Tag: scotus

AI-Generated Art Can’t Receive Copyright Protection After Supreme Court Declines Case

The advancement of AI-generated art suffered a crucial blow this week when the Supreme Court left in place a lower-court ruling that such works cannot be protected under U.S. copyright law.

The original plaintiff, a computer scientist from Missouri named Stephen Thaler, appealed to the Supreme Court after “lower courts upheld a U.S. Copyright Office ​decision that the AI-crafted visual art at issue in the case was ineligible for copyright protection ​because it did not have a human creator,” per Reuters.

Thaler, of St. Charles, Missouri, applied for ⁠a federal copyright registration in 2018 covering “A Recent Entrance to Paradise,” visual art he said his AI ​technology “DABUS” created. The image shows train tracks entering a portal, surrounded by what appears to be green and ​purple plant imagery.

The Copyright Office rejected his application in 2022, finding that creative works must have human authors to be eligible to receive a copyright.

According to The Verge, the U.S. Copyright Office issued new guidance last year saying that AI-generated could not enjoy copyright protection, potentially destroying the profitability of text prompts with no original source material. Thaler had also tried to patent his AI-generative works, which has also faced several legal challenges.

“The US federal circuit court similarly determined that AI systems can’t patent inventions because they aren’t human, which the US Patent Office reaffirmed in 2024 with new guidance, stating that while AI systems can’t be listed as inventors on a patent, people can still use AI-powered tools to develop them,” noted The Verge.

Thaler’s lawyers argued admitted that the Supreme Court’s rejection could likely hurt the advancement of AI-generated artworks.

“Even if it later overturns the Copyright Office’s test in another case, it will be too late,” Thaler’s lawyers claimed. “The Copyright Office ​will have irreversibly and negatively impacted AI development and use in the creative ​industry during ⁠critically important years.”

Without copyright protection, AI-generated works would fall under public domain, allowing anyone to copy, sell, or use, essentially destroying the potential to create commercial intellectual property.

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SCOTUS Shuts Down New York’s Bid To Redistrict GOP Seat Ahead Of 2026 Midterms

The U.S. Supreme Court shut down a bid by New York courts to redistrict a Republican-controlled congressional seat ahead of the 2026 midterms on Monday.

In its 6-3 ruling, the high court granted an emergency application to temporarily stay (“pause”) a state judge’s efforts to redraw Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis’ congressional district. Malliotakis has represented New York’s 11th Congressional District since 2021 and won reelection by 28 points during the 2024 election.

As described by The Hill, “A state judge had ordered the boundaries be redrawn after ruling the district dilutes black and Latino voting strength in violation of the state constitution.” The Supreme Court’s Monday order “granted Malliotakis’s emergency application to block that ruling as the litigation proceeds, effectively restoring her existing district lines for the midterms.”

The high court noted that the New York court’s ruling “is stayed pending the disposition of the appeal in the New York state courts” and the filing of a petition at SCOTUS asking the justices to take up the case. The Supreme Court’s stay will terminate if it declines to hear the case or if it agrees to take up the case and renders a verdict on the matter.

Associate Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson would have denied Malliotakis’ request for relief.

Associate Justice Samuel Alito authored a concurring opinion in which he expressed agreement with the court’s decision and blasted the New York judge’s directive “that blatantly discriminates on the basis of race.” He noted how the “New York Supreme Court (that State’s trial-level court) ordered the New York Independent Redistricting Commission to draw a new congressional district for the express purpose of ensuring that ‘minority voters’ are able to elect the candidate of their choice.”

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SCOTUS Blocks California School Policy Hiding Kids’ ‘Gender Presentation’ From Parents

The U.S. Supreme Court delivered a major win for California parents seeking to protect their children from LGBT ideology in state schools on Monday.

In its per curiam opinion, the high court vacated a stay (“pause”) issued by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on a December injunction by a California-based district court judge. That permanent injunction prohibited enforcement of a California policy that permitted or forced school employees to “mislead[] the parent or guardian of a minor child in the education system about their child’s gender presentation at school.”

In his order, District Judge Roger Benitez, a Bush 43 appointee, further required California officials to notify school personnel of his ruling and to include in materials for parents and faculty a statement acknowledging parents’ “federal constitutional right to be informed if their public school student child expresses gender incongruence.”

California parents’ victory was short-lived, however, because the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals froze Benitez’s order a few weeks later. In its unanimous ruling, the appellate court’s three-judge panel of Democrat appointees claimed that state officials “have shown that ‘there is a substantial case for relief on the merits,’” and said it was “skeptical of the district court’s decision on the merits.”

The 9th Circuit’s decision prompted plaintiffs to file an application with SCOTUS, in which they requested that the high court vacate the 9th Circuit’s stay and allow Benitez’s injunction to take effect.

In its unsigned opinion, SCOTUS granted the plaintiffs’ request to vacate the 9th Circuit’s injunction “with respect to the parents because this aspect of the stay is not ‘justified under the governing four-factor test.’” The high court noted that the parents are likely to succeed on the merits of their claims and that they will suffer “irreparable harm” if the 9th Circuit’s ruling is allowed to remain in place.

The court’s order does not apply to the plaintiff teachers suing over the policy, however. Associate Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito said they would have granted the plaintiffs’ application in full.

Associate Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented.

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Supreme Court Orders CNN to Respond

We have a MAJOR DEVELOPMENT in our landmark case against CNN at the United States Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court has just ordered CNN to file a formal response to our petition – the petition we filed to hold CNN and the mainstream media accountable for spreading falsehoods during President Donald Trump’s Senate impeachment trial, when they twisted and manipulated what a member of the president’s legal team actually argued. I know because I was there on the floor of the Senate when it happened.

When we filed our petition for writ of certiorari in this critical defamation case, CNN appeared to think it could simply ignore it. That’s a common tactic. If a party believes the Court isn’t likely to take a case, they can waive their response and hope the Justices quietly deny review.

That’s exactly what CNN tried to do.

Their strategy seemed simple: Don’t engage. Don’t draw attention to it. Let it die quietly.

But the Supreme Court didn’t let that happen. Instead, the Court stepped in and ordered CNN to respond – in writing.

That matters.

It doesn’t guarantee the Court will ultimately take the case. But it does signal that at least some of the Justices believe this issue deserves serious consideration.

And it should.

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5 Takeaways From Supreme Court’s Rejection of Trump’s Global Tariffs

The Supreme Court on Feb. 20 struck down many of President Donald Trump’s tariffs, stating they violated an emergency powers law he invoked last year.

The president previously declared a national emergency under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, saying the tariffs were needed to stem the flow of illegal drugs and to combat “large and persistent” trade deficits with foreign nations.

The act generally gives the president the power to regulate imports to address emergencies, but debate ensued over what that meant in practice.

Writing for the 6–3 majority, Chief Justice John Roberts rejected Trump’s arguments, saying that the law’s phrasing did not clearly authorize tariffs.

Tariffs enacted under other laws are not affected by the ruling.

Tariffs Not Authorized Under Emergency Law

Roberts said Trump rested his claim of tariff authority on the words “regulate” and “importation” in the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which gives the president authority to act.

“The President asserts the independent power to impose tariffs on imports from any country, of any product, at any rate, for any amount of time,” Roberts said. “Those words cannot bear such weight.”

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Media Silent On KBJ Attending Anti-ICE Grammys After Inventing ‘Scandals’ About Her Colleagues

America’s propaganda media have always applied two very different standards when judging the “ethics and conduct” of U.S. Supreme Court justices. While expending countless resources inventing nothingburger “scandals” of wrongdoing about the court’s originalists, these so-called “defenders of democracy” regularly go out of their way to glamorize the body’s leftist members — no matter how untoward or inappropriate their behavior may seem.

That’s the dynamic that was at play on Sunday evening, when Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson attended this year’s anti-ICE Grammy Awards. The Biden appointee made an appearance at the event following the nomination for “best audio book, narration and storytelling recording” for her 2024 memoir, according to USA Today.

While Jackson hobnobbed with Hollywood’s biggest snobs and received a favorable shoutout from host Trevor Noah, many of the night’s (overrated) winners used their acceptance speeches to give us their unwanted thoughts on something they know little to nothing about — immigration enforcement. From expletive-laden comments (“f-ck ICE”) to embarrassing “land acknowledgements,” the leftist-led attacks on lawful efforts to deport illegal aliens (including rapists and other violent criminals) were everything one would expect.

And yet, despite this overwhelming display of uber left-wing partisanship, as of Monday morning, there are no legacy media outlets or major Democrats expressing outrage about Jackson’s Grammy attendance. The same righteous “truth tellers” who were supposedly so concerned about non-scandals like Justice Sam Alito’s wife flying an Appeal to Heaven flag or Justice Clarence Thomas having a rich friend now have nothing to say when Jackson attends an overtly partisan event whose attendees expressed extreme hostility to federal law enforcement.

There are no leftist calls to impeach Jackson. Nor are there any demands for her to recuse herself from immigration-related cases involving the Trump administration — several of which are before the court this term.

The left’s outrage machine is dead silent.

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SCOTUS Decision On Mail-In Voting Rules Could Shape Future Elections

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 7-2 last week that Rep. Michael Bost, an Illinois Republican, has legal standing to challenge an Illinois election law that allows mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day to be received and counted for up to two weeks afterward, a decision that could shape how voting rules are litigated in future elections.

The case does not decide whether Illinois’ receipt deadline is lawful. Instead, the court revived Bost’s lawsuit and sent it back to lower courts to consider the merits.

Illinois law requires election officials to count mail-in ballots postmarked or certified no later than Election Day and received within two weeks of Election Day. Bost and two other candidates sued in 2022, arguing that counting ballots after Election Day conflicts with federal statutes that set a uniform day for federal elections.

Lower courts dismissed the lawsuit on standing grounds, concluding the plaintiffs had not shown a sufficiently direct injury. The Seventh Circuit, for example, pointed to Bost’s past electoral performance and treated alleged campaign costs tied to monitoring late-arriving ballots as voluntary steps taken to avoid a hypothetical harm.

Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, rejected that approach and held that candidates have a personal stake in vote-counting rules in their own elections. The opinion said an unlawful election rule can harm a candidate in multiple ways, but went further by recognizing an additional interest in “a fair process,” even apart from whether a rule changes the outcome.

In the court’s view, candidates are uniquely affected when the rules for counting votes depart from what the law requires, because the integrity of the process is tied to the legitimacy of whoever wins. The opinion also pointed to the practical consequences of forcing disputes to the last minute, warning that waiting until just before Election Day, or after ballots are counted, risks voter confusion and instability if courts step in too late.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett concurred in the judgment, joined by Justice Elena Kagan, but argued the case should be resolved using a more traditional standing theory. Barrett said Bost had standing because he alleged “pocketbook” harm from added campaign expenses tied to monitoring late-arriving ballots, rather than standing based simply on his status as a candidate.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, arguing the majority’s approach weakens the court’s usual requirement that plaintiffs show a concrete, particularized injury. In her view, an interest in election fairness is broadly shared, and the court’s ruling could invite more candidate-filed lawsuits over election administration rules.

The immediate impact may be procedural but significant: by lowering the barrier to getting into federal court, the ruling could increase pre-election challenges to rules governing vote counting and ballot deadlines, including disputes over how long ballots can arrive after Election Day and still be counted. The decision could also steer litigation earlier in the calendar, rather than after close races, because candidates can sue without proving a substantial risk of losing.

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Justice Jackson Cites Racist ‘Black Codes’ As Precedent To Justify Gun Control In Hawaii

During oral arguments in Wolford v. Lopez, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson suggested that the post-Civil War “Black Codes” – a set of openly racist laws enacted in the Democrat-controlled South to strip newly freed Black Americans of basic rights, including the right to possess firearms – could serve as legitimate historical precedent under the Supreme Court’s Bruen test. That test evaluates modern gun laws by asking whether similar restrictions were accepted in the nation’s historical tradition. The case concerns a Hawaii law that bars licensed gun owners from carrying firearms onto privately owned property open to the public. Jackson relying on the Black Codes for constitutional guidance is hilarious, as those laws were explicitly designed to deny civil rights to Black Americans in defiance of emancipation.

The exchange unfolded as Justice Jackson pressed U.S. Principal Deputy Solicitor General Sarah Harris on why post–Civil War Black Codes should be excluded from consideration when courts examine modern-day gun control laws. Hawaii relied on a 1865 Louisiana statute as historical support for its law, a statute even Neal Katyal, the lawyer representing Hawaii, admitted was “undoubtedly a relic of a shameful portion of American history.”

“So, I guess I really don’t understand your response to Justice Gorsuch on the Black Codes,” Jackson began. She explained that, under Bruen, courts are required to look to history and tradition to assess constitutionality. “The fact that the Black Codes were, at some later point, determined themselves to be unconstitutional doesn’t seem to me to be relevant to the assessment that Bruen is asking us to make.”

Harris responded by emphasizing the fundamentally racist purpose of those laws. “Black Codes were unconstitutional from the moment of their inception because they are pretextual laws that are designed to ensure that newly freed slaves are returned to a condition of sharecropping.”

Justice Jackson, a black woman, immediately pushed back. “Okay, let me stop you there. They were not deemed unconstitutional at the time that they were enacted,” she said. “They were part of the history and tradition of the country, and when we have a test now that’s asking us to look at what people were doing back then, I don’t understand why they should be excluded.”

Harris reiterated that point. “Because they are outliers. They are, by definition, unconstitutional. They have always been unconstitutional.”

Jackson bizarrely remained unconvinced. “Found later, afterwards, not at the time,” she said, returning to the Bruen framework. “And if the test says what’s happening at the time tells us what’s constitutional for this purpose, why aren’t they in?”

Harris responded by insisting the laws should be disregarded because they were aberrations and unconstitutional from their inception.

But Jackson rejected that framing. She argued that their unconstitutionality was determined later, not contemporaneously, making it a legitimate precedent. And, according to Jackson, if the test looks to historical practice at the time of enactment, she asked, why should those laws be left out?

Harris attempted to explain how a law could be unconstitutional from inception, while still accounting for historical analysis. Jackson claimed that Harris’s position effectively dismissed history altogether. When Harris denied that implication, Jackson underscored the contradiction by noting that history either matters under Bruen or it does not.

Harris then stressed that historical inquiry remains essential, though not indiscriminate. “We should deeply care about the history,” she said, adding that Bruen requires courts to identify a genuine national tradition by excluding aberrations. She described the Black Codes as precisely that — laws enacted “for the purpose of trying to reduce newly freed slaves back to conditions of servitude,” including measures that criminalized carrying arms on private property. “Those are obvious outliers which should not count under the whole point of Bruen.”

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Supreme Court Poised to Grant Chemical Warfare Immunity: How Glyphosate Legal Shield Would Poison American Justice

Introduction: The Supreme Court’s Glyphosate Gamble: Corporate Immunity Over Human Life

The U.S. Supreme Court has stepped onto a dangerous precipice, agreeing to hear a case that could grant chemical manufacturers a staggering new power: blanket immunity from lawsuits for poisoning the American people. Agro-chemical giant Bayer, owner of Monsanto, is appealing a $1.25 million Missouri jury verdict, arguing that because federal regulators claim its flagship weedkiller Roundup is safe, the company should be shielded from all state-level failure-to-warn lawsuits brought by cancer victims. A ruling in Bayer’s favor would dismantle legal recourse for thousands of citizens and establish a perilous precedent where captured federal agencies, not independent science or juries, dictate corporate accountability for public harm. This case represents nothing less than a corporate coup against the constitutional right to a trial by jury, placing profits above the sanctity of human life.

The Glyphosate Deception: A Chemical Assault on Human Health

At the heart of this legal battle is glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup and the most heavily used herbicide in the world, with approximately 300 million pounds applied annually in the United States alone. For decades, Monsanto marketed Roundup as safe for humans and animals, a claim now exposed as a profound deception by a mountain of independent research.

Despite the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) repeated assertions that glyphosate is “not likely to be carcinogenic,” science tells a horrifically different story. A major 2025 international carcinogenicity study found that low doses of glyphosate-based herbicides cause multiple types of cancer in rats, with tumors appearing in blood, skin, liver, and other organs even at levels regulators consider safe. This research adds to a substantial body of evidence linking glyphosate exposure to non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and other chronic diseases in humans. As investigative journalist Carey Gillam notes in her book, the truth about such public health dangers often only emerges through “lawyers, lawsuits, journalists, and the occasional whistleblower” when regulators fail. The EPA’s fraudulent safety claims stand in direct contradiction to this independent science, blessing a chemical poison while natural, non-toxic agricultural solutions are suppressed and ignored.

Corporate Capture: How Regulatory Agencies Betray the Public Trust

Bayer’s legal strategy hinges on a doctrine known as federal preemption, which posits that federal regulatory approval should override state-level consumer protection laws and common-law tort claims. This argument reveals the deep and dangerous corruption of federal health agencies, which now serve as puppets for the very industries they are supposed to regulate.

This phenomenon, known as regulatory capture, is systemic. As Robert F. Kennedy Jr. explains in his work on corporate influence, agencies like the FDA become “sock puppets” for Big Pharma and chemical interests, with a significant portion of their budgets coming from the companies they oversee. The glyphosate case is a textbook example. The EPA has consistently parroted the industry line on glyphosate’s safety, ignoring robust independent evidence of carcinogenicity. This betrayal was further underscored when the Trump administration’s Solicitor General, in a December legal brief, urged the Supreme Court to take Bayer’s side, arguing that a manufacturer “should not be left subject to 50 different labeling regimes.

This move represents a blatant political manipulation of the justice system to insulate a powerful corporation from accountability. If the Court rules for Bayer, it would effectively nullify state-level consumer protections and constitutional rights, centralizing power in the hands of a corrupted federal bureaucracy. As a NaturalNews.com report on the case warns, this gambit “silences victims and overrides the rule of law,” completing the transformation of public health agencies into immunity-granting enablers of corporate malfeasance.

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Top US court to review suit against German chemicals giant

The US Supreme Court will hear an appeal by German chemical company Bayer on a Roundup-related case in which a man was awarded $1.25 million, claiming the herbicide gave him blood cancer.

The court made the announcement regarding Monsanto Co. v. Durnell in a statement on Friday, with a verdict expected by July. Bayer is currently facing thousands of similar lawsuits.

Roundup originally belonged to the now-defunct American agrochemical and agricultural biotechnology corporation Monsanto, which was purchased by Bayer in 2018.

At the heart of the case is whether Bayer and other manufacturers should be held liable if they comply with the US Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) rulings on product warnings, while still running afoul of state laws requiring warnings on goods that may be carcinogenic.

Bayer argues that the EPA has determined that glyphosate, the main component of the controversial herbicide, is not likely to be carcinogenic to humans, and approved Roundup labels without cancer warnings.

In a statement on Friday, Bayer CEO Bill Anderson said that “it is time for the US legal system to establish that companies should not be punished under state laws for complying with federal warning label requirements.”

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