Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Courts in session
Abbreviated Pundit Roundup is a long-running series published every morning that collects essential political discussion and analysis around the internet.
We begin today with Chris Geidner of LawDork and his coverage of the SCOTUS opinion in Moyle v. United States and Idaho v. United States, two abortion cases about the implementation of the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA); an opinion that turned out to be only a leaked draft—for now, anyway.
...per a version of the document eventually posted online by Bloomberg, the document was dated June 26, 2024, it is likely that the court was at least at some point planning on releasing the decision on Wednesday. The fact that it apparently had reached the Publications Unit certainly suggests, again, that it likely was, at some point recently, considered to be the final decision.
And yet. The bottom line is that it wasn’t ultimately issued on Wednesday, which means that, for some as of yet unknown reason, it was pulled — which then means that it might not be the final decision.
Given the apparent near-final status, however, it is worth highlighting what the document does say.
As Bloomberg and others have reported, the document, if it becomes the final decision, would dismiss the cases as improvidently granted. Referred to as a DIG, this means the justices shouldn’t have taken the cases — for now, at least — in the first place and does not resolve the underlying question that was the reason why the justices took the case. The decision also would end the stays on the district court’s injunction — meaning, here, that Idaho’s near-total abortion ban would be blocked insofar as and where it conflicts with EMTALA’s protections,