Immigration Matters is a recurring series by César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández that analyzes the court’s immigration docket, highlighting emerging legal questions about new policy and enforcement practices.

The future of President Donald Trump’s executive order attempting to limit access to birthright citizenship is now positioned for a final decision from the Supreme Court. Questioning from the justices, during approximately two hours of oral arguments in Trump v. Barbara, suggests an icy reception for the Justice Department’s claim that the constitutional guarantee of citizenship turns on an innovative interpretation of the legal concept known as “domicile.” Without acceptance of that interpretation by the court, the Trump administration is unlikely to successfully defend the president’s directive.

The Supreme Court on Friday sent a lawsuit seeking to hold oil and gas companies liable for damage to the Louisiana coast back to the federal courts. Several Louisiana parishes – the equivalent of counties in that state – had filed the lawsuit in state court, and in 2024 a federal appeals court in New Orleans rebuffed the companies’ latest effort to move the case to federal court. By a vote of 8-0 in Chevron USA Inc. v. Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, with Justice Samuel Alito not participating because he owns stock in the parent company of one of the defendants in the case, the justices on Friday morning threw out the appeals court’s decision.

The federal law at the center of the case is known as the “federal officer removal statute.” It gives federal courts the power to hear state court cases filed against “any officer (or any person acting under that officer) of the United States or of any agency thereof, in an official or individual capacity, for or relating to any act under color of such office.”

Welcome to SCOTUSblog’s recurring series in which we interview experts on different supreme courts around the world and ask about how they compare to our own. Today we focus on the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court, which has some absolutely fascinating differences with SCOTUS (in ways both very good and very bad – you can choose which is which). To help me unpack things, I spoke to Professor Diego Werneck Arguelhes.

Professor Arguelhes is Dean of the Law Faculty at the Insper Institute for Education and Research, in São Paulo, Brazil. He obtained his LL.B. and M.A. from the State University of Rio de Janeiro, and his LL.M. and J.S.D. from Yale Law School.

During oral argument on Wednesday in Blanche v. Lau, the justices will consider the rights of lawful permanent residents who have been accused of committing a crime that puts them at risk of being removed from the country.

Please note that SCOTUS Outside Opinions constitute the views of outside contributors and do not reflect the official opinions of SCOTUSblog.

In Chiles v. Salazar, the Supreme Court held that Colorado’s law prohibiting licensed counselors from seeking to change the sexual orientation or gender identity of minors was subject to strict First Amendment scrutiny – a victory for opponents of the law. The statute, the court held, discriminated based on viewpoint by allowing the counselors to engage in therapies that affirmed specific sexual orientations and gender identities, but not speech that sought to change them.