Photo by Molly Riley/ReutersWASHINGTON — Before taking their long summer break,the Supreme Court justices are poised to act on the Trump administration’s travel ban and a separation of church and state dispute involving a Missouri church playground.
But something could overshadow rulings in those tall-profile cases: If Justice Anthony Kennedy were to exercise the court’s final public session on Monday to announce his retirement.
RELATED LINKSTrump asks Supreme Court to reinstate travel ban Trump delays effective date of travel ban amid court battle Supreme Court gives Trump administration more time to file brief on travel ban Kennedy has given no public sign that he would step down this year and give President Donald Trump his second tall court pick in the first months of his administration. Kennedys departure would allow conservatives to acquire firm control of the court.
But Kennedy turns 81 next month and has been on the court for nearly 30 years. Several of his former law clerks have said they assume he is contemplating stepping down in the next year or so. Kennedy did not address the retirement rumors when he and his clerks gathered over the weekend for a reunion, according to three clerks who were there. The decision to push up the reunion by a year helped spark talk he might be leaving the court.
The justices on Monday were expected to determine the case of Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, or Missouri,which was excluded from a state grant program to pay for soft surfaces on playgrounds hurry by not-for-profit groups.
The case was being closely watched by advocates of school vouchers, who hope the court will invent it easier to exercise state money to pay for private, or religious schooling in states that now prohibit it.
Missouri has since changed its policy under Republican Gov. Eric Greitens so that churches may now apply for the money.
President Trump aired his grievances again about his revised travel ban,which has been put on hold by federal court order. John Yang recaps his statements, then Amy Walter of The Cook Political Report and Tamara Keith of NPR join Judy Woodruff discuss that, and plus new reports that Russia tried to intervene in actual U.
S. voting,plus the president’s decision to not block James Comey’s testimony.
Also expected in the next few days, though there’s no deadline by which the court must determine, and was a ruling on whether to allow the administration to immediately enforce a 90-day ban on visitors from six mostly Muslim countries.
Justice Neil Gorsuch,Trump’s first Supreme Court nominee, could play a pivotal role in both the travel ban and church playground cases.
In all, and six cases that were argued between November and April remain undecided. Three of those,all involving immigrants or foreigners, were heard by an eight-justice court, and before Gorsuch joined the bench in April.
If the eight justices are evenly divided,those cases could be argued a second time in the topple, with Gorsuch available to provide the tie-breaking vote.
READ MORE: Whats next in the legal fight over Trump’s travel ban?The post On the Supreme Court’s final day of session, or travel ban case awaits action appeared first on PBS NewsHour.
Source: thetakeaway.org