In the context of the violation of a right to a public trial during jury selection, when the structural error was first raised via an ineffective assistance of counsel claim, the defendant must demonstrate that he suffered prejudice in order to secure a new trial. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy delivered the opinion of the 7-2 majority. The Court held that structural errors were so fundamental that they were errors in the trial process itself and therefore were not susceptible to harmless error analysis. An error may still be structural despite not resulting in fundamental unfairness each time it occurred. The right to a public trial was one such error. Generally, a structural error that the defendant objected to at trial and raised a direct appeal automatically allowed for a new trial. However, when the defendant did not preserve the issue but only raised it later within the context of an ineffective assistance of counsel claim, the defendant must meet the higher standard of the ineffective assistance claim and show that he suffered prejudice. When a structural error claim was raised at trial or on direct appeal, the systemic costs of remedying the error were relatively low. When the error was raised through an ineffective assistance of counsel claim during post-conviction proceedings, however, the costs were much higher, which justified placing this burden on the defendant. In this case, the defendant was unable to meet his burden to show that the violation of his right to a public trial was prejudicial to the outcome of his case, so he was not entitled to a new trial.
Justice Clarence Thomas wrote a concurring opinion in which he argued that it is not clear from precedent that the Sixth Amendment right to a public trial extended to the jury selection phase. Additionally, a defendant cannot establish that he suffered prejudice sufficient to support a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel by showing that his counsel’s errors rendered the trial fundamentally unfair. Justice Neil Gorsuch joined in the concurring opinion. In his separate opinion concurring in the judgment, Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. wrote that this case called for a straightforward application of the ineffective assistance of counsel test. To prevail on such a claim, the defendant must show that counsel’s performance was defective and that defect resulted in prejudice to the outcome of the trial. Because the defendant in this case could not meet that burden, he was not entitled to relief. Justice Gorsuch joined in the opinion concurring in the judgment.
Justice Stephen G. Breyer wrote a dissent in which he argued that a defendant who successfully demonstrated that his attorney’s deficient performance resulted in a structural error should not have to meet the additional requirement of showing that the error was prejudicial. Precedent had established that structural errors were categorically exempt from harmless error analysis. In this case, however, the majority opinion subjected the public-trial violation to precisely the examination that the Court had previously established was inappropriate and impossible for structural errors. Justice Elena Kagan joined in the dissent.


National Association of Manufacturers v. Department of Defense

The Clean Water Act (CWA) provides for judicial review in instances where the Environmental Protection Agency’s action results in the issuance or denial of any permit or places restrictions on waste emissions or other activities related to the waters.On August 28, 2015, a final rule issued by the Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers that defined the scope of “the waters of the United States” under the CWA came into effect. Numerous states and other organizations challenged the validity of the agencies’ rule and contended both that it did not conform with the CWA and was improperly adopted in violation of the requirements of the Administrative Procedures Act. Following consolidation of the claims before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, the National Association of Manufacturers intervened to join the plaintiffs and moved to dismiss. The plaintiffs argued that the CWA does not provide the federal circuit courts with jurisdiction over the agencies’ rule and that review is properly held in the district courts instead. The appellate court held that it had jurisdiction because, although the rule only defined the scope of U.S. waters, by defining its boundaries, the rule functionally placed restrictions on activity related to the waters. Therefore, the rule affected permitting requirements and thus had the practical effect of granting or denying permits.

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The Court reversed and remanded, holding because that the Waters of the United States Rule (WOTUS Rule or Rule) does not fall within the scope of Section 1369(b)(1) of the CWA, challenges to the rule must be filed in federal district courts rather than appellate courts.
Writing for a unanimous Court, Justice Sotomayor explained that there are generally two avenues for challenging final EPA actions: (1) in federal district court under the Administrative Procedures Act, or (2) in federal appellate court if the challenged action falls under one of seven specifically enumerated categories. Here, the Court rejected the government's arguments that the WOTUS Rule falls under two of the categories of EPA actions that are exclusively reviewable at the appellate level in the first instance.
The Court held that the first category, under §1369(b)(1)(E), which pertains to agency actions “approving or promulgating any effluent limitation or other limitation under section 1311, 1312, 1316, or 1345” does not apply because the WOTUS Rule is not an effluent limitation. It is also not an "other limitation," which the statutory structure suggested must be similar to an effluent limitation. Further, the Rule was not promulgated under § 1311 because that section does not provide authority to define statutory terms appearing elsewhere in the CWA.
The second category, which pertains to actions falling under § 1369(b)(1)(F), encompasses and grants exclusive and original jurisdiction to courts of appeal to review EPA actions “issuing or denying any permit under section 1342.” The WOTUS Rule does not issue or deny individual permit applications, and the Court therefore rejected the argument that the Rule was exclusively reviewable in appellate court under § 1369(b)(1)(F).
Finally, the Court rejected a number of policy arguments the government offered in support of its position. Though acknowledging the persuasiveness of arguments in favor of judicial efficiency and national uniformity with regard to broad regulations, among others, the Court held that these contentions did not outweigh the importance of following the statutory text.


The Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act of 2009 established a process for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to license “biosimilar” products: products that are “highly similar” to already-approved biological products. Under the Act, biosimilar product applicants must provide notice to the seller of the original product at least 180 days prior to the first commercial marketing of the biosimilar product. The Act also requires the biosimilar seller to provide the original seller with the details of its application within 20 days of receiving notice of FDA review.
In May 2014, Sandoz Inc. filed an application for FDA approval of its product Zarxio, which was highly similar to Amgen Inc.’s product Neupogen (both products are bone marrow stimulants). On July 7, 2014, the FDA notified Sandoz that its application was under review, and the next day, Sandoz notified Amgen of the application. Later that month, Sandoz informed Amgen that it would not disclose the details of its application as required by the Act. On March 6, 2015, the FDA approved Sandoz’s application; Sandoz then notified Amgen of the FDA’s approval.
In October 2014, Amgen sued Sandoz and claimed that Sandoz violated the Act because it failed to disclose the details of its application and did not give proper notice of commercial marketing before the FDA’s approval of its biosimilar product. The district court held that failure to disclose application details under the Act does not authorize the original seller to receive damages from the biosimilar product seller or prevent the sale of the biosimilar product. The court also held that an applicant may give notice of commercial marketing before FDA approval. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit vacated the district court’s ruling and held that effective notice may only be given after the FDA has approved the application. Therefore, Sandoz’s notice was effective in March 2015 rather than July 2014, and Sandoz could not sell its biosimilar product until 180 days after the March 2015 notice. The court also held that, because the Act only permits remedies based on patent infringement claims, Sandoz’s failure to disclose the details of its application did not violate the Act. Both parties filed petitions for writs of certiorari which were granted and consolidated.

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The Court held that the Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act of 2009 allows for commercial notice of a “biosimilar product” to be effective if given prior to approval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), but that the Act’s notice requirement is not enforceable with an injunction. Justice Clarence Thomas delivered the opinion for the unanimous Court, which held that the only relief that the Act provided for the applicant’s failure to turn over application and manufacturing information was the filing of a declaratory judgment action. The relevant section of the Act explicitly stated that declaratory relief was available, and therefore no other relief, whether damages or injunctive, was available. The larger context of the statute, which only provided for injunctive relief in the specific instance of a breach of confidentiality, supported this interpretation. Although federal law did not allow for injunctive relief, on remand, the lower court should consider whether injunctive relief may be available under the relevant state law. The Court also held that the plain text of the Act places the notice requirement in relation to the first commercial marketing, not the FDA’s approval. Therefore, the Act allows for effective notice to be given prior to approval by the FDA.
Justice Stephen G. Breyer wrote a concurring opinion in which he argued that Congress granted the FDA the authority to interpret the Act, and if it concluded that a different interpretation was correct, it could properly deviate from the majority’s holding.


Land developer Steve Sherman sued the Town of Chester (Chester) and alleged a regulatory taking of his property because Chester prevented him from developing his land by requiring unfair and repetitive procedures. While that case was pending, a real estate company, Laroe Estates, Inc. (Laroe), sought to intervene in the case and claimed that it currently owned the property in question based on an initial 2003 agreement and a subsequent one in 2013. In 2013, TD Bank, which held a superior mortgage on the property, initiated foreclosure proceedings. Laroe and Sherman then entered into a new sales agreement that took the foreclosure proceedings into account, but TD Bank took possession of the property. The district court denied Laroe’s motion to intervene because Laroe was not the owner of an interest in the property at the time of the alleged taking and therefore lacked independent standing in the takings claim. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held that, under Article III of the U.S. Constitution, Laroe was not required to show it independently had standing to intervene. The appellate court reasoned that the Second Circuit case United States Postal Service v. Brennan, which held that there is no need to impose a standing requirement on an intervenor if there is an established valid case or controversy, applied in this case.

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An intervenor to a lawsuit must meet the requirements of Article III standing if the intervenor wishes to pursue relief that was not already requested by the plaintiff. Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. delivered the opinion for the unanimous Court, which held that Article III required that plaintiffs establish standing on each of their claims. When there are multiple plaintiffs, at least one of plaintiffs must have standing for the relief requested in the complaint. The Court held that the same principle applied to intervenors. Therefore, if an intervenor sought a different type of relief than what the current plaintiff was seeking, it must establish Article III standing for that relief. In this case, it was unclear whether the intervenor sought the same relief as the original plaintiff. That issue must be resolved by the lower court in order to determine whether Laroe Estates, Inc. must establish Article III standing.


The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sued Charles Kokesh for violating federal securities law by misappropriating funds from four business development companies. The district court found in favor of the SEC and ordered that Kokesh pay $34.9 million for “the ill-gotten gains causally connected” to Kokesh’s violations. On appeal, Kokesh argued that this “disgorgement” order is barred by the five-year statute of limitations on this type of claim because the SEC brought its action more than five years after the claims accrued. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed the lower court’s ruling. The appellate court held that the five-year statute of limitations did not apply to this case because the ordered payment was remedial rather than punitive in nature. The goal of disgorgement is not to punish a wrongdoer for illegal activity, but rather to return to the rightful owner whatever profits the wrongdoer gained in the course of the illegal activity. Therefore, a disgorgement payment may be ordered so long as the amount “reasonably approximates the ill-gotten gains causally connected to the Defendant’s violations.”

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Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) disgorgement functions as a penalty, and therefore is subject to the five-year statute of limitations. Justice Sonia Sotomayor delivered the opinion for the unanimous Court. The Court held that, although disgorgement was originally supposed to be a form of restitution, since the 1970s courts have ordered disgorgement in the SEC context to deprive defendants of their profits and as a form of deterrence to protect the investing public. In 1990, Congress authorized the SEC to seek monetary civil penalties; though that statute did not address disgorgement, courts continued to order that remedy. Subsequently, the Court determined that the five-year statute of limitations applied when the SEC sought statutory monetary penalties. Because disgorgement is a remedy for wrongs to the public instead of only to an individual plaintiff, it is meant to be deterrent rather than compensatory and therefore functions as a penalty to which the five-year statute of limitations should apply.


In April 1998, Divna Maslenjak, an ethnic Serb from modern-day Bosnia, met with a U.S. immigration official to seek refugee status for her and her family at the close of the Bosnian civil war. Through a translator, Maslenjak told the immigration official that the family feared persecution in their home region of Bosnia based on their Serbian ethnicity. Maslenjak also told the immigration official that the family feared reprisal because her husband had evaded conscription into the Bosnian Serb militia during the war. Maslenjak and her family were granted refugee status in 1999 and immigrated to the United States in September 2000. Maslenjak was naturalized as a U.S. citizen on August 3, 2007. During the naturalization process, Maslenjak denied ever having given false or misleading information to a U.S. official in order to gain entry to the United states or to avoid removal.
On October 7, 2007 Maslenjak’s husband, Ratko, was convicted on two counts of making false statements on a government document for his failure to disclose that he had in fact served as an officer in a Serbian military unit. To avoid deportation, Ratko applied for asylum. Testifying on his behalf at the asylum hearing, Maslenjak admitted that Ratko had served in the Serbian militia and that she had lied to the immigration officer during the refugee application interview in 1998. Maslenjak was subsequently charged with two counts of naturalization fraud for denying having ever given false or misleading information to a U.S. official. At trial, the jury was instructed that, in order to find Maslenjak guilty of fraudulently obtaining her naturalization, it need not find that her false statements were material to the decision to approve her naturalization, merely that she made them knowing their falsehood. Maslenjak was convicted on both counts, sentenced to two years probation, and stripped of her citizenship. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed her conviction and held that proof of a material false statement was not a required element of naturalization fraud.

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In order for a naturalized American citizen to be stripped of her citizenship, the government has to prove that she obtained her citizenship illegally; if the underlying illegality is a false statement to government officials, the government must prove that the false statement influenced the citizenship process. Justice Elena Kagan delivered the opinion for the 9-0 majority. The Court held that that the plain text of the naturalization fraud statute required a causal connection between the illegal action and obtaining citizenship. The broader statutory context also supported this interpretation because it relied on the same causal connection between the requirements for naturalization and obtaining citizenship. In the case of a false statement to government officials, the required causal connection was present when the false statement sufficiently altered the citizenship process such that it influenced the award of citizenship. The standard to determine when a false statement “sufficiently altered” the process was an objective one. The government had to prove that the misrepresentation would have prompted reasonable officials to investigate further, and at that point, the question was whether the investigation would likely have turned up any disqualifying information. The government need not definitively prove that it would have, and the defendant may show that she would have qualified despite the misrepresentation. This test balanced the government’s and defendant’s interests while also taking the realities of case-specific investigations into account. Because the jury instructions used in this case did not reflect this test, they were incorrect.
In his opinion concurring in part and concurring in the judgment, Justice Gorsuch wrote that it was sufficient to determine there needed to be a causal link between the illegal act and the awarding of citizenship. Because the jury was not instructed on this causal link, the jury instructions were incorrect. The majority opinion should not have gone further to announce new tests about what the government must show to prove that a misrepresentation affected the award of citizenship. Justice Clarence Thomas joined in the opinion concurring in part and concurring in the judgment. Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. wrote a separate opinion concurring in the judgment in which he argued that that the relevant text required only that a false statement meet the same materiality standard that applied in other contexts--that the false statement had a “natural tendency to influence” the outcome, not whether it actually influenced the outcome. There was no indication that Congress intended a different standard to apply.


Epic Systems Corporation (Epic) is a Wisconsin-based healthcare data management software company. Epic has an arbitration agreement that requires its employees to resolve any employment-based disputes with Epic through individual arbitration and to waive their right to participate in or receive benefit from any class, collective, or representative proceedings. In February 2015, former Epic employee Jacob Lewis sued Epic in federal court individually and on behalf of similarly-situated employees and claimed that they had been denied overtime wages in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. Epic moved to dismiss the complaint and cited the waiver clause of its arbitration agreement. The district court denied Epic’s motion and held that the waiver was unenforceable because it violated the right of employees to engage in “concerted activities” under Section Seven of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed the lower court’s decision and added that the waiver was also unenforceable under the savings clause of the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA). That clause provides that arbitration agreements are to be enforced unless there legal or equitable grounds that would render a contract unenforceable. Finding the waiver of collective proceedings illegal under the NLRA, the appellate court held that the arbitration agreement was unenforceable under the FAA. This case was consolidated with Ernst & Young v. Morris and National Labor Relations Board v. Murphy Oil USA, Inc., both cases that dealt with the relationship between the FAA and the NLRA.

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The Court held that neither the Arbitration Act's saving clause nor the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) supersede Congress's instructions in the Federal Arbitration Act that arbitration agreements providing for individualized proceedings must be enforced. Justice Neil Gorsuch delivered the opinion for a 5-4 majority. The majority found that the Federal Arbitration Act "instructed federal courts to enforce arbitration agreements according to their terms" and that the NLRA "does not mention class or collection action procedures" and thus cannot be read to displace the Arbitration Act.
Justice Clarence Thomas filed a concurring opinion to add that "the employees also cannot prevail under the plain meaning of the Federal Arbitration Act."
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg filed a dissenting opinion in which Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan joined. The dissent noted the extreme imbalance between employer and employee and Congress's attempt to remedy that imbalance in passing the NLRA and its forerunner, the Norris-LaGuardia Act. In this context, the dissent found that the Federal Arbitration Act should not shrink the NLRA's "protective sphere."


On December 30, 1984, James McWilliams raped and robbed Patricia Reynolds, who died in surgery later that night. McWilliams was arrested, tried, and convicted of murder during robbery in the first degree and murder during rape in the first degree. At the sentencing phase, defense counsel requested that the court order neuropsychological testing for McWilliams. The court did so and ordered that the Alabama Department of Corrections (DOC) conduct the testing. The DOC doctor who conducted the testing recommended further testing from a doctor who was not affiliated with the DOC. The second doctor’s report was made available to both parties but did not arrive at the court until the day before the sentencing hearing, and the court did not allow a continuance for defense counsel to review the report with the assistance of an expert. At the sentencing hearing, the court concluded that there were aggravating factors but no mitigating factors and sentenced McWilliams to death by electrocution. The conviction and sentence were affirmed on direct appeal in Alabama state courts.
In 2004, McWilliams filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in federal district court. The district court denied the petition without addressing all of the specific claims, one of which included a claim that he was denied his due process rights under the Supreme Court’s decision in Ake v. Oklahoma because the court did not provide him with an independent psychiatric expert. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit vacated the lower court’s decision and remanded the case for the district court to address the specific claims in the petition. The district court again denied the petition, and the appellate court affirmed the lower court’s decision by holding that McWilliams’ due process rights were not violated because he was provided with a competent psychiatric expert, which met the requirement of Ake, and any harm that he might have suffered was not prejudicial to the outcome of the sentencing hearing.

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The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Ake v. Oklahoma clearly established that a state must provide an indigent defendant with access to an expert witness who is sufficiently available to the defense and independent of the prosecution to effectively conduct an examination and assist in the preparation of a defense. Justice Stephen G. Breyer delivered the opinion for the 5-4 majority. The Court held that, after certain threshold matters--such as the defendant’s indigence and whether his mental condition was relevant and in question--are met, then Ake v. Oklahoma clearly requires that the defendant be provided with access to a competent mental health expert who can effectively assist in the “evaluation, preparation, and presentation” of a defense. In this case, a single evaluation available to both parties and the assistance of an outside volunteer expert who suggested that the defense consult other experts as well did not relieve the state of its responsibility under Ake. The Court declined to address the question of whether Ake required that the state provide an indigent defendant with an expert retained specifically for the defense, as this case could be resolved on narrower grounds.
Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. wrote a dissent in which he argued that Ake did not clearly establish that an indigent defendant is entitled to a separate defense expert who is a member of the defense team. Although some language in Ake suggests that an indigent defendant is entitled to a separate defense expert, other language makes it clear that an indigent defendant is only entitled to an expert who can perform specific tasks for the defense team. There is no reason that a neutral expert cannot be sufficient. As further evidence that the rule from Ake is ambiguous, lower courts have diverged in their interpretation of the rule. Therefore, there can be reasonable dispute as to whether access to a neutral expert satisfies the state’s requirement under Ake. Justice Alito also argued that the majority opinion essentially ignored the question for which it granted certiorari and did not provide a basis for its failure to accept the lower court’s harmless error analysis. Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., Justice Clarence Thomas, and Justice Neil Gorsuch joined in the dissent.


In March 2011, Robert Nelson was employed by BNSF Railway Co. (BNSF) and sued the company for damages under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act (FELA) based on knee injuries sustained during the course of his employment. BNSF moved to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction. The lower court granted the motion and Nelson appealed. Brent Tyrrell also worked for BNSF and was allegedly exposed to carcinogens that caused him to develop ultimately fatal kidney cancer. In May 2014, Kelli Tyrell, the administrator of Brent’s estate, sued BNSF on Brent’s behalf under FELA for damages based on the injuries Brent sustained during the course of his employment. BNSF filed a motion to dismiss Tyrrell’s claim for lack of personal jurisdiction. The lower court denied the motion, and BNSF appealed. Both cases were filed in Montana state court because Supreme Court precedent for FELA decisions allows state courts jurisdiction to hear FELA cases solely due to the railroad doing business in the forum state. However, the injuries did not occur in Montana, and BNSF is incorporated in Delaware with its principal place of business in Texas.
The Supreme Court of Montana consolidated both cases to decide whether Montana courts have personal jurisdiction over BNSF under FELA and whether Montana courts have personal jurisdiction over BNSF under Montana law. BNSF argued that, under the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Daimler AG v. Bauman, the state courts cannot exercise general jurisdiction. However, the Montana Supreme Court rejected that argument and held that, because BNSF does business in Montana, under FELA, Montana courts have personal jurisdiction. Montana’s Supreme Court also held that the state has general personal jurisdiction over BNSF under Montana law because BNSF “maintains substantial, continuous, and systematic” contacts with Montana.

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The Federal Employers’ Liability Act (FELA) does not address the issue of whether state courts may exercise personal jurisdiction over railroads, and the Supreme Court’s precedent in Daimler AG v. Baumann controls a state court’s exercise of general jurisdiction. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg delivered the opinion for the 8-1 majority. The Court held that the relevant language in FELA addresses venue and subject-matter jurisdiction, not personal jurisdiction. The statute lacked the language that Congress typically uses to provide for personal jurisdiction, and there is no indication in the legislative history that suggested that Congress meant to do otherwise. Therefore, the exercise of personal jurisdiction in this case must meet the requirements of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Supreme Court’s jurisdiction jurisprudence. Because neither plaintiff in these cases was injured in Montana or in work related to Montana, the exercise of personal jurisdiction here would violate the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, so only the exercise of general jurisdiction would be permissible. Under the Supreme Court’s decision in Daimler AG v. Baumann, BNSF Railway Co. did not have sufficiently substantial contact with Montana to be “at home” in Montana for the purpose of general jurisdiction.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part in which she argued that the decision in Daimler AG v. Baumann was a significant departure from the Supreme Court’s previous jurisdiction precedent. Because the “at home” language from Daimler replaced the more nuanced “continuous contacts” analysis from previous precedent, Daimler made it harder to subject multinational and multistate corporations to general jurisdiction and was wrongfully dispositive in cases like this one.


In February 2009, Erick Daniel Davila was found guilty of capital murder for the killings of Annette Stevenson and her granddaughter, Queshawn Stevenson. The jury sentenced Davila to death. After the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed his conviction on direct appeal and the U.S. Supreme Court denied his petition for a writ of certiorari, Davila pursued habeas relief in the state courts, which was denied at the trial and appellate levels. Davila then sought federal habeas relief and claimed, among other things, that he received ineffective assistance of trial, appellate, and state habeas counsel. Because Davila did not raise the ineffective assistance of appellate counsel claim in the state habeas proceedings, the federal district court held that the claim was procedurally defaulted and denied habeas relief. Davila appealed and argued that Supreme Court precedent that ineffective state habeas counsel can overcome the procedural default of an ineffective assistance of trial claim should also apply to the procedural default of claims of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court’s denial of relief.

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Ineffective assistance of appellate counsel does not overcome the procedural default of ineffective assistance of counsel claims. Justice Clarence Thomas delivered the opinion for the 5-4 majority. The Court held that, as a general rule, a federal court may not review claims that were procedurally defaulted in state court because they were decided on adequate and independent state procedural rule. A state prisoner may only overcome this bar by showing that there was cause to excuse his failure to comply and actual prejudice from the underlying constitutional violation. While there was an exception for when a state required defendants to raise an ineffective assistance of trial counsel claim in a state post-conviction proceeding and the defendant failed to do so because of ineffective assistance of counsel, this exception was a narrow one. The Court had previously held that this exception applied only when the state prohibited defendants from bringing such claims on direct appeal. The exception was chiefly concerned with ensuring review of a claim of ineffective assistance of trial counsel, because of the crucial role that the criminal trial played in the justice system. Because this case dealt with appellate counsel, it did not raise the same serious concerns, and therefore the exception should not apply. Additionally, while the exception did not create systemic costs, the proposed rule in this case would do so without actually adding protections for defendants.
In his dissent, Justice Stephen G. Breyer wrote that the reasons underlying the exception for procedurally defaulted ineffective assistance of trial counsel claims applied to procedurally defaulted ineffective assistance of appellate counsel claims. The exception reflected the understanding that a defendant could not raise a claim of ineffective assistance of trial counsel until his first opportunity to do so outside of the trial. Similarly, a defendant could not raise a claim of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel until the first opportunity to do so outside of that appellate proceeding. Because the same underlying due process concerns regarding effective assistance of counsel applied at the appellate level and there was no indication that expanding the exception in this way would lead to an increase in systemic costs, the procedural default exception should apply to claims of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and Justice Elena Kagan joined in the dissent.


On March 16, 2008, Metropolitan Police Department officers responded to a noise complaint for a house party. Upon arrival, the officers heard loud music coming from the house. The officers then entered the house and observed party guests, including Theodore Wesby, drinking and watching “scantily clad women with money tucked into garter belts.” The partygoers claimed that a woman called “Peaches” was the host of the party, and that she had received permission from the owner, from whom Peaches was leasing the house. One partygoer called Peaches on the phone for an officer, since Peaches was not present. Peaches confirmed that she had permission from the owner, but when an officer called the owner, the owner claimed that the lease had not been executed and that he had not given permission for the party. The officers subsequently arrested the partygoers.
Sixteen of the arrested partygoers sued the officers and the District of Columbia for false arrest. The district court ruled in favor of the partygoers. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit affirmed and held both that the officers did not have probable cause for entry and were not entitled to immunity from liability. Probable cause to arrest for unlawful entry under D.C. law exists where a reasonable officer concludes from information known at the time that the arrestee knew or should have known that they entered the house against the will of the owner. The court reasoned that, because the partygoers believed in good faith that the owner had given Peaches permission for the party, they could not have intended to enter unlawfully. The court also ruled that the officers were not entitled to immunity because it was unreasonable for them to believe that they were not violating the partygoers’ clearly established Fourth Amendment rights against false arrest.

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The Court reversed and remanded. Justice Thomas authored the majority opinion, which held that (1) the officers had probable cause to arrest the partygoers, and (2) the officers were entitled to qualified immunity under 42 U. S. C. §1983. With regard to probable cause, Justice Thomas explained that the D.C. Circuit erred in analyzing individual factors rather than the totality of the circumstances at the party scene, which could have reasonably led the officers to believe that there was a substantial chance of criminal activity. On the qualified immunity question, the majority held that the officers were protected from suit unless their actions were "clearly" unlawful at the time. Given that they could have reasonably but mistakenly thought that they had probable cause to make the arrests at the time, their actions were not clearly unlawful. Justice Sotomayor filed an opinion concurring in part and concurring in the judgment. Justice Ginsburg filed an opinion concurring in the judgment in part.


In the mid-2000s, Anthony Perry began to develop osteoporosis, so in order to alleviate his pain and to ensure that he could continue working, he made an informal agreement with his supervisor at the U.S. Census Bureau. The deal allowed Perry to take breaks throughout the day to control the symptoms of his osteoporosis, and to make up any time lost during the workday after hours with no penalty. On June 7, 2011, Perry received a proposed removal notice that alleged that he had been paid for hours that he had not worked. He contested the charges and pointed to the informal agreement he and his supervisor had made and his unblemished performance record. In August 2011, Perry and the agency entered into an agreement that required him to serve a thirty-day suspension, to retire on or before September 4, 2012, and to forfeit any discrimination claims against the agency. After serving his suspension and retiring, Perry brought a pro se claim before the Merit Systems Protection Board, the federal board that is authorized the hear certain challenges by federal employees to adverse employment actions. An administrative law judge (ALJ) initially ruled that the Board lacked jurisdiction because retirements are presumed to be voluntary, and the Board cannot review claims that resulted in settlement with the agency. Perry appealed to the Board, which remanded the case. Upon further review, the ALJ again denied that it had jurisdiction and held that Perry had not sufficiently shown that he was improperly coerced into settling his claims. Perry appealed to the Board again, which affirmed the ALJ’s ruling. Perry appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, which transferred the case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit based on a lack of proper jurisdiction.The appellate court docketed the case but granted Perry’s motion to suspend proceedings until the U.S. Supreme Court resolves the jurisdictional issue of which court system should hear the case.

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A Merit Systems Protection Board decision to dismiss a case with mixed claims on jurisdictional grounds is subject to judicial review in district court. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg delivered the opinion for the 7-2 majority. The Court held that a case that is appealed to the Merit Systems Protection Board and that asserts claims under both the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 (CSRA) and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is a “mixed case.” The CSRA established a series of procedural routes that a mixed case may take, including that, when the Board decides the case on the merits or procedural grounds, the proper forum for judicial review is district court. The Court determined that a case dismissed on jurisdictional grounds may still be considered a “mixed case” for the purpose of judicial review of that decision. Although the CSRA defined a mixed case it terms of its appealability to the Board, it did not require that the case be able to be successfully appealed to fall under the definition. If the Court were to hold otherwise, it would create an unworkable system of distinguishing among the Board’s dismissals based on substantive, procedural, and jurisdictional, grounds. Employees seeking to appeal would also have to bifurcate their claims to litigate the CSRA claims in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and the federal discrimination law in district court. Such a system would be costly and impractical.
Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote a dissent in which he argued that the plain text of the CSRA required that appeals regarding CSRA claims be heard in the Federal Circuit, while federal discrimination claims were appealed to the district court. Although the statute allowed employees to bring claims before the Board, if the Board determined that it did not have jurisdiction over those claims, the other statutory provisions still applied. Any problems or inefficiencies in this statutory scheme were for the legislative branch, not the judiciary, to fix. Justice Gorsuch also argued that there was no statutory text clearly defining a “mixed case” or its procedural path, and there was no indication that Congress intended to carve out a particular place for such a case. Justice Clarence Thomas joined in the dissent.


The petitioners are a group of individuals who all obtained car loans from CitiFinancial Auto. When they were unable to make payments on the vehicles, CitiFinancial repossessed them, sold them, and then informed the petitioners they owed a balance to cover the difference between the agreed purchase price and the amount of money for which CitiFinancial sold the debt. It later sold the defaulted loans to Santander Consumer, USA (Santander), which attempted to collect these alleged debts. In November 2012, the petitioners filed a putative class action lawsuit that alleged that Santander violated the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) in its communications with them. Santander moved to dismiss the action and claimed that it was not a “debt collector” under the regulations of the FDCPA because Santander merely bought the debt from another institution and did not originate it. The district court agreed with Santander and dismissed the case.The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed the lower court’s decision and declined to rehear the case en banc.

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A party that purchases a debt and attempts to collect the debt for its own account is not a “debt collector” subject to the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA). Justice Neil Gorsuch delivered the opinion for the unanimous Court, which held that the plain text of the FDCPA defined debt collectors as those who collected debts owed to another and therefore focused on debt collection agents collecting on behalf of a debt owner. A debt owner who was collecting debts for his own profit was not subject to the FDCPA. Although the petitioners tried to argue that the statute’s use of the past tense “owed” covered those who were collecting debts that had been previously owned by someone else, as Santander Consumer USA, Inc. (Santander) did, that reading does not comport with the text of the statute. The Court held that it was clear that Congress intended to use “owed” in the present tense in the relevant part of the statute, because elsewhere Congress clearly distinguished between original and current creditors. Because the meaning of the text was plain and there was no evidence that Congress intended an alternate, broader reading, purchasers of debt who collect for their own accounts are not subject to the FDCPA.


California Public Employees’ Retirement System v. ANZ Securities, Inc.

Before it went bankrupt in 2008, Lehman Brothers operated as a global investment bank, with stock traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Between July 2007 and January 2008, the company raised over $31 billion through debt offerings. California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CPERS), the largest pension fund in the country, purchased millions of dollars of these securities. In 2008, another retirement fund filed a putative class action suit against Lehman Brothers that claimed that Lehman Brothers was liable under Section 11 of the Securities Act of 1933 for false and misleading statements. In February 2011, over three years after the initial proceedings were filed but before the district court had decided whether or not to certify the lawsuit as a class action, CPERS sued Lehman Brothers separately. The case was then merged with the other retirement fund’s lawsuit and transferred to the New York district court, where the first case was pending. Later in 2011, the parties involved in the initial suit settled. When CPERS received notice of the settlement agreement, it opted to pursue its own claims individually against Lehman Brothers. The district court dismissed the case as having been untimely filed because the filing of the initial putative class action suit did not constitute a timely filing for a later individual claim. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed.

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The filing of a putative class action lawsuit does not satisfy the three-year time limit in Section 13 of the Securities Act with respect to the individual claims of other class members.Justice Anthony M. Kennedy delivered the opinion of the 5-4 majority. The Court held that there were two types of statutory time bars on the filing of claims: statutes of limitations and statutes of repose. Statutes of limitations were designed to encourage plaintiffs to diligently pursue known claims, and often did not begin to run until the plaintiff knew about the claim. In contrast, statutes of repose reflected a legislative determination that defendants should be free from liability after a certain point and began to run after the defendant’s last culpable act. Because Section 13 was a complete bar to recovery for claims brought more than three years after the relevant securities filing, it was defined in reference to the defendant’s last culpable act and was a statute of repose. Both the text and legislative history of Section 13 supported this categorization. Statutes of repose were generally not subject to equitable tolling provisions, which prevented the time limitations from running for a certain period, because they represented a legislative policy determination that superseded a court’s ability to grant equitable relief. Therefore, the filing of a putative class action does not satisfy the three-year time limit for the purpose of filing subsequent individual claims because the three-year statute of repose fully protects the defendant from liability when its limit is reached.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote a dissent in which she argued that Section 13 was only designed to ensure that defendants had notice of their potential liability within three years; the potential claims were not limited to those that could be filed within three years. In this case, because a class action was filed within the statutory time period, the defendants were on notice of their potential liability to the class. Justice Ginsburg also argued that the majority opinion harmed the ability of the investing public to protect their rights, which ran counter to the purpose of Section 11 of the Securities Act and increased the incentive for defendants to drag out litigation. Justice Stephen G. Breyer, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and Justice Elena Kagan joined in the dissent.


Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior Court of California

Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. (BMS) is a global pharmaceutical company incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in New York. BMS manufactures Plavix, a prescription drug intended to prevent blood clotting, and markets and sells the drug nationwide, including in California. In addition, BMS maintains five offices in California, four research facilities, and one government affairs office, as well as 250 sales representatives. In eight amended complaints filed with the San Francisco Superior Court, 86 California residents and 575 non-California residents joined in suing BMS and McKesson Corporation, a California-based Plavix distributor, on individual product defect claims. Each alleged serious side effects from their use of Plavix, that BMS had misrepresented the drug’s safety and efficacy, and asserted numerous California product liability causes of action against BMS. BMS moved to dismiss the claims for lack of personal jurisdiction in California. BMS argued that these claims had no link to its California activities, as the nonresident plaintiffs were not injured by Plavix in California, had not been prescribed Plavix in California, and had not received Plavix distributed by McKesson from California. Additionally, BMS did not research or manufacture Plavix at its facilities in California. The trial court denied BMS’s motion and held that the company was subject to the California court’s general jurisdiction because it had “wide-ranging, continuous, and systematic activities in California.” The California Court of Appeal rejected the trial court’s assessment that BMS was subject to general jurisdiction in California, but held that the nonresident plaintiffs’ claims were sufficiently related to BMS’s California activities to support specific jurisdiction. The California Supreme Court affirmed and held that BMS’s nationwide marketing and distribution created a “substantial nexus” between the nonresident plaintiffs’ claims and BMS’s activities in California because the claims were based on the same allegedly defective product and misleading marketing that allegedly caused injury both in and outside of California.

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When the plaintiffs’ claims would have been exactly the same even if the defendant had no forum state contacts, there is no basis for specific jurisdiction because the case does not sufficiently arise out of or relate to the defendant’s forum activities. Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. delivered the opinion for the 8-1 majority. The Court held that the exercise of personal jurisdiction must comport with the requirements of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which examined whether the defendant had a sufficient relationship with the state to subject it to jurisdiction. For general personal jurisdiction to apply, a corporation must be incorporated or headquartered within the state seeking to assert jurisdiction. For specific, or case-linked, jurisdiction, the suit had to arise out of the defendant’s contacts with the forum state. Therefore, there must be a connection between the controversy at issue and the state seeking to exercise specific jurisdiction. In this case, the relevant plaintiffs were not California residents and did not claim to have suffered harm there; all the relevant acts occurred outside of California. Therefore, this case did not sufficiently arise out of or relate to the defendant’s contacts with California for California to exercise specific jurisdiction.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a dissent in which she argued that the majority opinion would make it unnecessarily difficult to hold a nationwide corporation liable for acts that harm plaintiffs in different states. The basis for personal jurisdiction was whether the defendant had sufficient minimum contacts with a state such that subjecting the defendant to a lawsuit within that state did not offend “traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice.” Within this framework, the exercise of specific jurisdiction is appropriate when a defendant purposefully availed itself of the privileges of doing business in the forum state, when the claim arose out of or related to the defendant’s contacts with the state, and when the exercise of jurisdiction was reasonable under the circumstances. Applying these factors to this case showed that California had specific jurisdiction over these claims. By holding otherwise, the majority made it more difficult for plaintiffs to aggregate their claims, which would likely lead to an increase in litigation and make it easier for corporate defendants to avoid liability.


In May 2013, Rodney Class was arrested in the District of Columbia for possession of three firearms on United States Capitol Grounds in violation of 40 U.S.C. §5104(e). Class, representing himself, pleaded guilty in the district court. He appealed to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on grounds of constitutional error and statutory error. The appellate court affirmed the judgment of the district court and found Class guilty due to his guilty plea. The appellate court explained that the its precedent in United States v. Delgado-Garcia—which held that, “[u]nconditional guilty pleas that are knowing and intelligent...waive the pleading defendant[‘s] claims of error on appeal, even constitutional claims”—is binding on this case. Delgado articulates two exceptions to this rule in which a defendant may appeal: (1) “the defendant’s claimed right to not be haled into court at all” and (2) “that the court below lacked subject-matter jurisdiction over the case...” However, the court held that neither exception applies here.

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No, a guilty plea alone does not bar a federal criminal defendant from challenging the constitutionality of his conviction. Justice Stephen Breyer delivered the 6-3 majority opinion of the Court. The Court looked at several prior decisions developing its jurisprudence on how a guilty plea affects the constitutional claims available to a criminal defendant, finding a clear doctrine that "a plea of guilty to a charge does not waive a claim that—judged on its face—the charge is one which the State may not constitutionally prosecute." The Court found that Class had neither expressly nor implicitly waived his constitutional claims by pleading guilty and that Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(a)(2), which governs "conditional" guilty pleas, is inapplicable because the Rule's drafters specifically stated that the rule "has no application" to the types of constitutional claims raised in this case.
Justice Samuel Alito filed a dissenting opinion, in which Justices Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas joined, criticizing the majority for reaching a decision not clearly grounded in the Constitution or other basis, and for failing to clarify the "confusing" doctrine established in prior cases. The dissent looked first to the Constitution and found that it does not prohibit the waiver of rights Class asserted, then found that neither is there a federal statute or rule that bars such waiver. Ultimately, the dissent found that Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure should govern the case and thus that an unconditional guilty plea waives all nonjurisdictional claims, except for those specifically described in the prior Court cases on point.


In 2007, Stephanie Artis was employed by the District of Columbia Department of Health (DOH) as a code inspector. She alleges that she and her supervisor developed a contentious relationship and that he singled her out for unfair treatment in the workplace. On April 17, 2009, Artis took her first administrative step against DOH by filing a discrimination claim with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and while that claim was pending, DOH terminated Artis’s employment in November 2010.
In December 2011, Artis filed a lawsuit against the District in federal court alleging violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and invoked the district court’s supplemental jurisdiction to assert claims based on the District’s Whistleblower Act, False Claims Act, and common law. The district court granted the District’s motion on the pleadings and dismissed Artis’s sole federal claim, violation of Title VII, as facially deficient. It thus found it had no basis to exercise jurisdiction over the remaining claims.
Fifty-nine days after her claims were dismissed in federal court, Artis filed the remaining claims in a D.C. trial court. The District alleged that Artis’s claims were time barred based on the respective statutes of limitations, and the trial judge agreed, finding that the federal supplemental jurisdiction statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1367(d) does not suspend state statutes of limitations at the time of the unsuccessful federal filing.

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In a 5-4 decision, the Court reversed and remanded, ruling in favor of Artis and finding that the tolling provision of 28 U.S.C. § 1367 operates to suspend or “stop-the-clock” on supplemental state court claims while the concordant federal suit is pending and for 30 days thereafter. The majority rejected the District of Columbia’s argument that the statute simply provides for a 30-day grace period to refile those claims in state court. The Court also rejected the argument that it should disavow the stop-the-clock approach as a matter of constitutional avoidance, explaining that questions regarding the constitutionality of §1367(d) had been settled under prior case law. Justice Gorsuch dissented, with Justices Thomas, Alito, and Kennedy joining.


Hamer v. Neighborhood Housing Services of Chicago

Charmaine Hamer, a former intake specialist for the Housing Services of Chicago (NHS) and Fannie Mae’s Mortgage Help Center, filed suit against her former employers, alleging violations of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of Fannie Mae and NHS on September 14, 2015.
Under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 4(a)(1)(A) and 28 U.S.C. Section 2107(a), Hamer had until October 14, 2015 to appeal the judgment. On October 8, 2015, her attorney filed a motion to extend the appeal deadline to December 14, 2015, which the district court granted. Hamer filed her appeal on December 11, 2015.
In a brief requested by the appellate court, Fannie Mae and NHS argued that Hamer’s appeal was untimely under Rule 4(a)(5)(C) and thus that the appellate court lacked jurisdiction over the appeal. That rule states that “[n]o extension under this Rule 4(a)(5) may exceed 30 days after the prescribed time or 14 days after the date when the order granting the motion is entered, whichever is later.” Hamer argued that the rule is at odds with 28 U.S.C. Section 2107(a), which provides that “the district court may, upon motion filed not later than 30 days after the expiration of the time otherwise set for bringing appeal, extend the time for appeal upon a showing of excusable neglect or good cause.” The appellate court found Hamer’s argument unpersuasive and dismissed her appeal for lack of jurisdiction.

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A court-made rule imposing a time limit is not jurisdictional. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg delivered the opinion for a unanimous court. In Bowles v. Russell, 551 U.S. 205 (2007), the Court held an appeal filing deadline prescribed by statute is "jurisdictional" in that missing the deadline requires dismissal of the appeal. Here, applying the principle that only Congress may determine a lower federal court's subject matter jurisdiction, the Court noted that in contrast to congressional legislation, court-made rules (including the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure) cannot be jurisdictional. The Court vacated the decision of the of the Seventh Circuit and remanded for further proceedings.


A Georgia jury convicted Marion Wilson of malice murder and several other felonies. At sentencing, Wilson’s attorney argued that Wilson was not the triggerman and presented evidence of his difficult childhood. The trial court sentenced Wilson to death, and the Supreme Court of Georgia affirmed his convictions and sentence on direct appeal. Wilson filed a state petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the Superior Court of Butts County, Georgia, in which he argued ineffective assistance of his trial counsel in the sentencing phase of his trial. His argument rested on lay testimony that could have been used as evidence of his difficult childhood and expert testimony that could have explained his poor judgment skills. The superior court denied the petition in a written order. Wilson then filed an application for a certificate of probable cause to appeal, which the Georgia Supreme Court summarily denied in a one-sentence order.
Wilson then filed a federal petition for a writ of habeas corpus, and the district court denied him relief on the grounds that the state trial court reasonably applied clearly established federal law. However, the district court granted Wilson a certificate of appealability on the issue of effective assistance of counsel at sentencing. A panel of the Eleventh Circuit affirmed the district court’s decision, reasoning that “the one-line decision of the Supreme Court of Georgia . . . is the relevant state-court decision for our review because it is the final decision on the merits.” In his petition for rehearing en banc, Wilson argued that the panel should have examined the last reasoned decision by a state court. Georgia originally argued a federal court should “look through” a summary order to see whether it was based on procedural grounds or merits, but then it changed its position and argued that the court should look to the reasoned opinion. The Eleventh Circuit, sitting en banc, appointed an amicus curiae to argue Georgia’s original position on the matter. The Eleventh Circuit en banc ultimately concluded that federal courts do not need to “look through” a summary decision on the merits to review the reasoning of a lower court.

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The Court reversed the Eleventh Circuit’s ruling, holding that a federal habeas court reviewing an unexplained state court decision on the merits should “look through” that decision to the most recent related state court decision that provides a relevant rationale and presume that the unexplained decision adopted the same reasoning, and that the state may rebut that presumption by showing that the unexplained decision most likely relied on different grounds than the reasoned decision below.
The Court explained that since its holding in Ylst v. Nunnemaker, every circuit to have considered the matter except for the Eleventh Circuit has applied a “look through” presumption where there has been a reasoned state judgment rejecting a federal claim and subsequent unexplained orders upholding the judgment or rejecting the same claim, presuming that those later unexplained orders rested on the same ground.
The Court rejected the state’s argument that its opinion in Harrington v. Richter controls in this context, as that case did not directly consider the “look through” issue, and it also did not bar the application of Ylst’s reasoning in a case involving an unexplained decision on the merits.
The Court further explained that the “look through” presumption is not an absolute rule, and that while it is not a presumption that the Court applies in a general sense relative to silent opinions, when federal courts employ it pursuant to the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, it is for a specific and narrow purpose. Thus, there should be no reason why a federal court’s opinion of a state court’s silence should create binding precedent outside of this context. Finally, the Court explained that the “look through” approach does not show disrespect for the states, and is unlikely to lead a large number of courts to write full opinions where they otherwise would have ruled summarily.
The Court remanded the case to the Eleventh Circuit for further review consistent with the majority opinion. Justice Gorsuch filed a dissenting opinion, in which Justices Alito and Thomas joined.


U.S. Bank National Association v. Village at Lakeridge, LLC

The Village at Lakeridge, LLC, (Lakeridge) filed for bankruptcy on June 16, 2011. At that time, MBP Equity Partners 1, LLC (MBP), a member of Lakeridge, decided to sell its claim on Lakeridge’s assets to Robert Rabkin. In a deposition, Rabkin testified that he had a close relationship with a member of MBP’s board. U.S. Bank National Association, which also held a claim to Lakeridge’s assets, offered to purchase Rabkin’s claim, but Rabkin decided not to accept it. U.S. Bank subsequently filed a motion to designate Rabkin as both a statutory and non-statutory insider, either of which would prevent Rabkin from voting on bankruptcy plan proceedings. The bankruptcy court held that Rabkin had become a statutory insider by purchasing a claim from MBP, which the court considered an insider because it was an affiliate of Lakeridge. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that insider status is a question of fact that appellate courts review under the deferential standard of clear error. Under the clear error standard, an appellate court will only reverse a lower court’s finding if it is clear from the evidence that a mistake has been made. After reviewing the case under this standard, the appellate court reversed and held that a third party that is assigned a claim does not assume the insider status of the assigning party. The court also held that Rabkin was not a non-statutory insider because the evidence did not show that Rabkin had a close enough relationship with the member of MBP’s board to be considered an insider.

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The Ninth Circuit was correct to review the Bankruptcy Court's determination under a "clear error" standard because the "mixed question" whether a designation of non-statutory insider status is more factual than legal. Justice Elena Kagan delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court. In the Ninth Circuit, the determination of insider status turns on whether the facts support an "arm's length transaction" between the parties. Applied to the facts of this case, the issue was whether Rabkin’s purchase of MBP’s claim was conducted as if the two were strangers to each other? While this question involves issues of law and fact, the answer turns primarily on factual determinations, therefore the more deferential "clear error" standard was the appropriate standard of review.
Justice Anthony Kennedy filed concurring opinion to clarify that the Court does not necessarily find that the Ninth Circuit's standard is complete or proper, only that the application of that standard leads to the result the Court did in fact reach. Justice Sonia Sotomayor also filed a concurring opinion, in which Justices Kennedy, Thomas, and Gorsuch joined, disapproving the Court's decision not to address the question whether the Ninth Circuit's "arm's length transaction" standard is the correct one.


Several alien individuals were injured, kidnapped, or killed by terrorists in attacks against Israeli citizens overseas. The surviving aliens and the families of those who perished in the attacks accused Arab Bank, PLC (Arab Bank), a bank corporation headquartered in Jordan, of financing and facilitating various terrorist organizations involved in the attacks. The survivors sued Arab Bank in New York federal court under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS), which provides for federal district court jurisdiction over civil actions brought by aliens. Arab Bank moved to dismiss the ATS claims under the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit’s decision in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. In that case, the appellate court held that the ATS does not authorize claims against foreign corporations. The district court acknowledged that, because the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed Kiobel on other grounds and had not addressed the question of corporate liability, the court of appeals’ holding was still controlling precedent and therefore dismissed the ATS claims. On appeal, the appellate court noted that the Supreme Court’s decision did cast some doubt on the corporate liability holding in Kiobel. However, because the Supreme Court had not addressed the question of corporate liability, the appellate court affirmed the lower court’s dismissal.

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The Alien Tort Statute (ATS) does not permit lawsuits against corporations. Justice Anthony Kennedy authored the opinion for the 5-4 majority. The Court found that the original purpose of the ATS was to ensure that federal courts of the United States were available venues for foreign nationals alleging violations of international law and thereby to assuage potential foreign-relations issues. The Court reasoned that in this case, to allow the lawsuit to proceed would have the opposite policy effect, straining diplomatic relations with Jordan. If Congress wants to allow for lawsuits against foreign corporations in these types of circumstances, Congress should explicitly do so.
Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote a concurrence in which he concluded that there are two additional reasons the lawsuit should be dismissed—that the ATS is a jurisdictional statute that does not create a new cause of action and that federal courts should require a domestic defendant before hearing a lawsuit under the ATS.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a dissenting opinion in which Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, and Elena Kagan joined. Justice Sotomayor wrote that the text, history, and purpose of the ATS support the conclusion that corporations may be sued under the law and that the Court's decision absolves corporations of responsibility for egregious human rights abuses.


In July 1997, Carlos Manuel Ayestas, a Honduran national, was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of Santiaga Paneque at her home in Houston, Texas. Ayestas appealed his conviction and filed for state habeas relief based on a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel; he argued that his trial counsel failed to secure the testimony of family members who could have presented mitigating evidence. The state habeas court found that Ayestas’ trial attorney was not ineffective and denied his application for habeas relief. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals adopted the findings of the state habeas court and denied relief as well.
In 2009, Ayestas, with a new attorney, filed a federal habeas petition and claimed that his trial counsel had been ineffective because he had failed to conduct a reasonable investigation that would have uncovered “available and abundant” mitigating factors. However, the district court found that his claim was procedurally defaulted because it had not been raised in the state habeas proceeding and denied relief. The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed. The US Supreme Court subsequently decided Martinez v. Ryan, which held that ineffectiveness of state habeas counsel in failing to bring an ineffective assistance of trial counsel claim may excuse a procedural default. The Supreme Court later extended the holding of Martinez to Texas’ habeas scheme in Trevino v. Thaler. In light of these decisions, Ayestas asked for a rehearing. On rehearing in the district court, Ayestas filed a motion for investigative assistance that was “reasonably necessary” to develop his broader ineffective assistance of counsel claim under 18 U.S.C. § 3599(f). The district court denied the motion based on Fifth Circuit precedent that holds that investigative assistance is not “reasonably necessary” unless the habeas petitioner can carry the ultimate burden of proof on the underlying claim at the time of the request for investigative assistance. The district court determined that Ayestas could not meet his burden of proof on the ineffective assistance of counsel claim and therefore denied the motion. The appellate court affirmed.

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In a unanimous opinion authored by Justice Alito, after explaining that it had jurisdiction to hear the appeal because it related to a judicial rather than an administrative decision, the Court held that the Fifth Circuit applied the wrong legal standard in affirming the denial of Ayestas' claim for the investigative funding needed to prove his entitlement to federal habeas relief under 18 USC § 3599(f). Analyzing the statutory language, the Court concluded that it called for district courts to exercise their discretion in determining whether a reasonable attorney would deem the services sought by the funding to be sufficiently important to the case in order to meet the "reasonably necessary" requirement. The Fifth Circuit's "substantial need" standard was more stringent, and therefore improper.
The Court explained that the Fifth Circuit also erred in requiring Ayestas to present "a viable constitutional claim that [was] not procedurally barred," as this rule had become too restrictive in light of Trevino, and lower courts could potentially err in denying funding requests in cases where such funding could allow a petitioner to overcome a procedural default. On the other hand, the Court also explained that district courts had broad discretion in ruling on § 3599(f) funding requests, and while a funding applicant need not prove that they will win their case due to the funding services, the courts must evaluate the likelihood of success as part of the "reasonably necessary" test.
The Court remanded to the Fifth Circuit the state's alternative argument that § 3599(f) funding is never "reasonably necessary" when a petitioner for habeas relief seeks to bring a procedurally defaulted ineffective assistance of trial counsel claim based on facts outside the state court record.
Justice Sotomayor wrote a concurring opinion, in which Justice Ginsburg joined.


The Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians (the Gun Lake Tribe) is an Indian tribe in western Michigan that was first formally recognized by the U.S. Department of the Interior in 1999. In 2001, the Tribe petitioned for a tract of land called the Bradley Property to be put into trust for the Tribe’s use under the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA), 25 U.S.C. § 465, and the Bureau of Indian Affairs granted the petition in 2005. The Tribe subsequently constructed and opened the Gun Lake Casino on the Bradley Property.
David Patchak lives in a rural area near the Bradley Property and asserts that he moved there because of its unique rural setting and that the construction and operation of the casino caused him injury. Patchak filed a lawsuit against the Secretary of the Interior and other defendants, claiming that the Secretary lacked the authority to put the Bradley Property into trust for the Gun Lake Tribe. That lawsuit was argued up to the U.S. Supreme Court on a threshold issue of standing, and after the Supreme Court held that Patchak had standing to sue, President Obama signed into law the Gun Lake Act, which provided, among other things, that any legal action relating to the Bradley Property “shall not be filed or maintained in a Federal court and shall be promptly dismissed.”

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In a plurality opinion authored by Justice Thomas, the Court affirmed the ruling by the D.C. Circuit, concluding that Section 2(b) of the Gun Lake Act did not violate Article III of the Constitution. The Court stated that it was not an impermissible exercise of legislative power for Congress to change the law applicable to pending lawsuits, even if it made one side much more likely to prevail. The Court distinguished this scenario from legislative attempts to compel a particular result under old law, which would have violated Article III. The Court explained that by stripping federal courts of jurisdiction in actions relating to the property at issue, §2(b) “changed” the law, and that making this type of change was a valid exercise of legislative power. Justice Breyer filed a concurring opinion. Justice Ginsburg filed a concurring opinion, and Justice Sotomayor joined. Justice Sotomayor filed an opinion concurring in the judgment. Justice Roberts filed a dissenting opinion, and Justices Kennedy and Gorsuch joined.


Merit Management Group v. FTI Consulting, Inc.

Valley View Downs, LP, the owner of a Pennsylvania racetrack, acquired all shares of a competing racetrack, Bedford Downs, in exchange for $55 million. The exchange took place through Citizens Bank of Pennsylvania, the escrow agent, and Valley View borrowed money from Credit Suisse and other lenders to pay for the shares. Shortly thereafter, Valley View filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
FTI Consulting, Inc., as Trustee of the litigation trust that includes Valley View as one of the debtors, brought this lawsuit against Merit Management Group, a 30% shareholder in Bedford Downs. FTI seeks to avoid Bedford's $16.5 million transfer to Valley View under Bankruptcy Code sections 544, 548(a)(1)(b), and 550, which are safe harbor provisions for transfers "made by or to" certain enumerated entities. It is undisputed that Credit Suisse and Citizens Bank are financial institutions within the language of the statute, but at issue is whether the language “made by or to” includes institutions that act merely as a conduit for the transfer and do not benefit from it.
The Seventh Circuit held that section 546(e) does not provide a safe harbor against avoidance of transfers between non-named entities where a named entity merely acts as a conduit for the transfer. The Eleventh Circuit has interpreted the provision in the same way as the Seventh, while the Second, Third, Sixth, Eighth, and Tenth Circuits have held to the contrary.

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No, the safe harbor provision of Section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code does not provide a safe harbor against avoidance of transfers between non-named entities where a named entity merely acts as a conduit for the transfer. Justice Sonia Sotomayor delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court. The language of §546(e) and the specific context in which it is used support the conclusion that the relevant transfer for purposes of the safe-harbor inquiry is the transfer the trustee seeks to avoid. The statutory structure also supports this interpretation. Applying that interpretation to the facts of the case, the Court found that because the parties do not contend that either Valley View or Merit is a covered entity, the transfer falls outside of the §546(e) safe harbor.


SAS Institute Inc. appealed a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in which that court held that the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) did not err in issuing a final written decision in an inter partes review that was petitioned by SAS Institute. While the PTAB contended that it need only have addressed certain challenged claims, rather than every challenged claim, SAS alleged that the PTAB in fact misconstrued a claim term, as well as erred by not addressing all the claims SAS challenged in its original petition.

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In a 5-4 opinion the Court reversed and remanded, holding that when the United States Patent and Trademark Office institutes an inter partes review to reconsider an already-issued patent claim, under 35 U.S.C. §§311–319, it must decide the patentability of all of the claims the petitioner has challenged.
Justice Gorsuch authored the majority opinion, stating that the plain text of the statute decided the question in this case. The Court explained that § 318(a)'s use of the words "shall" and "any" imposed a mandatory and comprehensive directive. Thus, if the statutory language provided that the Patent Trial and Appeal Board's "final written decision 'shall' resolve the patentability of 'any patent claim challenged by the petitioner,' it mean[t] the Board must address every claim the petitioner . . . challenged."
The Court went on to state that § 312(a)(3) envisioned a review process guided by the petitioner rather than the agency. And while the agency director had the authority to reexamine any patentability questions on an ex parte basis at any time under § 303(a), Congress structured the inter partes review statute to provide the director with simply a "yes or no" choice as to whether to review pursuant to a given petition.
The Court rejected the notion that efficiency considerations justified a claim-by-claim approach, characterizing this as a policy argument better suited for legislative than judicial consideration. It also found unpersuasive the idea that any "partial institution" power asserted by the director was not entitled to Chevron deference. Finally, the opinion noted that judicial review pursuant to the Administrative Procedure Act remained available in the event that the agency acted outside the confines of its statutory authority.
Justice Ginsburg authored a dissenting opinion, which was joined by Justices Breyer and Sotomayor. Justice Kagan joined the dissent except as to Part III-A.


Ohio currently employs a process that clears the state’s voter rolls of individuals who have died or relocated. Under this process, voters who have not voted for two years are sent notices to confirm their registration. If the state receives no response and these individuals do not vote over the next four years, they are ultimately removed from the rolls.
Plaintiffs are various civil rights groups that are challenging the process, claiming that it is not only inappropriate to remove individuals from the voter rolls as a consequence of failing to vote but also violates part of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993. The Act prohibits a program for voter-list maintenance for federal elections that involves “the removal of the name of any personal from the official list of voters . . . by reason of the person’s failure to vote.” Plaintiffs believe that the Supreme Court should involve itself and determine whether this process violates the Act. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit previously struck down these rules, deeming them a violation of federal voting law because Ohio's process involves using an individual's failure to vote as a "trigger" for sending out a confirmation notice to that person. Plaintiffs consequently argue that there is no reason to disturb the appellate court decision. Defendants argue that Ohio is adhering to federal voter law, as set forth in the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA) and the Help America Vote Act of 2002 (HAVA).

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Ohio's list-maintenance process does not violate any provision of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA) or the Help America Vote Act of 2002 (HAVA). In a 5-4 decision authored by Justice Samuel Alito, the Court found that Ohio's procedure of requiring (1) a failure to vote for two years, (2) a failure to return a notice card, and (3) a failure to vote for four additional years was sufficiently rigorous under NVRA and its amended versions. The Court reasoned that by the plain language of the statute, NVRA forbids removal of a voter if failure to vote is the sole reason for removal. While Ohio list-maintenance process does use failure to vote as a trigger for removal, because it is not the sole basis for removal, it does not violate the statute. Justice Clarence Thomas concurred in full but wrote separately to offer constitutional reasons for rejecting the proposed interpretation of the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).
Justice Stephen Breyer wrote a dissenting opinion in which Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg joined. The dissent argued that the Ohio process does in fact rely on failure to vote to purge voter lists and that the additional requirement of responding to a mailed notice does not mitigate this violation of the statute.
Justice Sotomayor wrote a separate dissenting opinion arguing that the majority's decision ignores the driving purpose behind the NVRA—to address voter suppression laws—and pointing to statistics from amicus briefs showing that the law has a disproportionate effect of unregistering substantially more African American voters as compared to suburban white voters.


In April 2011, police arrested four men in connection with a series of armed robberies. One of the men confessed to the crimes and gave the FBI his cell phone number and the numbers of the other participants. The FBI used this information to apply for three orders from magistrate judges to obtain "transactional records" for each of the phone numbers, which the judges granted under the Stored Communications Act, 18 U.S.C. 2703(d). That Act provides that the government may require the disclosure of certain telecommunications records when "specific and articulable facts show[] that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the contents of a wire or electronic communication, or the records or other information sought, are relevant and material to an ongoing criminal investigation." The transactional records obtained by the government include the date and time of calls, and the approximate location where calls began and ended based on their connections to cell towers—"cell site" location information (CSLI).
Based on the cell-site evidence, the government charged Timothy Carpenter with, among other offenses, aiding and abetting robbery that affected interstate commerce, in violation of the Hobbs Act, 18 U.S.C. 1951. Carpenter moved to suppress the government's cell-site evidence on Fourth Amendment grounds, arguing that the FBI needed a warrant based on probable cause to obtain the records. The district court denied the motion to suppress, and the Sixth Circuit affirmed.

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The government's warrantless acquisition of Carpenter's cell-site records violated his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures. Chief Justice John Roberts authored the opinion for the 5-4 majority. The majority first acknowledged that the Fourth Amendment protects not only property interests, but also reasonable expectations of privacy. Expectations of privacy in this age of digital data do not fit neatly into existing precedents, but tracking person's movements and location through extensive cell-site records is far more intrusive than the precedents might have anticipated. The Court declined to extend the "third-party doctrine"—a doctrine where information disclosed to a third party carries no reasonable expectation of privacy—to cell-site location information, which implicates even greater privacy concerns than GPS tracking does. One consideration in the development of the third-party doctrine was the "nature of the particular documents sought," and the level of intrusiveness of extensive cell-site data weighs against application of the doctrine to this type of information. Additionally, the third-party doctrine applies to voluntary exposure, and while a user might be abstractly aware that his cell phone provider keeps logs, it happens without any affirmative act on the user's part. Thus, the Court held narrowly that the government generally will need a warrant to access cell-site location information.
Justice Anthony Kennedy filed a dissenting opinion, in which Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito joined. Justice Kennedy would find that cell-site records are no different from the many other kinds of business records the government has a lawful right to obtain by compulsory process. Justice Kennedy would continue to limit the Fourth Amendment to its property-based origins.
Justice Thomas filed a dissenting opinion, emphasizing the property-based approach to Fourth Amendment questions. In Justice Thomas's view, the case should not turn on whether a search occurred, but whose property was searched. By focusing on this latter question, Justice Thomas reasoned, the only logical conclusion would be that the information did not belong to Carpenter.
Justice Alito filed a dissenting opinion, in which Justice Thomas joined. Justice Alito distinguishes between an actual search and an order "merely requiring a party to look through its own records and produce specified documents"—with the former being far more intrusive than the latter. Justice Alito criticizes the majority for what he characterizes as "allow[ing] a defendant to object to the search of a third party's property," a departure from long-standing Fourth Amendment doctrine.
Justice Gorsuch filed a dissenting opinion in which he emphasizes the "original understanding" of the Fourth Amendment and laments the Court's departure from it.


Oil States Energy Services LLC v. Greene’s Energy Group, LLC

During hydraulic fracturing (known as “fracking”) procedures, fluid is pumped into oil and gas wells to stimulate production. However, the wellheads that sit on top of oil and gas wells are not designed to withstand continuous exposure to fracking fluids and can sustain significant damage as a result. In an attempt to address this issue, Stinger Wellhead Protection Inc., a subsidiary of Oil States Energy Services, first tried using a design described in Canadian Patent Application No. 2,195,118 (the ’118 Application) that relies on using hydraulic pressure first to push a “mandrel” into the wellhead through which the fracking fluid could be pumped without contacting the wellhead equipment. That method failed to sufficiently address the issue, so the Oil States subsidiary attempted a different method using a mechanical lockdown mechanism (described in Patent No. 6,179,053, or the ’053 Patent), rather than hydraulic pressure. In 2012, Oil States filed a patent infringement suit against Greene’s Energy Group, during the course of which litigation the district court found the ’053 Patent to be distinct from the ’118 Application using the “ordinary meaning” standard. Greene’s filed for inter partes review, which is a process used by the Patent and Trademark Office where one party asks the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board to reconsider the PTO’s issuance of an existing patent and invalidate it on the ground that it was anticipated by prior art or obvious. Oil States challenges the practice of inter partes review as violating the constitutional right of patent owners to a jury and an Article III forum before having their patent invalidated.

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The Court affirmed the Federal Circuit’s ruling, holding that the the Patent and Trademark Office’s inter partes review process did not violate Article III or the Seventh Amendment of the Constitution.
Writing for the majority in a 7-2 decision, Justice Thomas explained that inter partes review falls precisely within the public rights doctrine, with the grant of a patent being a matter involving public rights, and inter partes review involving the same basic matter as the grant of a patent.
The opinion went on to clarify that three of the Court’s holdings under the Patent Act of 1870 recognizing patent rights as the “private property of the patentee” did not contradict this conclusion. The Court also explained that despite a history of patent disputes being decided by the judicial system in 19th-century England, inter partes review did not violate the principle that Congress may not remove matters of common law from judicial purview. The opinion further noted that just because American courts have typically decided patent disputes, they need not always do so, as matters governed by the public rights doctrine may be assigned to any of the three branches of government.
The Court stated that it has never adopted a “looks like” test to establish whether a matter was properly decided outside of an Article III court, meaning that drawing similarities between the inter partes review process and that of a court was inconsequential here. It also emphasized that its holding was narrow, and should not be misconstrued to suggest that patents are not property pursuant to the Due Process Clause or the Takings Clause.
Finally, the Court held that inter partes review does not run afoul of the Seventh Amendment, explaining that when Congress properly assigns a matter to a non-Article III entity, the Seventh Amendment does not create an independent barrier to that body’s adjudication of the dispute.
Justice Breyer authored a concurring opinion, which was joined by Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor. Justice Gorsuch authored a dissenting opinion, which was joined by Chief Justice Roberts.


In 2010, for the first time in over forty years, Wisconsin voters elected a Republican majority in the state assembly and the senate, and a Republican governor. As a result, the Republican leadership developed a voting district map that its drafters calculated would allow Republicans to maintain a majority under any likely voting scenario. The redistricting plan was introduced in July 2011, and both the senate and the assembly passed the bill shortly thereafter. The governor signed the bill into law in August 2011. Even before it was enacted, the plan faced two legal challenges, on constitutional and statutory grounds. A federal court upheld the plan as not violating the “one person one vote” principle nor violating the Equal Protection Clause.
Plaintiffs in this case challenge the plan as an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander. At issue is whether the plan systematically dilutes the voting strength of Democratic voters statewide.

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The plaintiffs failed to demonstrate Article III standing, so there is no need to resolve any of the questions presented. In a unanimous decision authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, the Court sidestepped (for now) all of the key issues regarding partisan gerrymandering, resolving the case instead on the technical issue of judicial standing. For a plaintiff to bring a case in federal court, she must have Article III standing, which requires showing three elements, one of which is "injury in fact." To show injury in fact, a plaintiff must show that she has suffered "invasion of a legally protected interest" that is "concrete and particularized." In this case, the Court found that the plaintiffs alleged but did not prove individual harms, providing evidence instead only of statewide harms of alleged partisan gerrymandering. The Court thus vacated the judgment of the district court and remanded for further proceedings.
Justice Clarence Thomas filed an opinion concurring in part and concurring in the judgment, in which Justice Neil Gorsuch joined. Justices Thomas and Gorsuch did not join the majority with respect to the decision to remand the case and allow the plaintiffs a second chance to prove standing and thus wrote separately to express this disagreement with the disposition.
Justice Elena Kagan filed a concurring opinion in which Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, and Sonia Sotomayor joined. Justice Kagan agreed with the findings and conclusions of the Court but wrote separately, in essence, to describe how the plaintiffs might proceed upon remand. Justice Kagan suggests that the plaintiffs might present more than simply a vote dilution theory, but also an infringement of their First Amendment right of association. Such a claim, according to Justice Kagan, would not require the plaintiffs to show injury-in-fact in the form of injury to her particular voting district because that claim would be statewide in nature. She predicts that partisan gerrymandering "injures enough individuals and organizations in enough concrete ways . . . that standing requirements, properly applied, will not often or long prevent courts from reaching the merits of cases like this one."


Cyan, Inc. v. Beaver County Employees' Retirement Fund

Since the enactment of the Securities Act of 1933, state courts have had concurrent jurisdiction to decide federal law claims brought under that statute. Congress then passed the Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act of 1998, which precluded certain state law securities class actions, and amended the 1933 Act to reflect that limitation on state court claims.
Beaver County Employees' Retirement Fund filed a lawsuit in a California superior court asserting claims under the 1933 Act. Cyan Inc. moved to dismiss the claims, arguing that the amended 1933 Act precluded state courts from exercising subject matter jurisdiction over 1933 Act claims entirely. The superior court rejected Cyan's objection to the exercise of jurisdiction. Federal district courts are split as to whether state courts have subject matter jurisdiction over covered class actions that allege only 1933 Act claims.

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