Short Circuit

Short Circuit speaks with the law students at SMU in our first visit to The Big D. With Anya Bidwell as your host, she introduces us to Texas lawyers Zack Faircloth, Will Langley, and Don Tittle. They dig into recent cases on the Second Amendment, “premature bankruptcy,” vaping regulation, and (of course) qualified immunity. With more than one matter that seems to be on track for the Supreme Court...

For the first time Short Circuit welcomes the Jones-Act-hating, free-trade-loving, tariff-busting, T-shirt-writing, and top-5-ranking Scott Lincicome of the Cato Institute. Scott introduces us to a rare breed at Short Circuit, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. That’s because the court just issued (another) opinion upholding some of the dumbest steel tariffs of recent years (and that’s...

A qualified immunity and property rights pairing this week. But first we announce the winning answer from last episode’s “decretal language” competition. Then, Patrick Jaicomo explains why in the Fourth Circuit it can be unconstitutional for the police to prevent you from livestreaming an encounter, but you can’t sue them about it. Then Suranjan Sen walks us through a couple challenges to New York...

Our newsletter begins announcements about federal en banc decisions with the phrase “And in en banc news.” And about a year ago we had an argument on the podcast on how to pronounce that fancy French-sounding phrase. Today we bring back the guests from that episode—Sam Gedge and Bob Belden—to settle the issue, once and for all. Along the way you’ll learn about how we have the Germans to thank for...

On this Groundhog Day special we’re sniffing out a couple eternally recurrent subjects: limits on government surveillance and limits on property rights. We’re joined by IJ’s Seth Young and also are very pleased to announce we once again have on Mike Chase, author of How to Become a Federal Criminal . Mike gives an overview of a case pending in the Fourth Circuit that could have major ramifications...

Could you identify a “bag of dope” through a tinted car window? A police officer in Euclid, Ohio thought he could, but it turns out the effort wasn’t close enough for government work. Under the Fourth Amendment, at least. IJ’s Rob Frommer joins us to tell the latest Sixth Circuit tale of cops not bothering to get a warrant. Then Suranjan Sen of IJ takes us to the Eighth Circuit where the police di...

We are joined by Texas “teenylaw” lawyer Kristen Vander-Plas LaFreniere. We talk about what it’s like to run a very small practice and then dig into the latest from the circuits. Kristen presents a religious victory over the Marines in the D.C. Circuit and gives a bit of background about what that service thinks of the Navy. If you’ve made it through basic training this is the episode for you. The...

In honor of the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr. we invited on three civil rights lawyers to talk about their latest, pathbreaking, cases and the challenges they face in bringing justice for all. Anya Bidwell of IJ welcomes her colleague Marie Miller, as well as Mark Silverstein, Legal Director of the ACLU-Colorado, and Sam Thypin-Bermeo a civil rights lawyer in Miami. Each discusses a recently...

Two tales of the criminal justice system this week, with the Excessive Fines Clause and the Fourth Amendment both playing a part. First, in the Second Circuit, Ari Bargil tells us how an ingenious scheme of selling marijuana over an app hits a snag when the funds have to go through the bank. Which is subject to all kinds of federal laws. What about the law forbidding excessive fines? For that it g...

Not many lawyers alive today can say they’ve litigated a Thirteenth Amendment case (yes, that amendment; the one about slavery). But we at IJ have one, and we’re asking the Supreme Court to take a look at it. What’s before the Court is whether prosecutors who—under political pressure—made a bogus case against a group of nurses are “absolutely immune” from the nurses’ civil rights lawsuit. IJ’s Ben...

You got insurance is not just a question they ask at the doctor’s office. Most of the time when someone sues the government—especially a local government—there’s at least some insurance potentially available to pay for the government’s defense and to pay a claim. But insurance policies are famous for having exclusions. And it turns out that in bunch of lawsuits in the Sixth Circuit there are exclu...

A very short episode for the Holidays. Sung by members of the Institute for Justice. Click to listen, but here are the words: On the 1st day of Short Circuit Christmas my federal reporter gave to me A thesaurus under Judge Selya’s pine tree On the 2d day of Short Circuit Christmas my federal reporter gave to me Two Calabresi tort rules And a thesaurus under Judge Selya’s pine tree. On...

One of our oldest friends (well, not really a “friend”) is back, the rational basis test. Turns out the government can justify refusing to give someone a license on the grounds that it’s extra work for the government itself to have to issue the license. That sounds kinda weird, right? IJ attorney Josh House agrees, as he discusses a new case from the Fifth Circuit. But it’s not all bad news this w...

For millions of lower-income Americans, state licensing laws make finding work or opening a small business harder and more expensive—if not outright impossible. So claims the third edition of Licensed to Work, a report of the Institute for Justice. We talk to Lisa Knepper, a co-author of the report, to hear why occupational licensing is such a big deal—and such a big barrier to so many—and what ha...

Money makes the world go round. And sometimes the Constitution and our civil rights laws help money out with that. We examine a couple recent cases where bankruptcy and attorney fees awards intersected with constitutional law. First, IJ’s Rob Peccola describes how the Second Circuit followed the Supreme Court’s recent instructions to take Constitution’s use of the word “uniform” seriously. Then, I...

Just in time for Thanksgiving we have two extremely juicy opinions (from a judicial engagement standpoint), one about the right to earn a living and one on the nondelegation doctrine. First, it’s our old friend Jeff Rowes of IJ who discusses how the Fifth Circuit ruled against a tanning salon that didn’t want to be shut down during the pandemic, but where the court really didn’t seem to want to. A...

We’re joined by two friends from the MacArthur Justice Center, Emily Washington and Eric Foley, to tell us all about a blood-boiling case of prosecutorial misconduct, concocted evidence, and lying to put a man on death row. They are fighting an epic battle in the Fifth Circuit against many things in their case, but this week we focus on one especially: absolute immunity, a special benefit prosecut...

Everything’s big in Texas. Including that famous English conjunction “and.” For the first time on Short Circuit we have two IJ attorneys based in the Lone Star State on the same episode, Arif Panju and Christie Hebert. They introduce us to two Texan cases from the Texas-dominated Fifth Circuit. First, Arif explains why some voting rights groups didn’t have standing to challenge a few changes to th...

When Americans vote it usually means one other thing. Americans suing. And this year is no different. Diana Simpson of IJ joins us, as she did on the eve of the 2020 election, to help summarize and scrutinize hot-off-the-press opinions on ballot access and voting rules for the election on November 8, 2022. We discuss cases in federal and state court involving laws in Pennsylvania, Nebraska, Nevada...

We recorded an episode live before an audience in New York City! NYC is home to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, and it’s an all Second Circuit special. Join IJ’s Patrick Jaicomo as he talks with three former Second Circuit clerks: Maaren Shah, Bruce Green, and Alex Reinert. They dive into three recent Second Circuit cases—a certain defamation action against former Presid...

The Institute for Justice has asked the Supreme Court to take a case challenging Kentucky’s Certificate of Need law (aka a “CON law”—very much a double entendre). Two attorneys in the case, Andrew Ward and Bob Belden, discuss how their clients simply want to provide home health care to their own immigrant community, why the law that prevents that violates the Constitution, and how the Sixth Circui...

The Supreme Court has said that once the police find a reason to pull you over, they can pull you over—even if that’s not at all why they actually want to pull you over. Patrick Jaicomo joins us to discuss a tragic story from the Fifth Circuit where the court denied qualified immunity to an officer, but also questioned why the police should be allowed to conduct pretextual stops in the first place...

Enjoy some intra-Ivy League ribbing with two Yale grads talking law and clerkships from deep inside New York’s oldest university. Short Circuit welcomes David Lat of Original Jurisdiction (f/k/a Article III Groupie) and Michael Yaeger of Carlton Fields and Empirical Justice. After some throat clearing about their alma mater being in the news quite a bit lately—and how for that reason maybe it’s a...

What’s new in OT22? Quite a bit, it turns out. This is our sixth annual Short Circuit Live Supreme Court Preview from the University of North Carolina School of Law. Once again, the student Federalist Society chapter graciously asked us to visit and preview the upcoming term of the United States Supreme Court, with some lighthearted trivia, a deep dive into a couple cases already being heard by th...

If a doctor says a prisoner needs to take his medication, and you’re a prison guard, you should give the prisoner his medication. A number of prison officials in Utah seem to have failed to do this for someone in detox, leading to his death. Does that violate the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments? Yes, said the Tenth Circuit, and the right is clearly established too,...