Ella Lee

1 week ago | thehill.com | Ella Lee |Zach Schonfeld

Justice Clarence Thomas’s shunning of “experts” defending gender-affirming care is delighting conservatives in their assault on liberal influence in academics and medicine, a mission now reaching the courts. The conservative justice argued in a solo opinion concurring with the court’s 6-3 decision to uphold Tennessee’s transgender youth care ban that so-called experts have jumped on the bandwagon to embrace such treatment while evidence to the contrary mounts.

1 week ago | thehill.com | Ella Lee

A federal appeals court panel on Wednesday temporarily lifted an order deeming President Trump’s firing of the Democratic-appointed chair of the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA) unlawful. The panel of three judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit granted the government’s request for an administrative stay, meaning Trump may remove FLRA Chair Susan Grundmann from the post — for now. The FLRA resolves disputes between federal employees and the government.

1 week ago | thehill.com | Ella Lee

Justice Clarence Thomas on Wednesday said that courts should not defer to “self-described experts” on gender-affirming care, suggesting it is a matter of medical uncertainty. Thomas’s concurring opinion came as the Supreme Court upheld in a 6-3 decision Tennessee’s ban on puberty blockers and hormone treatments for transgender minors, a ruling that could reverberate through several states that have similar laws.

1 week ago | thehill.com | Ella Lee |Zach Schonfeld

The Supreme Court justices’ annual financial disclosures were released Tuesday, revealing millions of dollars in combined book payments to the justices in 2024. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson took in the most, disclosing a nearly $2.07 million book advance from Penguin Random House, which published her memoir, “Lovely One,” in September. Jackson received nearly $894,000 the year prior. Jackson has been on a nationwide book tour between court sessions.

1 week ago | thehill.com | Zach Schonfeld |Ella Lee

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) got a frosty reception at a federal appeals court Tuesday afternoon as it scrutinized a lower judge’s ruling blocking President Trump’s federalization of the National Guard in Los Angeles. The three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit appeared inclined to let Trump maintain control of the guardsmen, weighing the scope of the president’s discretion in times of conflict and whether the courts have the authority to intervene at all.