A federal appeals fight scheduled for Thursday put an unusual and consequential question before the D.C. Circuit: how far a president or executive branch may go in penalizing private law firms based on the clients they represent or positions they take in politically charged matters.

According to reporting on the matter, former President Donald Trump is seeking appellate relief tied to efforts aimed at punishing major law firms.

The U.S. Department of Justice has opened a consequential new front in the federal-state debate over immigration and public benefits, suing New Jersey over state laws that allow undocumented students to qualify for in-state tuition and state financial assistance at public colleges and universities. The complaint tees up a challenge with both preemption and constitutional dimensions, and it is likely to draw close attention from states, higher-education institutions, and practitioners watching the boundaries of state authority in immigration-adjacent policymaking.

At issue are New Jersey measures that extend reduced tuition rates and aid eligibility to certain students without lawful immigration status, provided they meet state-defined criteria.

The Justice Department has filed suit against New Jersey, Gov. Mikie Sherrill, and Attorney General Jennifer Davenport, alleging that the state’s “Law Enforcement Officer Protection Act” unlawfully restricts federal law-enforcement activity. The case, filed in federal court in New Jersey, tees up a direct confrontation over the limits of state power when federal officers operate within state borders.

At the center of the dispute is a familiar constitutional fault line: whether a state may regulate, constrain, or impose conditions on federal officials carrying out federal duties.

In one of the most consequential election-law rulings of the term, the Supreme Court on April 29 struck down Louisiana’s congressional map, holding that the state’s SB8 plan was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. The Court concluded that the Voting Rights Act did not require Louisiana to create an additional majority-minority district, and without that predicate, the state could not rely on compliance with federal voting-rights law as a compelling interest to justify race-based line drawing.

The decision in Louisiana, Appellant v. Phillip Callais, et al. immediately reshapes the legal landscape for redistricting disputes.

The U.S. Supreme Court on April 17 issued a closely watched First Amendment ruling in Kaley Chiles, Petitioner v. Patty Salazar, in Her Official Capacity as Executive Director of the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies, et al., holding that Colorado’s law restricting licensed counselors from attempting to change a minor’s sexual orientation or gender identity must be evaluated under strict scrutiny.

The U.S. Supreme Court moved a major Trump-related dispute onto its docket, signaling that the justices are prepared to weigh in on one of the most legally and politically charged issues of the term: the challenge to President Donald Trump’s birthright-citizenship executive order and, just as importantly, the scope of nationwide injunctions entered against federal policy.

The case, Donald J. Trump, President of the United States, et al., Applicants v. CASA, Inc., et al., arises from litigation brought by CASA and states opposing the order.

The Supreme Court’s decision to take up the challenge to the federal law targeting TikTok marks one of the most consequential intersections of national security, platform regulation, and First Amendment law in years. The dispute centers on a statute requiring ByteDance to divest TikTok or face restrictions on the app’s U.S. operations, with challengers arguing the law unlawfully burdens speech and exceeds constitutional limits.

The Court’s involvement is significant not just because of TikTok’s reach, but because the case tests how far the political branches can go when regulating a communications platform on national security grounds.

The U.S. Supreme Court has issued a major First Amendment ruling in Chiles v. Salazar, holding that Colorado’s conversion-therapy law, as applied to a licensed counselor’s talk therapy with minors, regulates speech based on viewpoint and that the lower courts did not apply the required level of constitutional scrutiny. The decision is likely to reshape ongoing litigation over state regulation of licensed professionals and could prompt renewed challenges to similar laws across the country.

The case was brought by counselor Kaley Chiles, who argued that Colorado’s law barred her from engaging in voluntary, client-directed conversations about sexuality and gender identity when those conversations sought outcomes the state disfavored.

Litigation tied to the Trump administration remains one of the most consequential forces in federal courts, even when no single case captures the entire story. Across disputes involving executive authority, agency data access, immigration enforcement, and the boundaries between government power and the legal profession, courts are continuing to issue rulings that will shape public-law litigation for years.

One recent flashpoint involves challenges requiring agencies to justify contested access to government data, underscoring how Trump-era governance disputes have expanded beyond headline policy fights into core questions of administrative structure, privacy, and statutory authority.

The U.S. Supreme Court remains at the center of some of the most consequential constitutional disputes carried over from the Trump era, with the pending birthright-citizenship fight standing out as one of the term’s most closely watched matters.