A June 26, 2026 filing in the Ninth Circuit puts a threshold issue front and center: whether this case should remain in the court of appeals at all. Respondent Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) has filed a motion to dismiss in No. 25-8059, asking the court to terminate the proceeding before the merits are reached.

Although the docket entry provides only the motion’s caption-level detail, the filing itself is notable because motions to dismiss at the appellate level often turn on core gatekeeping doctrines that can decide a case without any substantive ruling on the challenged agency action.

A June 17, 2026 filing in the Fourth Circuit puts a familiar but strategically significant appellate issue front and center: whether an appeal should be dismissed before the merits briefing even begins. In No. 25, appellees Debra Campbell, the City of Asheville, and Esther Elizabeth Manheimer moved to dismiss the appeal in Case No. 26-1014, asking the court to terminate the proceeding at the outset rather than allow it to move forward on a full briefing schedule.

Although the short docket entry does not itself spell out every ground raised, motions like this typically target threshold defects that go to the appellate court’s power to hear the case at all.

A June 17 filing in the Fourth Circuit could stop appeal No. 26-1014 before merits briefing ever begins. In No. 25 MOTION, Debra Campbell, the City of Asheville, and Esther Elizabeth Manheimer ask the court to dismiss the appeal outright—a reminder that appellees do not always need to wait for full briefing to challenge whether an appeal belongs in federal appellate court at all.

Although the docket entry provides only the motion’s caption-level description, the filing appears to be a classic threshold attack on the appeal itself.

A new filing in View full case on Docket Alarm puts a familiar but often decisive appellate issue front and center: whether the appeal should be dismissed before merits briefing proceeds. On June 10, 2026, appellee The Legal Aid Society filed Motion No. 14 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, seeking dismissal of the appeal in docket 26-1232.

Although the docket entry itself is concise, motions to dismiss at the appellate level typically target threshold defects that can end a case without reaching the substantive issues.

In a unanimous opinion by Justice Gorsuch, the Supreme Court affirmed the judgment below in No. 25-466, with Justice Thomas filing a concurrence. Although the Court’s disposition is straightforward on its face, the opinion matters because it reinforces the Court’s current approach to appellate review: close attention to text, procedural posture, and the limited role of higher courts in revisiting questions not properly preserved or presented.

The Court’s holding was simple: the lower court’s judgment stands.

In an early jurisdictional ruling that Texas litigators will want to watch closely, the Texas Business Court has sent a former Exxon Mobil executive’s $5 million racial discrimination suit back to state district court, holding that the court’s enabling statute does not reach employment disputes. The decision marks one of the clearer signals yet about how narrowly the new court may read its own authority.

The case arose from claims by a former Exxon executive alleging race-based discrimination and seeking substantial damages.

In a 6-3 decision authored by Justice Barrett, the Supreme Court affirmed the lower court and reinforced a familiar theme of the current Term: when Congress channels review into a specific statutory scheme, lower federal courts may not use more general equitable or habeas theories to work around it. Justice Sotomayor, joined by Justice Kagan, concurred only in the judgment, while Justice Jackson dissented.

The Court’s opinion focused less on the underlying immigration dispute than on where and how such claims may be brought.

The U.S. Supreme Court handed oil and gas defendants a meaningful procedural victory in long-running Louisiana coastal-damage litigation, unanimously holding that the companies may pursue a federal forum under the federal-officer removal statute when the challenged conduct is tied to wartime fuel production for the federal government. The ruling, covered in AP’s report on the decision, does not resolve the merits of the environmental claims.