WHAT WE'RE READING

The morning read for Monday, Nov. 28

Each weekday, we select a short list of news articles, commentary, and other noteworthy links related to the Supreme Court. To suggest a piece for us to consider, email us at roundup@scotusblog.com.

Here’s the Monday morning read:

• U.S. Supreme Court to weigh Cuomo-era New York corruption cases (Nate Raymond, Reuters)
• The Supreme Court Gets a Fraud Test (The Editorial Board, The Wall Street Journal)
• How the Supreme Court Plans to Undermine Future Elections (Simon Lazarus, The New Republic)
• A Trump judge seized control of ICE, and the Supreme Court will decide whether to stop him (Ian Millhiser, Vox)
• Where are guns allowed in New York now? An updated look following Supreme Court ruling. (Samantha Max, Gothamist)

CASE PREVIEW

Former aide to Andrew Cuomo wants court to narrow scope of federal bribery law

The Supreme Court will hear oral argument on Monday in the latest in a series of cases involving the reach of federal public-corruption laws. The question before the justices in Percoco v. United States is whether an individual can be convicted of violating those laws even when he is not a government official or employee. The defendant in the case, Joseph Percoco, warns that allowing his conviction to stand would be a “startling expansion of federal bribery law” that could leave “lobbyists, donors, and virtually every other politically active individual at the mercy of headline-hungry prosecutors.”

CASE PREVIEW

A sharp business deal or a federal crime? Justices will review what counts as fraud in government contracting.

Over the past 40 years, the Supreme Court has repeatedly expressed concern about the breadth of federal criminal prosecutions under the mail and wire fraud laws. The court’s decisions have narrowed the scope of federal power, particularly in recognizing the right of state and local governments to operate without undue federal influence. In Ciminelli v. United States, which will be argued on Monday, the court returns to similar concerns with a New York bid-rigging case. Did a government contractor take criminal advantage of his contacts within state government?

ACADEMIC HIGHLIGHT

In major immigration case, both sides look to academia to untangle three knotty questions

Can the Biden administration issue guidelines setting priorities in the enforcement of immigration law? Do states have standing to challenge these guidelines? And if the guidelines are unlawful, does the Administrative Procedure Act give lower courts the power to vacate them — a universal remedy that goes beyond the parties to the case? These are the three questions before the Supreme Court in United States v. Texas, set to be argued on Nov. 29. Legal scholars have addressed all three issues, and their work is prominently cited in the briefing on both sides.

CAPITAL CASE

Court declines to block execution of Missouri man who says his conviction was tainted by racial bias

The Supreme Court on Wednesday declined to block the execution of Kevin Johnson, who is scheduled to die by lethal injection in Missouri on Nov. 29.

There were no recorded dissents from the court’s brief order.

Johnson was convicted and received the death penalty for the 2005 shooting death of William McEntee, a police officer. Johnson came to the Supreme Court on Nov. 10, asking the justices to put his execution on hold to give the justices time to consider his challenges to the constitutionality of his conviction and sentence. At Johnson’s first trial, two white jurors who made racist statements refused to join the rest of the jury in voting to convict Johnson – who is Black – of second-degree murder, which would not have carried the death penalty. Johnson argued that his second trial, at which he was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death, did not fix the constitutional violation at his first trial.