Bureaucratic overreach, a gun ban, and a wealth tax are on the Supreme Court’s agenda this fall, legal experts say.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to take up several cases this fall that could lead to controversial rulings, panelists said at a Sept. 18 forum hosted by the libertarian Cato Institute.
One case questions the legality of a ban on people under domestic restraining orders from possessing guns. Another deals with a Trump-era wealth tax that hit a married couple with an unexpected tax bill. Another case takes on so-called Chevron deference, a legal doctrine that critics say gives bureaucrats too much power.
Still, another case, which the court has not yet decided to take up, deals with alleged racial discrimination in high school admissions.
The panel was moderated by attorney Anastasia Boden, director of the Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute in the nation’s capital.
The two other legal experts were attorney Wen Fa, who is the director of Legal Affairs at the Beacon Center of Tennessee in Nashville, and attorney Cate Stetson, a partner at the law firm of Hogan Lovells in Washington.
On Nov. 7, the court will hear United States v. Rahimi (court file 22-915), which concerns a federal law that bars people under domestic violence-related restraining orders from possessing firearms. The Biden administration supports the ban.
Zackey Rahimi, who previously entered a guilty plea to violating the statute, was involved in five shooting incidents after a restraining order was entered against him in February 2020.
Then, the Supreme Court handed down its landmark New York State Rifle and Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen decision in June 2022, which said there was a constitutional right to bear arms in public places for self-defense. Mr. Rahimi asked the courts to review his conviction, given the change in Second Amendment jurisprudence.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit found that the law had ceased to be constitutional in light of the Bruen ruling. The ban on the possession of firearms by someone under a domestic restraining order “is an outlier that our ancestors would never have accepted,” the circuit court stated in its ruling.
