Legal News
Reports on lawmaking, constitutional issues, and court cases. The Daily Signal combines news reporting with conservative commentary and legal analysis.
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opinion
Arizona’s Attorney General Wages Lawfare on Families
Arizona is one of the nation’s leading states in offering families education choice—and families are loving it. Three out of four parents support the state’s Empowerment Scholarship Accounts program, which enables families to choose the learning environments that work best for their children. Parents can use these funds to pay for private school tuition, tutoring,… -
opinion
I Went to Supreme Court to Preserve the America My Parents Came Here For
Editor’s note: The following commentary is an excerpt from remarks presented before the Presidential Religious Liberty Commission on Sept. 8, with minor edits made only for readability.As a child, my parents often spoke of the great freedoms America offers. These freedoms and the opportunities they provide are why my parents moved here from Nigeria. They… -
news
Supreme Court Lets Girl Use Boys’ Restroom
The Supreme Court moved Wednesday to allow a female identifying as male to use a male restroom while her case is heard. The one-page unsigned order keeps South Carolina from enforcing a law requiring public school students to use restrooms aligning with their sex. The law, enacted as part of South Carolina’s 2024-2025 budget bill… -
news
Supreme Court Stays Order Requiring Trump to Pay $4B in Foreign Aid
The Supreme Court moved Tuesday to block a lower court order that required the Trump administration to spend $4 billion in foreign aid by Sept. 30. The high court’s judgment came in response to an emergency appeal filed Monday morning by the Trump administration that alleged it would suffer “irreparable harm” if forced to spend… -
news
Supreme Court Hands Victory to Trump in His Fight to Control ‘Independent’ Agencies
The Supreme Court said Monday that President Donald Trump could fire a member of the Federal Trade Commission, marking a victory for Trump as he seeks to exert more control over so-called independent agencies. The order, issued by Chief Justice John Roberts, temporarily halted a lower court demand that the Trump administration reinstate the fired… -
news
Here’s How Trump’s Judicial Nominees Are Stacking Up So Far
DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—President Donald Trump’s second-term judicial nominees share similar qualities with his first-term picks, though a limited number of vacancies mean his impact remains an open question. Trump began this term with just 40 vacancies to fill, less than half of the open seats as he inherited starting in his first term. Confirming 234 judges to the… -
news
‘This Is Lawfare’: AGs Draw Attention to Leftist Group Training Judges to Push Climate Alarmism
Twenty-three Republican state attorneys general sent a letter to Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin, demanding the EPA investigate funding for the Environmental Law Institute, which the AGs said attempts to “rig the courts” against American energy. The EPA confirmed receipt and reiterated Zeldin’s dedication to cutting down on wasteful spending from the previous administration…. -
news
State Department Slams Latest Instance of Leftist ‘Judicial Overreach’
FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—The State Department is condemning a Biden-appointed federal judge’s ruling barring the Trump administration from using the president’s latest travel ban to deny visas to foreigners from certain countries. U.S. District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan, a 2024 appointee of then-President Joe Biden, ruled Thursday that the State Department cannot rely on the… -
opinion
4 Cases to Watch in Next Supreme Court Session
On Oct. 6, just a few short months from now, the Supreme Court marshal will utter the traditional “Oyez! Oyez! Oyez!”—marking the start of yet another Supreme Court term. The court’s last term, which ended in June, featured hot-button topics ranging from nationwide injunctions to parental rights to religious liberty, and it delivered no shortage… -
opinion
The Left’s Latest Supreme Court-Packing Scheme Exposes an Existential Threat to Our Republic
Why are Democrats bringing up court-packing again? Back in 2020 and under President Joe Biden, the institutional Left would tell anyone foolish enough to listen that we needed to add seats to the Supreme Court. In October 2024, however, much of the court-packing rhetoric vanished, almost on cue. Now, it’s back, as Democrats strain to… -
news
EXCLUSIVE: How Marc Elias Group Used States to Ramp-Up Anti-Trump Lawfare
A litigation group run by veteran Democrat election lawyer Marc Elias helped coordinate legal challenges from California and Illinois to stop President Donald Trump’s agenda. Democracy Forward, where Elias is chairman, coordinated an online conference with lawyers working for the California and Illinois state attorneys general offices to challenge executive orders from Trump, according to… -
news
‘Blue Slip’ Brouhaha: Trump, Grassley Spar Over Judicial Nominee Confirmation Procedure
President Donald Trump is seeking to end the long-standing “blue slip” tradition of giving senators veto power over some judicial nominees from their states—but he’s getting pushback from the Republican senator whose mind he needs to change. “I was offended by what the president said, and I’m disappointed that it would result in personal insults,”… -
opinion
Justice Kagan Hits the Nail on the Head in Her Complaint About How the Supreme Court Restrains the Judicial Insurrection
District court judges have usurped President Donald Trump’s control over the executive branch, too often requiring the Supreme Court to intervene to stop the judicial insurrection. Unfortunately, the court has often done so via the “shadow docket” by acting on emergency petitions the administration has appealed to the top. While the court has often made… -
news
EXCLUSIVE: Lawsuit Against School District Which Secretly Transitioned Tween Girls Added to SCOTUS Docket
FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—America First Policy Institute and Illumine Legal asked the Supreme Court to hear the case of two families whose daughters were exposed to transgender ideology behind their backs. In 2021, Erin Lee’s 12-year-old daughter was invited by her art teacher to come to art club after school in the Poudre School District… -
news
Ex-DOJ Lawyers Join DNC, Left’s Lawfare Against Trump
Media accounts have cast departing Justice Department lawyers as principled nonpartisan civil servants too conscientious to serve a politicized Trump administration. But several of these lawyers have taken up very political roles after they’ve left the department. Dan Freeman, the litigation director for the Democratic National Committee, touted his time in the Justice Department in… -
opinion
Supreme Court Tells Judge to Fall in Line
In polite but firm judicial language, the Supreme Court made it clear on July 3 that Massachusetts federal district court Judge Brian Murphy wouldn’t get away with dodging the stay the court had issued against him in an important immigration case. According to the court, Murphy is bound by the prior order and cannot “enforce… -
news
BREAKING: Supreme Court Allows Trump’s ‘Transformation of the Federal Bureaucracy’ to Proceed
The Supreme Court Tuesday stayed a district judge’s injunction blocking President Donald Trump from carrying out a “critical transformation of the federal bureaucracy.” Trump signed Executive Order 14210 on Feb. 11, implementing the Department of Government Efficiency Workforce Optimization Initiative. On Feb. 26, Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought and Office of Personnel… -
opinion
What Made Justice Kagan Change Her Mind on Universal Injunctions?
When judges change their mind, they explain their reasons. Or at least they ought to, because that’s what makes their judgments trustworthy. But when the Supreme Court decided Trump v. CASA this term, Justice Elena Kagan suddenly changed her mind on universal injunctions—and didn’t explain why. There, the Supreme Court held that federal courts likely… -
news
US Supreme Court to Take Up Two Transgender Athlete Cases
THE CENTER SQUARE—The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday agreed to take up two cases in its next term on laws banning men from participating in girls and women’s sports, based on biological sex. The Supreme Court will hear arguments on Little v. Hecox and West Virginia v. B.P.J. The cases come out of Idaho and… -
news
Supreme Court Upholds Porn Age-Verification Law
Last Friday, the Supreme Court held in Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton that states can require pornographic websites to verify that users are over 18. States now have much more leeway to ensure that children are protected from internet pornography. In 2023, Texas introduced the law challenged in Paxton. The law requires pornography websites to…