complied with the Second Amendment. Hawaii's law required a property owner's "express authorization" to bring a handgun onto private property open to the public.
DRUG USERS AND GUNS
The court on June 18 limited the application of a U.S. law that bars firearms possession by certain drug users, rejecting a position taken by the Trump administration that had threatened the gun rights of millions of Americans who use marijuana and own firearms. The justices upheld a lower court's decision to dismiss an illegal gun possession charge brought under the law at issue against Ali Hemani, an American-Pakistani dual citizen and Texas resident who told authorities he was a regular marijuana user. The Supreme Court found that the government had failed to show that its prosecution of Hemani complied with the U.S. Constitution's Second Amendment right to "keep and bear arms."
CAMPAIGN FINANCE
The court on June 30 again struck down campaign spending limits, this time rejecting federal restrictions on coordinated spending between political parties and their candidates on free speech grounds. The ruling came as major Republican committees head toward the November midterm elections with a significant cash advantage over their Democratic counterparts. Siding with Vice President JD Vance and other Republican challengers, the court ruled that a cap on the amount of money parties can spend on campaigns with input from candidates violates the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment protections against government abridgment of freedom of speech.
MAIL-IN BALLOTS
The court on June 29 backed state laws that allow mail-in ballots received after Election Day to be counted, rejecting a Republican-led challenge to a five-day grace period in Mississippi. It overturned a lower court's decision that had deemed Mississippi's law inconsistent with U.S. statutes that set the timing of federal elections — for the presidency, Senate and House of Representatives. The Trump administration argued in favor of the challenge to Mississippi's law, which permits mail-in ballots sent by certain voters to be counted if they were postmarked on or before Election Day but received up to five business days after a federal election.
U.S. ASYLUM PROCESSING
The court on June 25 handed Trump a victory by backing the federal government's authority to turn away asylum seekers when officials deem U.S.-Mexico border crossings too overburdened to handle additional claims. It overturned a lower court's finding that the policy violated federal law. The Trump administration has said it may seek to revive the policy, known as "metering," after it was dropped by former President Joe Biden. The metering policy allowed U.S. immigration officials to stop asylum seekers at the border and indefinitely decline to process their claims.
WEEDKILLER CANCER CLAIMS
The justices on June 25 reined in thousands of lawsuits pursued in state courts accusing Bayer of failing to warn users that the active ingredient in the German company's Roundup weedkiller causes cancer. They overturned a jury verdict in Missouri awarding $1.25 million to a man named John Durnell who said he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma after years of exposure to glyphosate in Roundup. The court agreed with Bayer that a U.S. law that governs pesticides precludes failure-to-warn claims that are brought under state law from moving forward in court.
HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES ABROAD
The justices on June 23 further limited the reach of a federal law used to hold corporations liable for human rights abuses committed abroad, as they issued a ruling ending a lawsuit by members of the Falun Gong movement accusing Cisco Systems of facilitating religious persecution in China. The justices reversed a lower court's decision that had breathed new life into the 2011 lawsuit, which was brought under the Alien Tort Statute of 1789. The suit had alleged that Cisco knowingly developed technology that allowed China's government to surveil and persecute Falun Gong members. The Alien Tort Statute lets non-U.S. citizens seek damages in American courts for violations of international law.
SEC 'DISGORGEMENT' POWER
The court on June 4 rejected a challenge to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's broad authority to recover illegal profits using a financial remedy called disgorgement, buttressing one of the Wall Street watchdog agency's key powers. It upheld a lower court's decision that had endorsed a wide use of the SEC's disgorgement authority. The Trump administration had defended the SEC in the case. The challenge was brought by a defendant who, at the agency's request, was ordered by a court in California to repay more than $3 million in ill-gotten gains and interest related to a financial fraud case.
FCC FINES ON WIRELESS CARRIERS
The justices on June 4 backed the Federal Communications Commission's system for levying fines, ruling against wireless carriers AT&T and Verizon in their challenge to the agency. Trump's administration defended the FCC's system for assessing financial penalties, known as forfeiture orders. The carriers had argued that the agency's in-house proceedings deprived them of their right to a jury trial under the U.S. Constitution.
COMPENSATION FROM CUBA
The justices on June 23 made it easier for U.S. companies to seek compensation from Cuba's government for property seized decades ago by former leader Fidel Castro's government, ruling in favor of ExxonMobil in its lawsuit against Cuban state-owned firm Corporación CIMEX. The court said a legal defense called foreign sovereign immunity, which generally prohibits U.S. lawsuits against foreign governments and their agents, is not available in cases like the one Exxon brought against CIMEX under a 1996 U.S. law called the Helms-Burton Act. In another case, the court delivered a setback on May 21 to four American cruise operators that contested $440 million in combined judgments in litigation brought by a U.S. company accusing them of unlawfully using docks in Cuba that it built and were later seized.
CRISIS PREGNANCY CENTERS
The court on April 29 sided with the operator of Christian faith-based anti-abortion "crisis pregnancy centers" in New Jersey that is trying to impede a state investigation into whether the facilities engage in deceptive practices. The justices revived a federal lawsuit brought by First Choice Women's Resource Centers challenging a 2023 subpoena from the state attorney general seeking information on the organization's donors and doctors. A lower court had thrown out the lawsuit. The First Choice facilities seek to steer women away from having abortions.
RASTAFARIAN INMATE
The justices on June 23 refused to let a Rastafarian man sue state prison officials in Louisiana after guards held him down and shaved him bald in violation of his religious beliefs in a case brought under a federal law protecting incarcerated people from religious discrimination. They upheld a lower court's decision to dismiss Damon Landor's lawsuit because it found the statute at issue did not permit him to sue the individual prison officials and guards for monetary damages. Landor's religion requires him to let his hair grow.
DEATH ROW INMATE
A man convicted of a 1997 murder in Alabama was spared execution after the court on May 21 kept in place a judicial finding that the inmate is intellectually disabled and thus ineligible for the death penalty. The justices dismissed an appeal by Alabama officials of a lower court's approach to determining Joseph Clifton Smith's intellectual capacity. That method involved weighing multiple intelligence quotient, or IQ, test scores alongside expert testimony. A 2002 Supreme Court precedent held that executing an intellectually disabled person violates the U.S. Constitution's Eighth Amendment prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.
JURY COMPOSITION
The justices on May 28 sided with a Black death row inmate in Mississippi who accused prosecutors of racial discrimination in blocking Black potential jurors for a trial in which he was convicted in 2006 for his role in the murder of a grocery store owner. They ruled that state courts in Mississippi did not properly evaluate Terry Pitchford's claim that four Black potential jurors had been unlawfully dismissed in violation of a landmark 1986 Supreme Court precedent known as Batson v. Kentucky that prohibits excluding jurors based on their race.
SENTENCE REDUCTIONS
The court ruled on May 28 that judges cannot order the early release of prisoners on the grounds that they would have received shorter sentences currently following the enactment of a 2018 criminal justice reform law. It upheld lower-court rulings against two Pennsylvania men convicted of armed robberies who sought compassionate release based on the First Step Act, which Congress passed years after they were sentenced.
SECURITIES LITIGATION
The court on June 11 sided with a group of investment funds affiliated with BlackRock and other asset managers in their bid to fend off certain lawsuits brought by private plaintiffs under a key federal securities law. It reversed a lower court's ruling that had allowed hedge fund Saba Capital Master Fund to sue under the Investment Company Act of 1940 to void fund bylaws restricting the voting power of activist shareholders. The Trump administration backed BlackRock, FS Credit Opportunities and other funds involved in the case, including Adams Diversified Equity Fund, Adams Natural Resources Fund and Royce Global Trust.
COX COPYRIGHT DISPUTE
The court ruled on March 25 that Cox Communications cannot be held liable for piracy by its internet service subscribers of songs owned by Sony Music, Warner Music Group, Universal Music Group and other labels, ending their billion-dollar-plus music copyright lawsuit. The 9-0 ruling overturned a lower court's decision to order a new trial to determine how much the internet service provider owed the record labels for a form of liability called contributory copyright infringement. Cox had said a retrial could have produced a verdict against the Atlanta-based ISP of as much as $1.5 billion.
PHARMACEUTICAL 'SKINNY LABELS'
Drugmaker Hikma's generic version of Amarin Pharma's cardiovascular medication Vascepa did not infringe Amarin's patents, the court ruled on June 4. The decision may make generic drugmakers less vulnerable to patent lawsuits involving so-called "skinny labels." The justices overturned a lower court's decision in favor of Amarin. Generic drugmakers had argued that a ruling in favor of Amarin in the case would have discouraged them from making and selling their lower-cost drugs and increased U.S. drug prices.
(Reporting by John Kruzel, Andrew Chung, Blake Brittain, Jan Wolfe, Diana Novak Jones and Nate Raymond; Editing by Will Dunham)
