Securus Technologies was a telecommunications company primarily known for providing phone and video services to correctional facilities. Its location-tracking subsidiary, LocationSmart, allowed law enforcement officers to obtain real-time cell phone location data. In May 2018, The New York Times reported that Cory Hutcheson, a former Missouri sheriff, had used the Securus system to track the cell phones of a state highway patrol captain, a judge, and other individuals — allegedly for personal reasons — despite uploading fabricated legal authorizations. The revelations triggered congressional inquiries, led the carriers to shut down their location-based services programs by 2019, and prompted the FCC investigation that ultimately produced the $104 million in combined forfeiture orders at issue in this case.

Carpenter was a landmark 2018 Supreme Court decision — also authored by Chief Justice Roberts — holding that the government's acquisition of historical cell-site location information from a wireless carrier constitutes a search under the Fourth Amendment, generally requiring a warrant. The case involved a robbery suspect whose movements were reconstructed from 127 days of cell phone location records obtained without a warrant. Roberts's detailed description of how cellular location tracking works has become a frequently cited primer on the technology. The Court borrows that description here to set the factual stage for why location data is both valuable and privacy-sensitive.

The Hobbs Administrative Orders Review Act (28 U.S.C. §§ 2341–2351) provides for judicial review of orders from certain federal agencies — including the FCC, FTC, and USDA — directly in the courts of appeals, bypassing the district courts entirely. Under Hobbs Act review, the appellate court examines the agency's order on the administrative record under the deferential standards of the Administrative Procedure Act — no jury, no live witnesses, no trial. This is significant because it means the carriers' only path to a jury was to refuse to pay the forfeiture and wait for the government to bring a § 504 collection action in district court — the very choice the carriers argued was unconstitutionally coercive.

The Seventh Amendment, ratified in 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights, preserves the right to a jury trial in federal civil cases. Three features are worth noting. First, "Suits at common law" distinguishes from equity and admiralty proceedings, which were historically tried without juries — the Amendment applies only to legal claims, not all civil disputes. Second, the $20 threshold has never been adjusted for inflation; in today's dollars it would be approximately $700. Third, the word "preserved" is significant: the Amendment did not create a new right but maintained the jury trial right as it existed under English common law in 1791 when the Bill of Rights was ratified. The Amendment applies only in federal courts, though most states guarantee civil jury rights through their own constitutions.

The Communications Act was enacted during the New Deal to consolidate federal regulation of telephone, telegraph, and radio, replacing the earlier Federal Radio Commission with the FCC. The Act has been amended many times — most significantly by the Telecommunications Act of 1996 — and now governs an industry landscape (cellular networks, broadband internet, streaming media) that its drafters could not have imagined. The forfeiture provisions at issue in this case, found in § 503(b), were not part of the original 1934 Act. They were added by amendment in 1960 and expanded in subsequent decades to give the FCC an enforcement tool short of revoking broadcast licenses or pursuing criminal prosecution.

This statistic — drawn from an amicus brief filed by the Investor Choice Advocates Network — illustrates the central tension Justice Thomas identifies: the SEC collects billions in disgorgement but returns only a small fraction to the investors it claims to be protecting. In this single year, the SEC returned roughly 5.7% of the amount it obtained in disgorgement orders. At oral argument, the SEC acknowledged that less than $6.1 billion was actually collected from defendants, and that while 88% of collected funds are "designated for distribution," that does not mean the money is ultimately distributed to investors. The gap between amounts ordered and amounts actually returned has drawn criticism from across the political spectrum and from industry groups who argue the SEC uses disgorgement as a de facto fine rather than a victim-compensation mechanism.

Assumpsit (Latin: "he undertook") was one of the original common-law writs — standardized forms of action through which plaintiffs initiated lawsuits in English and early American courts. It began as a remedy for broken promises but evolved into a general tool for recovering money the defendant owed the plaintiff, even without a formal contract. Its significance here is that assumpsit was a common-law (legal) remedy, not an equitable one, meaning cases brought under it carried the right to a jury trial. Justice Thomas cites it to show that restitution — requiring someone to pay back unjust gains — has deep roots in common-law courts, not just equity courts, supporting his argument that disgorgement should trigger the Seventh Amendment's jury trial right.

An "accounting for profits" is a specific equitable remedy in which a court orders the defendant to calculate and surrender the profits earned from misusing the plaintiff's property or rights. Historically, it was most commonly used in fiduciary relationships — for example, when a trustee profited by using trust property for personal gain, or when one business partner diverted partnership opportunities for himself. The remedy required a direct relationship between the wrongdoer and the victim: the wrongdoer held the victim's property or owed the victim a duty of loyalty. Justice Thomas argues that SEC disgorgement does not fit this model because the securities fraudster is typically not in a fiduciary relationship with defrauded investors, and the disgorged funds go to the SEC rather than directly to victims.

The Seventh Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights, preserves the right to a jury trial in federal civil cases "at common law" where the amount in controversy exceeds twenty dollars. The central interpretive question — and the crux of Justice Thomas's concurrence — is which modern remedies count as "common law" (legal) versus "equitable." At the founding, separate court systems handled these categories: common-law courts heard cases seeking money damages and used juries, while equity courts (historically the Court of Chancery in England) heard cases seeking injunctions, specific performance, and other non-monetary relief without juries. The Seventh Amendment preserved the jury right only for the former category. The two systems were merged procedurally in 1938 with the adoption of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, but the substantive distinction between legal and equitable remedies persists for Seventh Amendment purposes.

Jarkesy was a landmark 2024 decision in which the Supreme Court held (6–3) that when the SEC seeks civil penalties for securities fraud, the Seventh Amendment entitles the defendant to a jury trial in a federal district court. The ruling effectively prohibited the SEC from adjudicating fraud cases carrying civil penalties through its own in-house administrative law judges — a practice the Commission had used extensively for over a decade. Jarkesy is part of a broader series of recent decisions constraining the SEC's enforcement powers: Kokesh (2017) imposed a statute of limitations, Liu (2020) required disgorgement to follow equitable principles, and Jarkesy (2024) required jury trials for penalty actions. Justice Thomas's concurrence in this case extends that trajectory by arguing that disgorgement itself should also require a jury trial.

Benjamin N. Cardozo (1870–1938) served as an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1932 to 1938, succeeding Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. Before his appointment, he served as Chief Judge of the New York Court of Appeals, where he authored many of the most influential opinions in American common law. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest judges in American legal history. His opinions are known for their literary quality and analytical precision — dozens remain staples of law school curricula nearly a century later, including Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad on proximate cause and MacPherson v. Buick Motor Co. on products liability. When the quoted opinion was issued in 1922, Cardozo was a judge on the New York Court of Appeals, not yet on the Supreme Court.

The "Great Onyx Cave" case is one of the most frequently taught decisions in American property law courses. The cave in question was located near Mammoth Cave in Kentucky. The Kentucky Court of Appeals held that the landowner above a portion of the cave was entitled to one-third of the profits from its commercial exploitation as a tourist attraction, even though the cave could only be accessed from the neighbor's property and the landowner suffered no financial harm from its use. The case has endured in legal education for nearly a century as a vivid illustration of the principle that a property owner may recover a wrongdoer's profits from invading the owner's rights, regardless of whether the invasion caused any measurable financial loss — the same principle the Court applies here to SEC disgorgement.

"Amici" is the plural of "amicus curiae," Latin for "friend of the court." Amici curiae are individuals or organizations that are not parties to the case but file briefs offering the court their perspective on the legal issues involved. In Supreme Court cases, amicus briefs are common and can be influential — they allow industry groups, advocacy organizations, legal scholars, and government entities to present arguments or data the parties themselves may not raise. Here, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce filed an amicus brief supporting Mr. Sripetch's position, arguing that without a pecuniary loss requirement, the SEC might seek disgorgement even in cases where no investor's legally protected interests were violated.

A "circuit split" occurs when two or more U.S. Courts of Appeals reach conflicting interpretations of the same federal law. The federal appellate system is divided into thirteen circuits, each covering different geographic regions, and their decisions are binding only within their own territory. When circuits disagree, the same federal statute can effectively mean different things depending on where a case is filed. Resolving circuit splits is one of the primary reasons the Supreme Court grants certiorari — agrees to hear a case — since the Constitution charges the Court with ensuring uniform interpretation of federal law. Here, the First and Ninth Circuits held that the SEC could obtain disgorgement without proving investors suffered financial losses, while the Second Circuit required such proof, meaning the SEC's enforcement powers varied by geography.

The Restatements are a series of legal treatises published by the American Law Institute (ALI), a private organization founded in 1923 to clarify and systematize American common law. Each Restatement distills the prevailing rules from court decisions across all fifty states into a single organized reference. They are not binding law, but courts — including the Supreme Court — frequently cite them as authoritative summaries of legal principles. The "First" and "Third" designations refer to successive editions: the First Restatement of Restitution was published in 1936, and the Third Restatement of Restitution and Unjust Enrichment in 2010. Both are cited extensively in this opinion to establish what traditional equitable principles require.

A "pump and dump" is a securities fraud scheme in which conspirators acquire shares of a low-priced stock, then artificially inflate ("pump") the price through misleading promotional campaigns — often via online message boards, spam emails, or social media — before selling ("dumping") their shares at the inflated price. When the promotion stops, the price typically collapses, leaving later investors holding shares worth far less than they paid. The scheme depends on information asymmetry: the promoters know the price increase is artificial, while the investors they attract do not. Pump-and-dump schemes violate the antifraud provisions of the Securities Exchange Act, primarily Section 10(b) and SEC Rule 10b-5.

Penny stocks are shares of small companies that typically trade at less than $5 per share, often on over-the-counter markets rather than major exchanges like the NYSE or Nasdaq. Because penny stocks are thinly traded, have limited public disclosure requirements, and generally lack coverage by financial analysts, they are particularly vulnerable to price manipulation schemes. The SEC has long identified penny-stock fraud as a persistent enforcement priority and has adopted special rules governing penny-stock transactions under 17 C.F.R. §§ 240.15g-1 through 240.15g-100.

Cox Communications is a decision from the current Supreme Court term — decided so recently it does not yet have a page number in the United States Reports. The case involved allegations that the internet service provider Cox Communications was liable for copyright infringement committed by its subscribers who used the company's network to pirate music. The Supreme Court's citation of Cox here, alongside Grokster (file-sharing software) and Taamneh (social media platforms and terrorism), signals that the Court views induced-infringement and secondary-liability doctrines as operating on the same principles across patent law, copyright law, and even anti-terrorism law: passive provision of services or products is not enough, regardless of the legal domain.

Mensing (2011) established what the Court calls the "duty of sameness" for generic drug manufacturers. The case held that generic manufacturers cannot unilaterally change their drug labeling to add or strengthen safety warnings — federal law requires their labels to be identical to the brand-name label in all material respects. This created a significant legal paradox: brand-name manufacturers can be held liable under state tort law for inadequate safety warnings, but generic manufacturers cannot, because they have no legal ability to change their warnings even if they know of new risks. The duty of sameness is directly relevant here: it means Hikma could not have removed the clinical study information from its label even if it wanted to. The same federal law that forces label uniformity also provides the "obvious alternative explanation" for why Hikma's label contains information about statin use.

Taamneh (2023) did not involve patent or copyright law — it arose under the federal Anti-Terrorism Act. The families of victims of an ISIS terrorist attack in Istanbul sued Twitter, Google, and Facebook, alleging that the platforms aided and abetted terrorism by allowing ISIS to use their services for recruitment and propaganda. The Supreme Court unanimously held that merely providing neutral, widely available services — even with knowledge they might be misused — does not constitute aiding and abetting. The Court borrows Taamneh's reasoning here by analogy: just as social media platforms are not liable for merely hosting content that terrorists might use, generic drug manufacturers are not liable for merely distributing a product that doctors might prescribe for patented uses. The borrowing illustrates how the Court views secondary liability doctrines as operating on consistent principles across legal domains.

Grokster was a landmark 2005 Supreme Court case arising from the peer-to-peer file-sharing era that followed the shutdown of Napster. Grokster and StreamCast distributed free software that allowed users to share music and movie files directly with each other — technologies with legitimate uses, but overwhelmingly used for piracy. The entertainment industry sued, and the Supreme Court unanimously held that distributing a product with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright could give rise to secondary liability. Although Grokster was a copyright case, the Court here treats its "active steps" framework as directly applicable to patent inducement under 35 U.S.C. § 271(b) — borrowing across intellectual property domains to define what "active inducement" requires.

Twombly (2007) and its companion case Iqbal (2009) are the two most consequential federal pleading decisions of the past half-century. Before Twombly, federal courts applied the lenient standard from Conley v. Gibson (1957), which held that a complaint should not be dismissed unless "no set of facts" could support the claim. Twombly replaced that with the "plausibility" test: a complaint must contain enough factual matter to state a claim that is "plausible on its face" — not merely conceivable. Iqbal confirmed that this heightened standard applies to all civil cases, not just antitrust. Together, they significantly raised the bar for plaintiffs at the pleading stage and are among the most-cited Supreme Court decisions in the federal court system. They provide the analytical framework the Court applies throughout this opinion.

A Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss tests whether a complaint states a legally viable claim before any discovery or trial takes place. The court must accept all of the plaintiff's factual allegations as true and draw all reasonable inferences in the plaintiff's favor — but the complaint must still cross the plausibility threshold. This procedural posture is significant: the Supreme Court is not deciding whether Hikma actually induced infringement. It is deciding only whether Amarin's complaint alleged enough facts to deserve to proceed to discovery, where it could gather evidence to support its claims. The Court's conclusion that Amarin fails even this relatively low bar underscores how weak the inducement theory is on these facts.

The Federal Circuit is a specialized appellate court created by Congress in 1982 with exclusive nationwide jurisdiction over patent appeals, among other subjects. Unlike the twelve regional courts of appeals (such as the Second or Ninth Circuit), which hear a wide variety of cases from their geographic regions, the Federal Circuit hears patent cases from every federal district court in the country. This centralization was intended to create uniform patent law nationwide. The court sits in Washington, D.C., and its decisions are reviewable only by the Supreme Court. In footnote 3 of this opinion, the Court expressly rejects the Federal Circuit's recent trend of focusing on whether medical providers "could read" statements as encouragement to infringe — a notable rebuke of the specialized court's developing jurisprudence on induced infringement.

Hypertriglyceridemia refers to elevated levels of triglycerides — a type of fat — in the blood. It is classified as "severe" when triglyceride levels exceed 500 mg/dL (normal is below 150 mg/dL). At these levels, patients face significant risk of pancreatitis, a painful and potentially life-threatening inflammation of the pancreas. Severe hypertriglyceridemia is relatively uncommon, affecting an estimated 3–4 million Americans. The distinction between "severe" hypertriglyceridemia and the broader category of "hypertriglyceridemia" is central to this case: Hikma was approved only for the severe form, but its website listed the therapeutic category as the broader "hypertriglyceridemia" — a category encompassing tens of millions of patients, including those eligible for the patented cardiovascular treatment.

Vascepa is a prescription medication containing a highly purified form of EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid), an omega-3 fatty acid derived from fish oil. Unlike over-the-counter fish oil supplements, which contain a mixture of omega-3 fatty acids, Vascepa contains only EPA in a purified, FDA-regulated formulation. The drug was commercially significant for Amarin: annual U.S. sales exceeded $800 million at their peak. The 2019 FDA approval for cardiovascular risk reduction — based on the landmark REDUCE-IT clinical trial involving over 8,000 patients — was transformative, expanding Vascepa's potential patient population from a few million Americans with severe hypertriglyceridemia to tens of millions of statin users with elevated triglycerides.

Generic substitution laws — sometimes called "drug product selection" laws — authorize or require pharmacists to dispense a generic drug in place of the prescribed brand-name drug when a therapeutically equivalent generic is available. In mandatory substitution states, a pharmacist must substitute the generic unless the prescribing physician specifically writes "dispense as written" or "brand medically necessary" on the prescription. These laws are the reason generic drugs capture market share so quickly after launch: the pharmacist, not the doctor, often makes the final dispensing decision. This dynamic is central to the case because it means generic drugs can be used for patented indications without the generic manufacturer ever communicating with the prescribing physician — the substitution happens automatically at the pharmacy counter.

The Orange Book — named for its original orange cover — is published by the FDA and updated monthly. It lists every FDA-approved drug product along with its associated patents, patent expiration dates, and therapeutic equivalence ratings. The book is the linchpin of the generic drug approval process: brand-name manufacturers are required by law to list their relevant patents in the Orange Book, and generic applicants must certify to each listed patent in their ANDA, either by asserting the patent is invalid or uninfringed (paragraph IV certification) or by carving out the patented use (section viii statement). The Orange Book is freely available online, and its patent listings effectively determine when and how generic competitors can enter the market.

The Drug Price Competition and Patent Term Restoration Act of 1984, known as the Hatch-Waxman Amendments (named for Senator Orrin Hatch and Representative Henry Waxman), created the modern framework for generic drug approval in the United States. Before Hatch-Waxman, generic manufacturers had to conduct their own full clinical trials to gain FDA approval — a process nearly as expensive and time-consuming as developing the original drug. The Act created the abbreviated new drug application (ANDA) process, allowing generics to rely on the brand-name manufacturer's safety and efficacy data. In exchange, brand-name manufacturers received patent term extensions to compensate for time lost during the FDA review process. The law is widely credited with the dramatic expansion of the generic drug market: generics now account for roughly 90% of prescriptions filled in the United States.

Joyce Beatty is a former U.S. Representative who served Ohio's 3rd Congressional District (Columbus) from 2013 to 2025. She served as Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus from 2021 to 2023. Her standing in this lawsuit arises from her role as an ex officio trustee of the Kennedy Center Board — a position she held as a member of Congress designated by House leadership. The voting rights claim (Count Three) is directly tied to her status: the Board's May 2025 bylaws stripped ex officio members of voting rights, which this order declares unlawful.

Under the Kennedy Center's governing statute (20 U.S.C. § 76h(a)), certain government officials serve on the Board of Trustees "ex officio" — by virtue of holding their office, rather than by presidential appointment. These include members of Congress designated by House and Senate leadership from both parties, as well as several senior government officials. The statute provides for both "general" (presidentially appointed) trustees and these ex officio members. The court's ruling here — that the Board cannot categorically strip ex officio members of their vote — means these congressional representatives retain equal governance authority alongside the appointed trustees.

The Kennedy Center's "organic statute" — the federal law that created and governs the institution. Originally enacted as the National Cultural Center Act of 1958 (Pub. L. 85-874), it established a national performing arts center in Washington, D.C. After President Kennedy's assassination in November 1963, Congress amended the Act in January 1964 to name the center in his honor (Pub. L. 88-260). Because the name was established by federal statute, it can only be changed by another statute — an executive action or board resolution cannot override a congressional enactment. This principle, that a lower authority cannot undo what a higher authority has done, is the legal foundation of the entire order.

BLOM Bank, decided by the Supreme Court in 2025, addressed the standard for Rule 60(b)(6) relief — the catchall provision allowing a court to set aside a judgment for "any other reason that justifies relief." The case involved a dispute over assets held in a Lebanese bank that were frozen during Lebanon's financial crisis. The Court reaffirmed that Rule 60(b)(6) is reserved for "extraordinary circumstances" and cannot be used as a substitute for a timely appeal. The decision is cited here for its articulation of the "extraordinary circumstances" standard, which the movants argue is met by the alleged use of a collusive lawsuit to justify billions of dollars in payments from the Treasury.

J. Michael Luttig served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit from 1991 to 2006, appointed by President George H.W. Bush. He was widely considered one of the most influential conservative jurists of his era and was reportedly on the short list for the Supreme Court during the George W. Bush administration. After leaving the bench, he served as General Counsel of Boeing. In 2022, he testified before the House January 6th Committee, advising then-Vice President Pence that he had no constitutional authority to reject Electoral College votes. Luttig is listed first among the 35 movants, and Susman Godfrey's representation in this motion is limited to Luttig and Judge Nancy Gertner.

"Wright & Miller" is the informal name for Federal Practice and Procedure, a multi-volume legal treatise widely considered the leading authority on federal civil procedure. Originally authored by Charles Alan Wright (a constitutional law professor at the University of Texas) and Arthur R. Miller (a civil procedure professor now at NYU), the treatise has been continuously updated since 1969 and currently spans over 100 volumes. It is cited by federal courts more frequently than any other secondary source on procedural questions. Volume 11, § 2870, which this motion cites four times, specifically addresses the court's power to set aside judgments for fraud on the court under Rule 60(d)(3).

Charles Littlejohn was an IRS contractor who in 2020 leaked the tax return information of Donald Trump and thousands of other wealthy Americans to journalists at The New York Times and ProPublica, respectively. He pleaded guilty in October 2023 to one count of unauthorized disclosure of tax return information under 26 U.S.C. § 7213A and was sentenced to five years in prison in January 2024. His conduct formed the basis of the underlying claims in this lawsuit: the plaintiffs alleged the IRS was liable for Littlejohn's unauthorized disclosures. The motion notes that in a separate case arising from the same disclosures, Griffin v. IRS, the government argued that Littlejohn was a contractor, not a government employee, and therefore the IRS was not liable — a defense the government did not raise here.

Hazel-Atlas is the foundational Supreme Court case on a federal court's inherent power to vacate judgments obtained by fraud. The case involved a patent dispute in which Hartford-Empire manufactured a fake scientific article and submitted it to the Patent Office and the court to support its patent claims. The Supreme Court held that a court has the inherent power to set aside a judgment procured through such fraud, even after direct appeals have been exhausted. Justice Black's opinion emphasized that allowing such fraud to stand would "undermine the very temple of justice." The decision established that the power to address fraud on the court exists independently of any rule or statute and cannot be eliminated by procedural time limits.

"Fraud on the court" is a legal term of art distinct from ordinary fraud. Ordinary fraud (addressed by Rule 60(b)(3)) involves one party deceiving another — for example, fabricating evidence. Fraud on the court is broader and more serious: it involves conduct that corrupts the judicial process itself, undermining the court's ability to function as a neutral arbiter. Classic examples include bribing a judge, colluding with opposing counsel to fix the outcome of a case, or manufacturing a fictitious lawsuit to obtain a judgment that serves an ulterior purpose. Because fraud on the court threatens the integrity of the entire system, it is not subject to the one-year time limit that applies to ordinary fraud under Rule 60(b)(3), and it can be raised by non-parties.

Waetzig was decided by a unanimous Supreme Court in 2025 and resolved whether a voluntary dismissal under Rule 41(a)(1)(A)(i) counts as a "final judgment, order, or proceeding" subject to Rule 60 review. The case arose from an employment dispute in which the plaintiff voluntarily dismissed his action without prejudice and later sought to reopen it. The Court held that the voluntary dismissal was indeed a "final" order reviewable under Rule 60. The decision is significant here because it forecloses the argument that a self-executing voluntary dismissal under Rule 41 is immune from post-dismissal judicial review.

Kem is the controlling Eleventh Circuit authority on non-party standing under Rule 60. The case involved a former corporate officer who sought to set aside a consent decree entered in a trademark dispute between his former company and the defendant. The Eleventh Circuit held that while Rule 60 motions based on fraud on the court are typically brought by parties, non-parties may bring such motions in "extraordinary circumstances" — even when their interests are not directly affected by the judgment. Kem was decided before the 2007 restyling of Rule 60, when the fraud-on-the-court provision was located in subsection (b) rather than its current location in subsection (d). The advisory committee's notes confirm the 2007 amendments were "intended to be stylistic only," preserving Kem's holding.

Section 2414 authorizes the payment of "final" judgments against the United States rendered by federal district courts, as well as "compromise settlements" of claims in cases where the government faces "imminent" litigation. It is the statutory bridge between court judgments or settlements and the Judgment Fund's disbursement mechanism. The statute's requirement that settlements be for "defense of imminent litigation or suits against the United States" is significant here: the movants argue that a settlement arising from a collusive or feigned lawsuit does not satisfy this requirement because there was no genuine adversarial proceeding to defend against.

The Judgment Fund is a permanent, indefinite appropriation maintained by the U.S. Treasury that pays judgments and settlements against the federal government. "Permanent" means it does not require annual renewal by Congress; "indefinite" means there is no statutory cap on the amount that can be paid in any given year. The Fund was established in 1956 to streamline payments that previously required individual congressional appropriations for each judgment. It is administered by the Bureau of the Fiscal Service within the Treasury Department. Payments from the Judgment Fund are not subject to the normal congressional appropriations process, which is why the movants argue that using the Fund requires a legitimate underlying legal dispute — without one, the payment lacks statutory authorization.

Rule 41(a)(1)(A)(i) permits a plaintiff to dismiss an action without a court order by filing a "notice of dismissal" before the opposing party serves an answer or a motion for summary judgment. Because the rule requires only a notice — not a motion — the plaintiff does not need the court's permission or the defendant's consent. The rule is self-executing: the case is dismissed the moment the notice is filed. A dismissal "with prejudice" means the plaintiff cannot refile the same claims. Because the dismissal takes effect automatically, the court ordinarily cannot block it — which is why the movants here argue that Rule 60 is necessary to undo it after the fact.

Rule 60 governs relief from final judgments, orders, or proceedings in federal court. This motion invokes two distinct subsections. Rule 60(b) lists six specific grounds on which a court may set aside a judgment "on motion": (1) mistake or excusable neglect; (2) newly discovered evidence; (3) fraud, misrepresentation, or misconduct by an opposing party; (4) a void judgment; (5) a satisfied or discharged judgment; and (6) "any other reason that justifies relief" — a catchall that applies only in "extraordinary circumstances." Rule 60(d) separately preserves a court's inherent powers, including the power to "set aside a judgment for fraud on the court." Unlike Rule 60(b), which is subject to time limits (generally one year for grounds (1)–(3)), Rule 60(d) has no time limit because fraud on the court is considered too serious to be barred by procedural deadlines.

The Court flags two issues it expressly declines to resolve — both of which are actively dividing the lower courts. First: whether §1's "contracts of employment" provision applies when the worker operates through an independently owned business entity (here, a company Brock owns). The Ninth Circuit has said no (Fli-Lo Falcon v. Amazon.com, 2024), while the Second Circuit has said yes for single-employee corporations (Silva v. Schmidt Baking, 2025). Second: whether §1 still applies when the worker takes title to the goods before delivering them — arguably making the worker a buyer-reseller rather than a transporter. The First Circuit has held that intrastate couriers filling local take-out orders are not engaged in interstate commerce (Immediato v. Postmates, 2022). These unresolved questions will almost certainly generate further Supreme Court litigation — potentially involving Flowers Foods once again.

The Commerce Clause (Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 of the U.S. Constitution) grants Congress the power "To regulate Commerce . . . among the several States." It is one of the most frequently litigated constitutional provisions and serves as the legal basis for a vast range of federal legislation, from civil rights laws to environmental regulations. The Court here is careful to distinguish between two uses of the phrase "engaged in interstate commerce": Commerce Clause cases use it to define the outer limits of federal regulatory power, while §1 of the FAA uses it to define which workers are exempt from mandatory arbitration. The Court notes that Congress sometimes uses broader formulations — like "affecting" or "involving" interstate commerce — when it wishes to legislate to the full extent of its Commerce Clause authority, suggesting that §1's narrower "engaged in" language has a more limited (though still broad) reach.

The Daniel Ball was a steamboat operating on Michigan's Grand River in the years after the Civil War. The case arose because the vessel lacked the federal license required of boats "engaged in commerce between the States." The steamer's owner argued that because the boat operated entirely within Michigan, it was not engaged in interstate commerce. The Court rejected that argument — even though the steamer never left Michigan, it carried goods that originated out of state or were destined for other states, making it part of an interstate journey. "10 Wall." refers to the 10th volume of Wallace's Reports, the bound set of Supreme Court decisions from 1863 to 1875, before the Court began publishing in its own "United States Reports" series. The modern equivalent citation is 77 U.S. 557.

Circuit City is the foundational modern case on §1's scope. The question was whether §1's exemption covers all employment contracts or only those of transportation workers. In a 5–4 decision, the Court held that §1 exempts only "contracts of employment of transportation workers" — reasoning that the specific references to "seamen" and "railroad employees" indicate Congress was focused on transportation. Justice Stevens dissented, arguing the exemption should cover all workers. Circuit City dramatically expanded the reach of mandatory arbitration in employment by confirming that most workers cannot invoke §1 to escape arbitration clauses. The decision remains controversial but has been consistently reaffirmed — and the recent trilogy of New Prime, Saxon, and Bissonnette can be understood as the Court gradually widening the transportation-worker exemption that Circuit City narrowed.

Latrice Saxon was a ramp supervisor at Southwest Airlines who loaded and unloaded cargo from aircraft at Chicago's Midway Airport. Southwest argued she did not qualify for §1's exemption because she never crossed state lines — she worked entirely within the airport. The Court unanimously disagreed, holding that a worker who physically loads or unloads goods moving in interstate commerce is "engaged in" that commerce even without personally crossing state borders. Saxon is the direct predecessor to this case: it established that crossing state lines is not required, but left open the question presented here — whether a worker who doesn't even interact with interstate vehicles (by loading or unloading them) can still qualify.

New Prime addressed whether §1's reference to "contracts of employment" is limited to traditional employer-employee relationships. The company argued that because its truck drivers were classified as independent contractors rather than employees, their contracts fell outside §1's exemption. The Court unanimously disagreed, holding that "contracts of employment" as understood in 1925 encompassed any agreement to perform work, including arrangements with independent contractors. This was significant because many companies in the transportation and gig economy classify their workers as independent contractors and had argued that this classification alone placed them outside §1's protection — leaving those workers subject to mandatory arbitration.

Bissonnette involved distributors for the same company at issue here — Flowers Foods, which operates LePage Bakeries as a subsidiary. In that case, baked goods distributors argued they fell within §1's exemption. Flowers countered that the exemption applies only to workers in the "transportation industry," not workers in other industries who happen to transport goods. The Supreme Court unanimously rejected that argument, holding that a worker need not be employed in the transportation industry to qualify — what matters is whether the worker's activities "play a direct and necessary role in the free flow of goods across borders." That this case returns to the Court just two years later, involving the same company and a closely related question, illustrates the ongoing litigation pressure over §1's boundaries.

The explicit naming of "seamen" and "railroad employees" reflects the labor landscape of 1925, when the FAA was enacted. Maritime workers and railroad employees were the two largest classes of interstate transportation workers at the time, and both already had their own federal dispute resolution frameworks — the Shipping Commissioners Act of 1872 for seamen and the Railway Labor Act (enacted in 1926, one year after the FAA) for railroad workers. Congress listed them specifically to make clear they were exempt, then added the catchall "any other class of workers engaged in . . . interstate commerce" to cover similar transportation workers. The scope of that catchall — how far beyond seamen and railroad employees it reaches — is the question the Supreme Court has been answering incrementally through this line of cases.

Arbitration is a private dispute resolution process in which the parties present their case to a neutral arbitrator rather than a judge and jury. In the employment context, mandatory arbitration clauses have become widespread — by one estimate, more than 60 million American workers are subject to them. Workers bound by such clauses typically give up the right to file a lawsuit in court, the right to a jury trial, and — in most cases — the right to participate in a class or collective action. Arbitration proceedings are generally private and confidential, with limited discovery and restricted rights to appeal. The practical stakes of this case are significant: if Brock qualifies for §1's exemption, he can pursue his wage claims in court, potentially on behalf of a class of distributors; if he doesn't, his claims go to private arbitration.

The Federal Arbitration Act was enacted in 1925 to address what Congress saw as judicial hostility toward arbitration agreements, which courts had frequently refused to enforce. The statute establishes a strong federal policy favoring arbitration and requires courts to enforce arbitration clauses in contracts. Over the past several decades, the FAA has become one of the most consequential statutes in employment and consumer law. The Supreme Court has interpreted it broadly, holding that it preempts state laws restricting arbitration (AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion, 2011) and that it applies to most employment contracts (Circuit City Stores v. Adams, 2001). Section 1's exemption for transportation workers — the provision at issue here — is the principal statutory escape valve for workers who would otherwise be bound by mandatory arbitration clauses.

Mistretta is the foundational case upholding the constitutionality of the United States Sentencing Commission. John Mistretta challenged his sentence under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, arguing that Congress violated the separation of powers by delegating rulemaking authority to a commission housed within the judicial branch. The Court held 8–1 (Justice Scalia dissenting) that Congress's delegation was constitutionally permissible because it was bounded by an "intelligible principle" — the statutory directives guiding the Commission's work. The case is cited here for its description of the pre-1984 federal sentencing system, in which judges and parole officers exercised broad discretion based on their assessment of a defendant's potential for rehabilitation — the system the Sentencing Reform Act replaced.

Concepcion (2022) involved Section 404 of the First Step Act, which made the Fair Sentencing Act's reduced crack cocaine penalties retroactive and authorized courts to resentence eligible defendants. The question was whether a court conducting that resentencing could consider intervening changes to the Sentencing Guidelines and other developments that occurred after the original sentence. The Court held 5–4 (Sotomayor writing for the majority) that it could, emphasizing courts' "broad discretion to consider all relevant information" when modifying a sentence. The majority in this case distinguishes Concepcion on the ground that eligibility for relief was conceded there — the only question was what information the court could consider once it was already authorized to modify the sentence. Here, by contrast, the threshold question is whether the prisoner qualifies for compassionate release at all. The dissent argues that distinction is artificial.

Loper Bright is the 2024 decision that overruled Chevron U.S.A. v. NRDC (1984), eliminating the doctrine under which courts deferred to an agency's reasonable interpretation of an ambiguous statute it administered. After Loper Bright, courts must "independently interpret the statute and effectuate the will of Congress" rather than deferring to the agency's reading. The majority's citation here applies this principle to the Sentencing Commission: even though Congress delegated authority to the Commission to define "extraordinary and compelling reasons," courts are not bound by the Commission's interpretation when it conflicts with the statute's meaning. This is a notable early application of Loper Bright outside the administrative-law context, extending its reasoning to the Sentencing Commission — an independent agency within the judicial branch, not an executive-branch agency.

Dorsey involved the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010, which reduced the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine from 100:1 to 18:1. The question was whether the new, lower crack cocaine penalties applied to defendants who committed their offenses before the Act but were sentenced after it took effect. The Court held 5–4 that they did — but in reaching that conclusion, Justice Breyer's majority opinion confirmed that the "ordinary practice" is to withhold new sentencing benefits from defendants already sentenced, and that the resulting disparities are a normal feature of any prospective change in sentencing law. The majority in this case relies on that observation to conclude that the disparity between pre- and post-First Step Act sentences is not "extraordinary."

Hewitt, decided just one term before this case, addressed a related question about the First Step Act's §924(c) amendments. The issue was whether a defendant being resentenced under a different provision of the Act (Section 404, which made the Fair Sentencing Act's crack cocaine reforms retroactive) could benefit from the §924(c) stacking changes during that resentencing. The Court held no — the §924(c) amendments do not apply to defendants whose sentences were already final when the Act was passed, even if they are being resentenced on other grounds. The plurality opinion's emphasis on Congress's "interest in finality" is repeatedly cited by the majority in this case to support the conclusion that the sentencing disparity cannot serve as a basis for compassionate release either.

The First Step Act was signed into law by President Trump on December 21, 2018, with broad bipartisan support — it passed the Senate 87–12 and the House 358–36. Beyond the §924(c) stacking changes at issue in this case, the Act: reduced mandatory minimums for certain drug offenses (including retroactively reducing crack cocaine sentences under Section 404); expanded the federal "safety valve" allowing judges to sentence below mandatory minimums for low-level drug offenders; required the BOP to develop a risk and needs assessment system (PATTERN) to earn time credits toward early release; prohibited the shackling of pregnant inmates; and placed federal prisons within 500 driving miles of inmates' families when practicable. The Act's coalition included groups as disparate as the ACLU, the Koch brothers' network, and the Fraternal Order of Police.

Before the First Step Act, the Bureau of Prisons exercised near-total control over compassionate release. From 1984 to 2013, the BOP filed an average of only 24 compassionate release motions per year — out of a federal prison population that exceeded 200,000 by the early 2010s. A 2013 report by the Department of Justice Office of Inspector General found the BOP's compassionate release process was "inconsistent" and plagued by lengthy delays, with some wardens declining to forward requests to the BOP Director at all. The First Step Act's change allowing prisoners to file their own motions after a 30-day exhaustion period led to a dramatic increase in filings: in Fiscal Year 2024, defendants filed 3,015 compassionate release motions nationwide.

The Sentencing Commission is a seven-member body that requires four members for a quorum to take official action. Multiple vacancies during the Trump administration left the Commission without a quorum from January 2019 until August 2022, when the Senate confirmed a slate of new commissioners nominated by President Biden. During this three-and-a-half-year gap, the Commission could not update its policy statements to reflect the First Step Act's changes — including the new prisoner-initiated compassionate release pathway. This left federal courts without Commission guidance on how to interpret "extraordinary and compelling reasons" in the context of prisoner-filed motions, forcing each circuit to develop its own framework and producing the circuit split this case was granted to resolve.

The Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 was a sweeping overhaul of the federal sentencing system, enacted as part of the Comprehensive Crime Control Act. It abolished federal parole, created the United States Sentencing Commission as an independent agency within the judicial branch, and directed the Commission to develop the Federal Sentencing Guidelines — binding rules that constrained judicial discretion by specifying sentencing ranges based on offense severity and criminal history. The Act also created the compassionate release provision at issue in this case. Congress's stated goals were to reduce sentencing disparities, promote transparency, and shift away from a rehabilitation-focused model toward one emphasizing proportionality and deterrence. The Guidelines were binding from 1987 until the Supreme Court made them advisory in United States v. Booker (2005).

Section 3553(a) lists the factors a federal court must consider when imposing a sentence: (1) the nature and circumstances of the offense and the defendant's history and characteristics; (2) the need for the sentence to reflect the seriousness of the offense, promote respect for the law, provide just punishment, deter criminal conduct, and protect the public; (3) the kinds of sentences available; (4) the applicable Sentencing Guidelines range; (5) pertinent Sentencing Commission policy statements; (6) the need to avoid unwarranted sentencing disparities among similarly situated defendants; and (7) the need to provide restitution to victims. Factor (6) — avoiding "unwarranted sentence disparities" — is particularly relevant to this case because petitioners argued that the disparity between their pre-Act sentences and what they would receive today is itself a reason for compassionate release.

In Deal, the Supreme Court held 6–3 that the 25-year "second or subsequent" penalty under the pre-2018 version of §924(c) applied to multiple counts charged in the same indictment — not only to offenses committed after a prior conviction had become final. This meant that a defendant who used a gun in six bank robberies charged together could receive a 5-year mandatory minimum on the first count and 25 years on each of the remaining five, for a total of 130 years on the gun charges alone. Justice Stevens, writing for the majority, acknowledged this was harsh but concluded the statutory text compelled it. Deal's interpretation of "second or subsequent" is precisely what the First Step Act changed: the 25-year mandatory minimum now applies only when a prior §924(c) conviction "has become final" before the new offense occurs.

Section 924(c) makes it a separate federal offense to use, carry, or possess a firearm in connection with a crime of violence or drug trafficking offense. Its mandatory minimum sentences escalate based on how the firearm was used: 5 years for possession, 7 years for brandishing, and 10 years for discharging the weapon. These penalties are mandatory and must run consecutively to the sentence for the underlying crime. Before the First Step Act, any "second or subsequent" §924(c) conviction in the same case triggered a 25-year mandatory minimum, meaning a defendant convicted of two counts in a single trial faced a minimum of 30 years on the gun charges alone.

The disparity in outcomes — the person who fired the fatal shots receiving 20 years while the accomplice faces death — is made possible by Mississippi's capital murder statute and the felony murder doctrine. Under Mississippi law (Miss. Code § 97-3-19(2)(e)), a killing committed during the course of a robbery is capital murder regardless of which participant actually fired the fatal shot. Any participant in the underlying felony can be charged with capital murder if the prosecution can show the defendant killed, attempted to kill, or contemplated that lethal force would be employed. Bullins, who was 16 at the time and thus ineligible for the death penalty under Roper v. Simmons (2005), was likely offered a plea to a lesser charge in exchange for avoiding a capital murder trial. Pitchford, who was 18, was eligible for the death penalty as an adult.

Rat shot (also called snake shot or dust shot) is a type of handgun cartridge loaded with very small pellets — similar in concept to a shotgun shell but fired from a pistol. It is designed for pest control at close range and is significantly less lethal than standard handgun ammunition, as the small pellets lose velocity rapidly and disperse widely. The detail is relevant to Pitchford's case because it bears on the disputed question of his intent: standard handgun rounds are designed to inflict lethal wounds on humans; rat shot is designed to kill rodents and snakes.

AEDPA was signed into law by President Clinton on April 24, 1996 — one year and five days after the Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people. While prompted by terrorism concerns, AEDPA's most consequential provisions restrict the ability of state prisoners to obtain federal habeas corpus review of their convictions. Before AEDPA, federal courts reviewed state court constitutional rulings de novo (from scratch). AEDPA changed this to a highly deferential standard: a federal court can grant relief only if the state court's decision was an "unreasonable application" of clearly established Supreme Court precedent or was based on an unreasonable determination of facts. The Court has described this standard as requiring the state court decision to be not merely wrong, but unreasonably wrong — as the dissent puts it in this case, "no fairminded jurist" could have reached the state court's conclusion.

Ford v. Georgia (1991) involved a Black defendant convicted of kidnapping, rape, and murder by an all-white jury. The Georgia courts held that Ford had forfeited his Batson claim by failing to comply with the state's procedural requirements for raising such objections. The Supreme Court reversed unanimously, holding that while states may establish reasonable procedural rules for raising Batson claims, those rules cannot be applied in a way that effectively defeats the underlying constitutional right. Ford is the key precedent in this case on the question of procedural preservation — the majority and the dissent both cite it but disagree sharply about what it means for Mississippi's waiver rules.

Thomas Miller-El, a Black man, was sentenced to death in Dallas County, Texas, in 1986 after prosecutors struck 10 of 11 eligible Black jurors from his panel. The case reached the Supreme Court twice. In the second trip — Miller-El v. Dretke — the Court reversed 6–3, with Justice Souter's majority opinion conducting a detailed statistical and comparative analysis of the prosecutor's strikes. The Court found that 91% of eligible Black jurors had been struck, that prosecutors had used a "jury shuffle" tactic to move Black jurors to the back of the panel, and that the Dallas County DA's office had a documented training manual instructing prosecutors on how to exclude Black jurors. The case established that courts evaluating Batson claims must consider the totality of evidence, including side-by-side comparisons of struck and accepted jurors — the same analytical method at issue in Pitchford's case.

Curtis Flowers was tried six times for the 1996 murders of four people in a furniture store in Winona, Mississippi — all by the same prosecutor, Doug Evans. Across those six trials, Evans used peremptory strikes against 41 of 43 Black prospective jurors. The Supreme Court reversed Flowers's sixth conviction 7–2, with Justice Kavanaugh — the author of today's opinion — writing for the majority. The Court held that Evans's extensive history of striking Black jurors, considered cumulatively, was strong evidence of discriminatory intent. Flowers was released in 2020 after the State dropped all charges. The case is widely regarded as one of the most extreme documented examples of racially discriminatory jury selection in modern American law and was the subject of the investigative podcast "In the Dark."

Batson was a landmark 1986 decision that fundamentally changed jury selection in American courts. Before Batson, under Swain v. Alabama (1965), a defendant alleging racial discrimination in jury selection had to prove a systematic pattern of discrimination by the prosecutor across multiple cases — a burden so heavy it was virtually impossible to meet in practice. In Batson, Justice Powell's majority opinion held that the Equal Protection Clause prohibits prosecutors from using peremptory challenges to exclude jurors based on race, and that a defendant can establish a violation in a single case. The three-step framework created in Batson — prima facie case, race-neutral explanation, pretext determination — has since been extended to civil cases (Edmonson v. Leesville Concrete Co., 1991), defense peremptory challenges (Georgia v. McCollum, 1992), and gender-based strikes (J.E.B. v. Alabama, 1994).

A fair cross-section challenge is a distinct constitutional claim from Batson. While Batson addresses intentional discrimination by a prosecutor in exercising peremptory strikes (an Equal Protection Clause claim under the Fourteenth Amendment), a fair cross-section challenge addresses the composition of the jury pool itself (a Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury). Under Duren v. Missouri (1979), a defendant can challenge the jury selection system if a "distinctive group" in the community is systematically underrepresented in the pools from which juries are drawn. The two claims target different stages of jury selection: Duren addresses who is summoned to the courthouse; Batson addresses who is struck from the panel once there.

Habeas corpus (Latin for "you have the body") is a legal proceeding in which a person in custody challenges the lawfulness of their detention. Its origins trace to English common law and the Magna Carta, and it is protected by the U.S. Constitution's Suspension Clause (Article I, § 9, cl. 2). In American practice, federal habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 allows state prisoners who have exhausted their state court appeals to ask a federal court to review whether their conviction or sentence violates the Constitution. It is often called the "Great Writ" and serves as a critical check on state criminal justice systems — but since 1996, the scope of federal habeas review has been significantly narrowed by AEDPA.

"Prima facie" is Latin for "at first sight." A prima facie showing is the minimum quantum of evidence needed to raise an inference that something occurred, shifting the burden to the opposing party to respond. In the Batson context, it is intentionally a low threshold — the defendant does not need to prove discrimination at step one, only present enough to warrant an explanation. Common methods include a statistical argument (the prosecution struck jurors of one race at a disproportionate rate, which is what Pitchford used) or a comparative argument (struck jurors of one race were similar to accepted jurors of another).

In the American trial system, each side may remove a limited number of prospective jurors from the panel without giving any reason — these are "peremptory challenges" (or "strikes"). They exist alongside "for cause" challenges, which require the attorney to state a specific reason, such as demonstrated bias, and which the judge must approve. Before Batson, peremptory challenges were essentially unreviewable — a prosecutor could strike a juror for any reason or no reason at all. Batson created a constitutional exception: race cannot be the basis for a peremptory strike, even though the whole point of the peremptory is that no reason need be given.

The 6-2-1 alignment in this case is notable. Justice Barrett wrote for a six-Justice majority including all of the Court's Republican appointees. Justice Sotomayor, joined by Justice Kagan, concurred in the judgment only — meaning she agreed Fernandez should lose but disagreed with the majority's reasoning. Sotomayor would have affirmed on the narrower ground that compassionate release requires "changed circumstances" after sentencing, and Fernandez was simply rehashing arguments already considered and rejected. Justice Jackson dissented alone, arguing that the majority's habeas-based limitation is "atextual" and that § 3582(c)(1)(A) was designed as a "safety valve" for broad judicial discretion. The practical difference between the majority and concurrence matters: Sotomayor's rule would still allow conviction-related doubts to support compassionate release if based on genuinely new evidence discovered after sentencing, while the majority categorically bars such claims regardless of when the evidence emerges.

Rutherford is the companion case decided the same day as Fernandez, also addressing the scope of compassionate release under § 3582(c)(1)(A). While Fernandez addressed whether conviction-validity challenges can qualify as "extraordinary and compelling reasons," Rutherford addressed a broader question: whether the phrase "extraordinary and compelling reasons" gives courts essentially unlimited discretion to grant compassionate release for any reason. The Court rejected that reading, holding that the terms "extraordinary" and "compelling" impose meaningful limits and are not infinitely flexible. Rutherford also held that the Sentencing Commission exceeded its authority when it added "unusually long sentences" as a category of "extraordinary and compelling" reasons in a 2023 amendment. Together, Fernandez and Rutherford significantly narrow the scope of compassionate release as expanded by the First Step Act.

Strickland established the two-part test for claims of ineffective assistance of counsel under the Sixth Amendment. A defendant must show both (1) that counsel's performance was deficient — falling below an objective standard of reasonableness — and (2) that the deficient performance prejudiced the defense, meaning there is a reasonable probability the result would have been different but for counsel's errors. Courts apply a strong presumption that counsel's performance was adequate. The Strickland standard is notoriously difficult to meet, which is part of Fernandez's broader argument: he contended that legal claims too weak to satisfy Strickland or Brady under § 2255 could still count as "extraordinary and compelling reasons" for compassionate release — an argument the majority explicitly rejected.

The 7-2 circuit split on this question was unusually lopsided. The Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, Tenth, and D.C. Circuits all held that challenges to a conviction's validity cannot serve as "extraordinary and compelling reasons" for compassionate release. Only the First Circuit (in Trenkler, 2022) and the Ninth Circuit (in Roper, 2023) allowed conviction-related claims to be considered under § 3582(c)(1)(A). The Third and Eleventh Circuits had not squarely addressed the issue. Circuit splits are one of the primary reasons the Supreme Court grants certiorari, and a 7-2 split strongly suggested the Court would side with the majority of circuits — which it did.

Schlup established the "actual innocence gateway" — a procedural mechanism that allows a federal prisoner to overcome procedural bars to habeas review (such as procedural default or the statute of limitations) by making a credible showing of actual innocence. To pass through the Schlup gateway, a petitioner must show that "it is more likely than not that no reasonable juror would have convicted him in the light of the new evidence." This is not a freestanding claim of innocence — it is a procedural mechanism that allows a court to reach the merits of an otherwise barred constitutional claim. Fernandez argued in his compassionate release motion that he could satisfy the Schlup standard, attempting to invoke it outside the habeas context. The Court's opinion does not resolve whether a freestanding actual innocence claim — one without an underlying constitutional violation — can ever support habeas relief, a question left open since Herrera v. Collins (1993).

Davis was a 2019 Supreme Court decision that struck down the residual clause of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(3)(B) as unconstitutionally vague. Section 924(c) imposes mandatory consecutive sentences for using a firearm "during and in relation to" a "crime of violence." The residual clause defined "crime of violence" to include any felony that "by its nature, involves a substantial risk" of physical force — language the Court found too vague to satisfy due process. Davis followed a line of cases invalidating similar residual clauses, including Johnson v. United States (2015), which struck down the residual clause in the Armed Career Criminal Act. Fernandez's firearms conviction was vacated under Davis because the predicate offense did not qualify as a "crime of violence" under the surviving elements clause. This left only his murder-for-hire life sentence in place.

The federal murder-for-hire statute, 18 U.S.C. § 1958, criminalizes traveling in or using a facility of interstate commerce (including telephones) with the intent that a murder be committed in exchange for anything of pecuniary value. The statute requires proof that the defendant intended a killing-for-pay, not merely that a killing occurred. It carries a maximum penalty of death or life imprisonment if death results. In Fernandez's case, the prosecution alleged that members of a drug ring paid him $40,000 to serve as a backup shooter in a double homicide. The conviction on this charge produced the life sentence that remained after his firearms conviction was vacated — making it the only conviction standing between Fernandez and release.

The First Step Act was a bipartisan criminal justice reform law signed by President Trump in December 2018. Among its many provisions, it amended the compassionate release statute to allow prisoners to file their own motions for sentence reduction directly with the court, rather than relying on the Bureau of Prisons to file on their behalf. Before the Act, the BOP was the sole gatekeeper, and a 2013 Inspector General report found the agency was drastically underusing the provision — releasing an average of only 24 inmates per year. The Act also directed the Sentencing Commission to update its policy statements on what constitutes "extraordinary and compelling reasons" for release. The expansion led to a surge in compassionate release filings, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic, and raised the question at the center of this case: just how broadly do those "extraordinary and compelling reasons" reach?

Section 2255 is the primary vehicle for federal prisoners to collaterally attack their convictions after direct appeal has been exhausted. It is the federal-prisoner equivalent of 28 U.S.C. § 2254, which governs habeas petitions by state prisoners. The statute allows a federal prisoner to move the sentencing court to "vacate, set aside, or correct" a sentence imposed in violation of the Constitution or federal law. The procedural constraints the Court describes — a one-year statute of limitations, a general bar on second or successive motions, procedural default rules — were designed to balance the interest in finality against the need to correct fundamental errors. These constraints are at the heart of this case: Fernandez had already used and lost his § 2255 challenge, and the question was whether compassionate release could serve as an alternative path around those limits.

Brady v. Maryland established that the prosecution has a constitutional obligation under the Due Process Clause to disclose material evidence favorable to the defense. Evidence is "material" if there is a reasonable probability that disclosure would have changed the outcome of the proceeding. The doctrine covers three categories: exculpatory evidence, impeachment evidence, and evidence bearing on witness credibility. A Brady violation requires showing that (1) the evidence was favorable to the defendant, (2) the prosecution suppressed it, and (3) the suppression was prejudicial. Fernandez's recurring argument throughout this case was that the government's notes from interviewing Luis Rivera — a co-conspirator who allegedly denied driving the getaway car — should have been disclosed under Brady because they could have been used to impeach the star witness, Patrick Darge.

The four victims are identified in the indictment only by their initials. Their names are a matter of public record: Carlos Costa (C.C.), age 29, and Pablo Morales (P.M.), age 25, were aboard BTTR aircraft N2456S. Mario de la Peña (M.d.l.P.), age 24, and Armando Alejandre Jr. (A.A.), age 45, were aboard N5485S. Costa, Morales, and Alejandre were American citizens; de la Peña was a U.S. legal permanent resident. Alejandre was a decorated Vietnam-era U.S. Marine Corps veteran. The distinction between "nationals" and "citizens" in the indictment reflects legal terminology: all U.S. citizens are U.S. nationals, but not all nationals are citizens — permanent residents qualify as nationals for purposes of certain federal criminal statutes, including 18 U.S.C. § 2332.

Juan Pablo Roque was a Cuban military pilot who defected to the United States in 1992 by swimming to the U.S. Naval Base at Guantánamo Bay. He joined Brothers to the Rescue, became a visible member of the Miami exile community, and simultaneously offered himself to the FBI as an informant on Cuban exile groups — a role the FBI accepted, unaware that Roque was actually a Cuban intelligence agent reporting to the DI. On February 23, 1996 — the day before the shootdown — Roque left Miami for Cuba via a third country, as described in this indictment. The following day, he appeared on Cuban state television denouncing BTTR and the exile community. Roque had married a Cuban-American woman, Ana Margarita Martinez, as part of his cover; she later won a $27 million default judgment against Cuba under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996.

Section 1111(a) is the federal first-degree murder statute, which defines murder as the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought. First-degree murder — killing with premeditation — carries a maximum penalty of death or life imprisonment. Because these killings occurred over international waters rather than within any U.S. judicial district, the government invokes 18 U.S.C. § 3238, which provides that offenses committed outside the jurisdiction of any particular state or district may be prosecuted in the district where the offender is found, arrested, or first brought — or, if not found in the United States, in the District of Columbia. The Southern District of Florida is the venue here because the BTTR flights originated from Opa-Locka Airport in Miami-Dade County and several of the conspiracy's overt acts occurred there.

Section 32 criminalizes the willful destruction of aircraft and was originally enacted as part of federal aviation safety legislation. Subsection (a)(l) covers the destruction of any aircraft "in the special aircraft jurisdiction of the United States," which is defined in 49 U.S.C. § 46501(2) to include any civil aircraft of the United States wherever it may be located worldwide. Because the BTTR Cessnas were U.S.-registered civilian aircraft (bearing N-numbers N2506, N2456S, and N5485S), they fell within this jurisdiction even though they were destroyed over international waters. Section 34 provides enhanced penalties when death results from aircraft destruction. This combination of statutes gives U.S. courts jurisdiction over the destruction of any American-registered aircraft anywhere in the world, regardless of who destroyed it.

The BTTR aircraft were Cessna 337 Skymasters — small, twin-engine propeller planes designed for civilian use, with a maximum speed of approximately 200 mph and no weapons or defensive systems. The Cuban MiGs were Soviet-designed military fighter jets (likely MiG-23s or MiG-29s) capable of speeds exceeding 1,500 mph and armed with air-to-air missiles. The speed and armament disparity was enormous — the Cessnas had no capacity to evade or defend against a military jet attack. Under the International Civil Aviation Organization's (ICAO) rules, military aircraft intercepting civilian planes are required to follow specific procedures, including visual signals and radio contact, before taking any hostile action. The ICAO investigation into the shootdown concluded that Cuba failed to follow these procedures and used excessive force against civilian aircraft that posed no military threat.

Concilio Cubano (Cuban Council) was an umbrella coalition of more than 100 dissident organizations inside Cuba, including human rights groups, independent journalists, and pro-democracy activists. It was founded in October 1995 and represented the broadest organized opposition to the Castro government since the revolution. The group had applied for official permission to hold a national meeting on February 24, 1996 — the same date as the BTTR shootdown. The Castro regime denied the application, arrested over 100 Concilio members in the days before the meeting, and effectively dismantled the organization. The timing is significant: the indictment alleges that the regime's suppression of Concilio Cubano and the shootdown of BTTR were coordinated responses to the same perceived threat — a convergence of internal dissent and external exile activism.

The sinking of the 13 de Marzo on July 13, 1994 is one of the most documented human rights atrocities of the Castro era. Approximately 72 people — including women, children, and elderly passengers — boarded the old wooden tugboat in Havana Harbor in an attempt to flee Cuba. Cuban government vessels pursued the tugboat into open water and rammed it repeatedly while using high-pressure water hoses on the passengers. At least 37 people drowned, including 10 children — the youngest was six months old. The Cuban government claimed the sinking was an accident, but survivors and international human rights organizations, including the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, concluded it was a deliberate attack on civilians. The incident occurred six weeks before the 1994 Maleconazo protests also referenced in this indictment.

The 24th parallel north runs roughly between Key West, Florida and Havana, Cuba. The 1977 U.S.-Cuba maritime boundary agreement established it as the dividing line between each nation's search-and-rescue and flight information regions. The parallel is critical to this indictment because it establishes that the BTTR aircraft were shot down in international waters and airspace — not in Cuban territorial space. Cuba's territorial waters and airspace extend only 12 nautical miles from its coast, well south of the 24th parallel. The indictment alleges the shootdown occurred north of the 24th parallel, meaning the aircraft were not only outside Cuban territory but outside even the operational zone where Cuba had notification rights. Under international law, shooting down civilian aircraft in international airspace is a violation of the Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation (1944), to which Cuba is a signatory.

Section 2332 is part of the federal criminal code's terrorism chapter (Chapter 113B). It criminalizes killing or conspiring to kill U.S. nationals while they are outside the United States. The statute was enacted as part of the Omnibus Diplomatic Security and Antiterrorism Act of 1986, largely in response to terrorist attacks against Americans abroad. Subsection (b)(2) covers conspiracy and carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment. The statute gives the United States extraterritorial jurisdiction — meaning U.S. courts can prosecute foreign nationals for acts committed entirely outside U.S. territory, provided the victims were U.S. nationals. This is the jurisdictional hook for charging the Cuban defendants, who were in Cuba at the time of the shootdown.

The "03" prefix indicates this case was originally filed in 2003 — seven years after the shootdown. The original indictment in this case number charged members of the Wasp Network spy ring, not the military and political leaders named here. This 2026 superseding indictment represents a dramatic expansion of the case, adding Raul Castro himself and the Cuban MiG pilots who carried out and supported the shootdown. The timing coincides with a shift in U.S.-Cuba relations: the Obama-era diplomatic normalization (2014–2016) had made such charges politically unlikely, while subsequent administrations took a harder line. Charging a former head of state with murder in a U.S. federal court is extraordinarily rare and raises significant questions of sovereign immunity and enforceability, though U.S. law does not recognize immunity for acts that violate international law.

The Wasp Network was a Cuban intelligence operation that placed agents throughout South Florida's Cuban exile community in the 1990s. The network's penetration of BTTR was central to the shootdown: Cuban spies provided the flight plans and operational details that allowed the military to prepare. In September 1998, the FBI arrested ten members of the network, five of whom — Gerardo Hernandez, Ramón Labañino, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando González, and René González — were convicted in 2001 in what became internationally known as the "Cuban Five" case. Hernandez was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder for his role in facilitating the BTTR shootdown. All five were eventually returned to Cuba: three in a December 2014 prisoner exchange that also secured the release of U.S. contractor Alan Gross, and two who had previously completed their sentences. The case was the subject of a 2019 Netflix film, "Wasp Network."

Brothers to the Rescue was founded in 1991 by José Basulto, a Cuban exile, Bay of Pigs veteran, and pilot. The organization operated out of Opa-Locka Airport in Miami-Dade County, Florida. At its peak, BTTR had dozens of volunteer pilots and several Cessna Skymaster aircraft. The group is credited with saving thousands of Cuban rafters in the Florida Straits during the 1990s migration crisis. After the 1994 U.S.-Cuba migration agreements reduced the flow of rafters, BTTR shifted its focus toward supporting pro-democracy movements inside Cuba, including the leaflet drops described in this indictment. Basulto was piloting the third BTTR aircraft on February 24, 1996 — the one that escaped destruction.

This indictment was brought jointly by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Michigan and the Organized Crime and Gang Section (OCGS) of the Department of Justice's Criminal Division in Washington, D.C. The involvement of "Main Justice" — as DOJ headquarters prosecutors are commonly called — in a local U.S. Attorney's case signals that the department viewed this as a priority prosecution. OCGS specializes in RICO and enterprise-theory cases and provides experienced trial attorneys to support complex organized crime prosecutions nationwide. Barbara McQuade, the U.S. Attorney whose name appears on the indictment, served as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan from 2010 to 2017 and was the first Arab-American woman to serve in that role. She is now a professor at the University of Michigan Law School and a legal commentator.

RICO's definition of "racketeering activity" in 18 U.S.C. § 1961(1) includes not only federal offenses but also certain state crimes — specifically, any act "chargeable" under state law and punishable by imprisonment for more than one year that involves murder, kidnapping, gambling, arson, robbery, bribery, extortion, or dealing in controlled substances, among others. This is how the government converts what would otherwise be state-level armed robberies into federal RICO predicates. MCL 750.529 is Michigan's armed robbery statute (a life felony), and 750.530 covers unarmed robbery. By incorporating these state offenses, the federal government can prosecute a multi-state robbery spree as a single coordinated RICO enterprise rather than leaving each robbery to be prosecuted separately in whatever state it occurred.

Publicdata.com is a commercial data aggregation service that compiles public records — including property records, vehicle registrations, voter rolls, and other government filings — into a searchable database. It is commonly used by skip tracers, private investigators, and debt collectors. The allegation that Castro obtained a subscription to this service is significant because it shows how the enterprise identified its targets: by searching public records databases, likely filtering by indicators associated with the demographic groups the enterprise targeted, such as surnames associated with South Asian or East Asian ancestry cross-referenced with property ownership records indicating higher-value residences.

This phrase tracks the statutory language of 18 U.S.C. § 1959(a) and is the motive element the government must prove for a VCAR conviction. The government does not need to prove that the defendant's sole or even primary motive was to advance in the enterprise — only that it was one of the defendant's purposes. Courts have held that the motive requirement is satisfied when committing the violent act was, in effect, part of the "job" — that is, the defendant committed the violence as part of carrying out the enterprise's activities, which inherently served to maintain the defendant's position within it. This is a relatively low bar compared to proving, for example, that an assault was committed specifically to earn a promotion within the organization.

Section 924(c) is one of the most consequential charging tools in federal criminal law. It imposes mandatory minimum sentences that must run consecutively to — not concurrently with — any other sentence. For brandishing a firearm (as alleged in several counts here), the mandatory minimum is 7 years. Critically, at the time this indictment was filed in 2015, a "second or subsequent" § 924(c) conviction in the same case triggered a 25-year mandatory consecutive minimum. This indictment contains four § 924(c) counts. Under the law as it existed in 2015, conviction on all four would have produced a mandatory minimum of 82 years (7 + 25 + 25 + 25) on the firearms counts alone, before adding any time for the RICO or VCAR convictions. The First Step Act of 2018 later changed this stacking rule so that the 25-year enhancement applies only when the defendant has a prior final § 924(c) conviction, but that reform was not retroactive to cases already sentenced before its enactment.

This is a charge under 18 U.S.C. § 1959, a statute separate from RICO itself. While RICO (§ 1962) criminalizes conducting an enterprise's affairs through racketeering, § 1959 criminalizes committing specific violent crimes "for the purpose of gaining entrance to or maintaining or increasing position in" a racketeering enterprise. The distinction matters: RICO requires proving a "pattern" of racketeering activity, while § 1959 can be charged based on a single violent act, provided the motive was to advance the defendant's position in the enterprise. Subsection (a)(3) covers assault with a dangerous weapon, which carries a maximum of 20 years imprisonment. The most serious subsection, (a)(1), covers murder and carries a potential death sentence or life imprisonment.

The indictment identifies racial targeting as part of the enterprise's method of operation but does not charge any federal hate crime offenses. The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act (18 U.S.C. § 249), enacted in 2009, criminalizes willful bodily injury motivated by the victim's race or national origin. One reason hate crime charges may not have been pursued here is that the racial targeting appears to have been instrumental — based on a belief that these families kept cash and jewelry in their homes — rather than motivated by racial animus. Federal hate crime law requires proof that the offense was committed "because of" the victim's protected characteristic, and courts have distinguished between selecting victims for perceived wealth associated with a demographic group and selecting them out of racial hostility.

This is a legal term of art under RICO. An "association-in-fact enterprise" does not require a formal organizational structure — no charter, bylaws, hierarchy chart, or official name. The Supreme Court held in Boyle v. United States (2009) that the government need only prove three things: a common purpose, relationships among the participants, and enough structure for the group to function as a "continuing unit." This is a lower bar than proving a formal organization and is why RICO can reach loosely organized criminal groups like the one alleged here, not just traditional organized crime families with formal ranks.

Section 2 is the federal aiding and abetting statute. It provides that anyone who "aids, abets, counsels, commands, induces, or procures" the commission of a federal offense is punishable as a principal — meaning they face the same penalties as the person who physically committed the crime. Its inclusion here is what allows the government to charge Chaka Castro — who the indictment alleges organized and directed the robberies from Texas but did not personally enter any of the victims' homes — with the same assault and firearms counts as the crew members who carried out the robberies on the ground.

RICO — the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act — was enacted in 1970 as Title IX of the Organized Crime Control Act. It was originally designed to combat the Mafia's infiltration of legitimate businesses, but prosecutors have since applied it far more broadly to any "enterprise" engaged in a "pattern of racketeering activity" (at least two related predicate acts within ten years). Section 1962(d) criminalizes conspiracy to violate RICO, meaning the government need not prove each defendant personally committed two predicate acts — only that they agreed to participate in an enterprise that would. RICO conspiracy carries a maximum penalty of 20 years imprisonment per count, and conviction subjects a defendant to mandatory forfeiture of any proceeds or property derived from the racketeering activity.

Boyle v. United Technologies Corp., 487 U.S. 500 (1988), is the foundational case for what became known as the "government contractor defense." It involved a Marine helicopter copilot, Lieutenant David Boyle, who drowned when his CH-53D Sea Stallion helicopter crashed into the ocean off the coast of Virginia. Boyle was unable to escape because the helicopter's emergency escape hatch opened outward rather than inward, trapping him as water pressure held the door shut. His father sued the manufacturer, Sikorsky Aircraft. The Supreme Court held 5–4 that state tort claims against military equipment manufacturers are preempted when three conditions are met: (1) the United States approved reasonably precise specifications for the equipment, (2) the equipment conformed to those specifications, and (3) the contractor warned the government about known dangers in the equipment. The key distinction the Court draws in Hencely is that Boyle involved a procurement contract — a product built to government specifications — while Fluor had a performance contract for services and allegedly departed from its military instructions rather than following them.

"Afghan First" was a Department of Defense contracting policy launched around 2010 as part of General David Petraeus's counterinsurgency (COIN) strategy in Afghanistan. It required military contractors performing base support services — construction, maintenance, food service, logistics — to prioritize hiring local Afghan nationals rather than importing third-country workers. The theory was that providing employment to military-age Afghan men would reduce Taliban recruitment by offering a financial alternative to insurgency. The program reflected the broader COIN doctrine that economic development was as critical as military operations to long-term stability. The tension at the heart of this case — that the program required hiring locals who were inherently harder to vet than credentialed foreign workers — is a direct consequence of that policy choice.

Todd Blanche served as President Trump's lead criminal defense attorney in two major cases: the Manhattan DA's prosecution (People v. Trump, 2023–2024) in which Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts, and the federal classified documents case (United States v. Trump, S.D. Fla.). Trump nominated Blanche as Deputy Attorney General in November 2024; the Senate confirmed him in March 2025. After Trump dismissed Attorney General Pam Bondi in April 2026, Blanche became Acting Attorney General. His dual role — having served as Trump's personal defense lawyer and now leading the Justice Department that is party to this settlement — has drawn scrutiny from legal ethics observers and members of Congress.

This case was a $10 billion lawsuit filed by President Trump, Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump, and the Trump Organization against the Internal Revenue Service in the Southern District of Florida. The suit alleged that the IRS's leak of Trump's tax returns to journalists — which resulted in their publication by The New York Times and ProPublica — caused massive damages. Rather than proceed to a ruling on the merits, the plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed the suit with prejudice on May 19, 2026, in exchange for the creation of this $1.776 billion Anti-Weaponization Fund and a formal apology. The plaintiffs received no direct monetary damages. Ninety-three House Democrats filed an amicus brief seeking to block the settlement, arguing it constituted unprecedented self-dealing by a sitting president suing his own administration.

Koski v. Republican National Committee was a companion case to this one, filed by different plaintiffs who argued that the Court should rule on the constitutionality of the proposed amendment before the referendum took place — that is, before voters spent time and resources on a potentially invalid vote. The Court ruled against the Koski claimants on this timing question, holding that under Scott v. James, judicial review had to wait until after the vote. The significance here is procedural: the Commonwealth successfully argued in Koski that the Court must wait, then after the vote attempted to argue that the results should carry weight — a position the Court called out directly at oral argument and rejected.

The Purcell principle derives from Purcell v. Gonzalez, 549 U.S. 1 (2006), a per curiam U.S. Supreme Court decision holding that federal courts should generally not change election rules close to an election. The principle is not a rigid rule but a prudential doctrine: courts should weigh the risk that last-minute judicial changes will cause voter confusion, administrative chaos, or undermine public confidence in election results. The principle has become increasingly important in election litigation and has been invoked by the Supreme Court to stay or vacate lower court orders in numerous cases, including in the 2020 and 2024 election cycles. The dissent argues that the Fourth and Eleventh Circuit opinions cited by the majority were using “election is happening right now” as Purcell-style rhetoric — not as literal statements about when an election begins.

To put this in perspective: in the 2024 congressional elections, Virginia voters split roughly 51%–47% between the two major parties statewide. Under the court-drawn nonpartisan maps, this translated to a 6–5 congressional delegation — close to proportional representation. Under the proposed replacement maps, that same electorate would have been expected to produce a 10–1 delegation, meaning a party with approximately 51% of the statewide vote would control approximately 91% of the seats. The Princeton Gerrymandering Project gave Virginia’s existing court-drawn maps an overall “A” grade for fairness; the proposed replacement maps were drawn by the legislature without the Redistricting Commission’s involvement.

Virginia is one of approximately 15 states that require proposed constitutional amendments to pass the legislature in two separate sessions with an intervening election. The requirement dates to the 1870 Virginia Constitution and was retained in the 1902, 1928, and 1971 constitutions. The purpose is to build a cooling-off period into the amendment process: after the legislature first proposes an amendment, voters get a chance to weigh in indirectly by supporting or defeating legislators who back or oppose it. Only after that electoral check does the legislature vote a second time. If it passes again, the amendment goes to voters for a direct up-or-down vote. The entire dispute in this case turns on whether that intervening “election” means only Election Day or the full period during which voters cast ballots.

Virginia voters approved this constitutional amendment in November 2020 with approximately 66% of the vote. The amendment created a 16-member bipartisan commission — eight legislators (four from each party) and eight citizen members — to draw congressional and state legislative district maps after each decennial census. If the commission deadlocked, the Virginia Supreme Court would draw the maps instead. The amendment was the product of a multi-year bipartisan campaign supported by groups across the political spectrum, including OneVirginia2021 and the League of Women Voters. The proposed amendment at issue in this case would temporarily suspend this provision to allow the General Assembly to draw new congressional districts without the commission’s involvement.

Coleman v. Pross is the leading Virginia case on the standard for amending the state constitution. It established that “strict compliance” — not merely substantial compliance — with the Article XII, Section 1 amendment procedures is constitutionally required. The case arose from a challenge to a proposed constitutional amendment on judicial retirement and held that the procedural requirements exist to ensure that amendments receive “the deliberate consideration and careful scrutiny that they deserve.” The strict-compliance standard is significant because it forecloses a harmless-error argument: the Commonwealth cannot argue that the procedural violation didn’t matter because the amendment would have passed anyway.

Foster v. Love was a U.S. Supreme Court case challenging Louisiana’s “open primary” system, in which all candidates for Congress ran on a single ballot in October — before the federal election day in November — and any candidate receiving a majority was declared elected without appearing on the November ballot. The Supreme Court struck down this system, holding that federal law requires that the “combined actions of voters and officials meant to make a final selection of an officeholder” take place on the federally designated election day. Both the majority and dissent in this Virginia case rely heavily on Foster’s “combined actions” definition of election, but draw opposite conclusions from it.

Scott v. James is a 1912 Virginia Supreme Court decision that established the timing rules for judicial review of constitutional amendments. The case held that courts cannot enjoin or interfere with the constitutional amendment process while it is still ongoing — but that once the process is complete, courts have both the power and the duty to review whether proper procedures were followed. This case became the central procedural battleground in the present litigation: the Commonwealth successfully argued before the election that Scott required the Court to wait until after the vote. Having won that argument, the Commonwealth then tried to argue after the vote that the election results should insulate the amendment from judicial review — a position the Court pointedly rejected.

Rucho is the U.S. Supreme Court decision that makes this entire case possible. In a 5–4 ruling written by Chief Justice Roberts, the Court held that partisan gerrymandering claims present “political questions” beyond the reach of federal courts. The majority concluded that there are no judicially manageable standards for determining when partisan gerrymandering goes “too far.” The opinion quotes Justice Kagan’s dissent — but it was the majority holding that matters here. By closing the federal courthouse door to gerrymandering challenges, Rucho left the issue entirely to the states. That is why this dispute is in the Supreme Court of Virginia rather than a federal court, and why the 2020 Virginia Redistricting Commission amendment was adopted in the first place.

George Wythe (1726–1806) was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, a delegate to the Constitutional Convention, and the first law professor in the United States, holding the Chair of Law and Police at the College of William & Mary. His students included Thomas Jefferson, John Marshall, and Henry Clay. The opinion’s point is that Wythe exercised judicial review — the power of courts to strike down legislation that violates the constitution — in Commonwealth v. Caton (1782), two full decades before Marshall’s more famous articulation of the same principle in Marbury v. Madison (1803). By invoking Wythe, the Court is grounding its authority in a Virginia tradition older than the federal one.

A.E. Dick Howard is the Warner-Booker Distinguished Professor of International Law at the University of Virginia School of Law and one of the most important figures in Virginia constitutional history. He served as the executive director of the commission that drafted Virginia’s current (1971) Constitution and subsequently authored the authoritative two-volume “Commentaries on the Constitution of Virginia” (1974). Because Howard was the principal architect of the 1971 Constitution — including Article XII, Section 1 at issue in this case — his scholarly writings about its provisions carry particular weight as evidence of the framers’ intent. He is cited six times in this opinion.

An “if-by-whiskey” argument is a rhetorical technique in which a speaker takes both sides of an issue depending on how a key term is framed. The name comes from a 1952 speech by Mississippi state legislator Noah “Soggy” Sweat Jr., who was asked whether he supported or opposed prohibiting whiskey. He responded by saying that if by whiskey you mean the devil’s brew that destroys families, he was against it — but if by whiskey you mean the oil of conversation and the drink enjoyed in good fellowship, he was for it. The Court is suggesting that gerrymandering’s defenders use the same technique: condemning gerrymandering in the abstract while defending it when their own party benefits.

The Yoshida litigation is the closest historical precedent for this case. In 1974, Yoshida International (a Japanese zipper manufacturer) challenged Nixon’s 10% import surcharge in the U.S. Customs Court. The trial court struck it down, holding that the Trading with the Enemy Act did not authorize peacetime tariffs and warning that reading it to do so would be “an abdication by the Congress of its constitutional power.” On appeal, the Court of Customs and Patent Appeals reversed — but included a remarkable passage acknowledging that such broad power “may be considered unwise, or even dangerous, should it come into the hands of an unscrupulous, rampant President.” The appeals court also explicitly noted that any surcharge imposed after January 3, 1975, would need to comply with the newly enacted Section 122, not TWEA. Congress enacted Section 122 while the Yoshida appeal was pending, in part to ensure that any future emergency surcharge would have a proper — and constrained — legal basis.

Ultra vires is a Latin legal term meaning “beyond the powers.” When a court holds that government action is ultra vires, it means the official acted outside the scope of authority granted by law. Here, the court is holding that President Trump exceeded the authority Congress delegated in Section 122 because the Proclamation identifies current account and trade deficits rather than balance-of-payments deficits as Congress defined them in 1974. This is a narrower ruling than a constitutional holding: the court is not saying the President lacks the constitutional power to impose tariffs generally, but rather that this particular tariff action does not satisfy the specific statutory preconditions Congress set. The distinction matters because an ultra vires ruling can potentially be cured — if the President could identify balance-of-payments deficits under the 1974 metrics, Section 122 could theoretically still be used.

These are three methods of measuring the balance of payments that were standard in the 1960s and 1970s but have since been discontinued by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The liquidity balance measured changes in U.S. reserve assets and all liquid liabilities to foreigners — tracking whether the U.S. was running down its liquid reserves. The official settlements balance measured changes in reserve assets and liabilities to foreign central banks and governments — tracking whether foreign governments were accumulating dollars they might demand be converted to gold. The basic balance summed the current account with long-term capital flows, attempting to separate durable economic trends from volatile short-term money movements. All three were designed for a world of fixed exchange rates. When fixed rates ended, these measurements lost their practical significance, and the BEA stopped reporting them. This obsolescence is the crux of the case: the majority holds the President must identify deficits using these 1974 metrics; the dissent argues that requirement effectively repeals the statute.

This is a crucial technical point that drives much of the legal dispute. The balance of payments is a comprehensive ledger of all economic transactions between a country and the rest of the world. It has three main components: the current account (trade in goods and services, income, and transfers), the capital account (small, mostly debt forgiveness), and the financial account (investment flows — stocks, bonds, direct investment, bank deposits, and reserve assets). By accounting convention, these three accounts must sum to zero: every dollar that flows out through imports or investment abroad must be matched by a dollar flowing in through exports, foreign investment, or debt. When people say a country has a “balance-of-payments deficit,” they are referring to a deficit in one component (like the current account), not the overall balance. The entire case hinges on which component Congress meant when it said “balance-of-payments deficits” in 1974.

This set of actions, announced on August 15, 1971, in a televised address, is commonly known as the “Nixon Shock.” It was one of the most consequential unilateral economic actions in modern American history. Nixon acted without consulting international partners or Congress, and the 10% import surcharge was imposed under the Trading with the Enemy Act — a World War I–era statute that had never been used for peacetime trade policy. The surcharge remained in effect for about four months, until the Smithsonian Agreement in December 1971 established new fixed exchange rates and the surcharge was lifted. The Nixon surcharge is the direct historical precedent for the Section 122 tariff at issue here: Congress enacted Section 122 in part to create a proper legal framework for the kind of emergency import surcharge Nixon had imposed without clear statutory authority.

The Bretton Woods system was the international monetary order established by 44 Allied nations at a conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, in July 1944. Under the system, participating countries pegged their currencies to the U.S. dollar at fixed exchange rates, and the U.S. guaranteed convertibility of the dollar into gold at $35 per ounce. This made the dollar the world’s reserve currency and gave the concept of “balance-of-payments deficits” concrete operational meaning: if a country ran persistent deficits, it would lose gold or foreign currency reserves, creating a genuine payments crisis. When this system collapsed in 1971–73 and was replaced by floating exchange rates — where currency values are set by markets rather than fixed by governments — the mechanics of balance-of-payments adjustment changed fundamentally. This shift is the central factual backdrop for the entire legal dispute in this case.

Trump v. CASA, Inc., 606 U.S. 831 (2025), is the Supreme Court decision that cast doubt on the power of federal courts to issue “universal” or “nationwide” injunctions — court orders that block enforcement of a government policy not just as to the parties before the court, but as to everyone. The Court held that Article III limits federal courts to redressing injuries to the parties, suggesting that injunctions should be tailored to the plaintiffs who have standing. This is why the CIT limits its injunction to the three importer plaintiffs (Washington, Burlap and Barrel, and Basic Fun) rather than blocking collection of the Section 122 tariffs from all importers. The practical consequence: other importers seeking relief from Section 122 duties would need to file their own suits or await a definitive appellate ruling.

The nondelegation doctrine holds that Congress cannot delegate its legislative power to the executive branch without providing an “intelligible principle” to guide the executive’s discretion. The doctrine derives from Article I of the Constitution, which vests “all legislative Powers” in Congress. Although the Supreme Court has not struck down a statute on nondelegation grounds since 1935, multiple current Justices have expressed interest in reinvigorating the doctrine. The court’s invocation here is strategic: it uses the constitutional avoidance canon to justify a narrower reading of Section 122 — reasoning that if the President could choose any sub-account of the balance of payments to identify a “deficit,” the statute would arguably lack an intelligible principle, creating a constitutional question the court prefers to avoid by adopting the narrower interpretation.

Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo (2024) is the Supreme Court decision that overruled Chevron deference — the 40-year-old doctrine under which courts deferred to an agency’s reasonable interpretation of an ambiguous statute it administered. After Loper Bright, courts must exercise their own “independent judgment” in determining the meaning of statutes, rather than deferring to the executive branch’s reading. Although Chevron deference did not directly apply to Presidential (as opposed to agency) interpretations of statutes, the CIT majority cites Loper Bright repeatedly to reinforce the court’s duty to independently interpret what “balance-of-payments deficits” means in Section 122 — rather than accepting the President’s reading.

Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, 146 S. Ct. 628 (2026), was decided by the Supreme Court on February 20, 2026 — the same day President Trump signed the Section 122 Proclamation challenged in this case. The Court held that IEEPA does not authorize the imposition of tariffs, finding that Congress’s grants of tariff power are made through specific, carefully constrained statutes — not through a general emergency powers law. The majority opinion, written by Chief Justice Roberts, stated that “the President enjoys no inherent authority to impose tariffs during peacetime” and that “when Congress grants the power to impose tariffs, it does so clearly and with careful constraints.” The CIT majority relies heavily on these same separation-of-powers principles to interpret Section 122’s constraints narrowly.

IEEPA (50 U.S.C. §§ 1701–1708) is a 1977 statute that grants the President broad authority to regulate international commerce during a declared national emergency. It was originally designed for economic sanctions — freezing foreign assets, blocking transactions with hostile regimes — and had been used extensively for that purpose by every President since Carter. In 2025, President Trump invoked IEEPA for the first time to impose tariffs, beginning with duties on imports from China, Canada, and Mexico, and eventually expanding to a broad “reciprocal tariff” regime. The Supreme Court struck down the IEEPA tariffs in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump on February 20, 2026 — the same day President Trump signed the Section 122 Proclamation at issue in this case. The Section 122 tariffs are widely understood as the administration’s replacement authority after losing the IEEPA tariff power.

Section 122 had never been invoked by any President in the roughly 50 years between its enactment in January 1975 and Proclamation No. 11012 in February 2026. This makes the current case the first judicial interpretation of the statute’s key terms. The provision was one of several tariff authorities Congress created or modified in the Trade Act of 1974, a comprehensive overhaul of U.S. trade law enacted during a period of severe economic disruption — the collapse of the Bretton Woods monetary system, the OPEC oil embargo, and stagflation. Other provisions of the same statute, including Section 301 (unfair trade practices), have been used frequently. Section 122’s half-century of dormancy is central to both sides’ arguments: Plaintiffs argue it proves the statute’s conditions cannot be met in a modern floating-exchange-rate economy; the Government argues that long nonuse does not equal repeal.

Burlap and Barrel was founded in 2016 by Ethan Frisch and Ori Zohar. The company sources spices directly from small-scale farmers in countries across Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America, and sells them primarily through its website and specialty retailers. Its business model — importing relatively small quantities of high-value goods from many countries — makes it acutely sensitive to across-the-board tariffs because it cannot easily shift sourcing to domestic suppliers (the U.S. does not produce most of the spices it sells) and because even a 10% surcharge across 22 countries of origin compounds quickly.

The U.S. Court of International Trade (CIT) is a specialized Article III federal court based in New York City with exclusive nationwide jurisdiction over civil actions involving international trade and customs law — including challenges to tariffs, duties, and trade remedy determinations. It was established in 1980 as the successor to the U.S. Customs Court (which itself traced back to the Board of General Appraisers, created in 1890). The CIT has nine judges, appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate, who serve lifetime terms. Appeals from the CIT go to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and from there to the Supreme Court. Because of its exclusive jurisdiction over tariff disputes, the CIT has become the primary judicial forum for challenges to the trade policies of the current administration.

Public reporting by Reuters and others has identified Law Firm A as Goodwin Procter LLP, a major corporate law firm founded in 1912 and headquartered in Boston. Goodwin is consistently ranked among the top firms globally by revenue and is particularly prominent in private equity, technology M&A, and life sciences work. The firm publicly represented iRobot in its acquisition by Amazon — one of the two deals at issue in this indictment — which matches the indictment’s description. Goodwin itself is a victim in this case, not a defendant.

CC-1 has been publicly identified as Nicolo Nourafchan, a Yale Law School graduate who worked at several major law firms — including Sidley Austin, Latham & Watkins, and Goodwin Procter — from 2013 to 2023. Nicolo was charged in a separate, related indictment (also unsealed on May 6, 2026) as the central figure in a broader insider trading scheme spanning nearly a decade and involving more than a dozen M&A transactions. The DOJ charged 30 people total across the two indictments. This indictment covers the downstream trading network that received tips originating from Nicolo through his brother Lorenzo and an intermediary (CC-2). CC-1 is not a named defendant here because he was charged separately.

The indictment charges two separate conspiracy counts for what appears to be the same underlying scheme. This is not redundant — the two statutes have different elements and serve different purposes. Section 1349 is a conspiracy provision specific to securities fraud under 18 U.S.C. § 1348; it requires only an agreement to commit securities fraud and does not require prosecutors to prove an overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy. Section 371, charged in Count Two, is the general federal conspiracy statute; it does require proof of at least one overt act, but it carries a lower maximum penalty (five years versus twenty-five years under § 1349). Prosecutors routinely charge both to ensure at least one conviction survives if the other count is challenged on appeal. The practical difference for defendants is sentencing exposure: § 1349 carries the same maximum as the underlying securities fraud (25 years), while § 371 caps at five years.

Rule 10b-5 is the most important antifraud provision in securities law. Adopted by the SEC in 1942, it prohibits fraud and deception in connection with the purchase or sale of any security. Despite being a regulation rather than a statute, it has become the primary legal basis for insider trading enforcement — even though the rule never actually mentions “insider trading” by name. The SEC and DOJ developed the insider trading prohibition through decades of case law applying 10b-5’s broad antifraud language. Count Four charges a violation of 10b-5 directly (through the Securities Exchange Act, 15 U.S.C. § 78j(b)), while Count Three charges a parallel violation under the broader federal securities fraud statute (18 U.S.C. § 1348), which was added by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002 and does not require proof of a “manipulative or deceptive device.”

Large law firms use document management systems (commonly iManage or NetDocuments) to store all deal-related documents — merger agreements, board presentations, fairness opinions, and other materials that contain MNPI. These systems are supposed to have “ethical walls” (also called “information barriers”) that restrict access to deal documents to only those attorneys staffed on that matter. The indictment’s emphasis that this “was a deal that CC-1 did not work on” signals that CC-1 deliberately accessed documents outside his authorized scope — meaning either the information barriers failed or CC-1 circumvented them. The SEC’s related complaint alleges that Nicolo Nourafchan searched the document management system using keywords and viewed documents in preview or read-only mode to minimize his electronic footprint.

iRobot is best known as the maker of the Roomba robotic vacuum. Amazon announced the acquisition on August 5, 2022, at a price of $61 per share — a roughly 22% premium over iRobot’s prior closing price — valuing the company at approximately $1.7 billion. However, the acquisition was never completed: Amazon terminated the deal in January 2024 after the European Commission indicated it would block the transaction on antitrust grounds. iRobot’s stock, which had surged on the announcement, subsequently collapsed. The company later laid off a substantial portion of its workforce. The defendants who traded on the MNPI would have profited by purchasing iRobot securities before the August 5 announcement and selling into the price spike.

“Vista” refers to Vista Equity Partners, one of the largest technology-focused private equity firms in the world, founded by Robert F. Smith in 2000 and based in Austin, Texas. Vista manages over $100 billion in assets and specializes in taking publicly traded enterprise software companies private. KnowBe4 is a cybersecurity company that provides security awareness training and simulated phishing platforms. Vista’s acquisition of KnowBe4 was announced on October 12, 2022, at $24.90 per share, valuing the company at roughly $4.6 billion. Unlike the iRobot deal, this acquisition closed successfully in February 2023. Notably, Law Firm A represented an investment bank advising a special committee of KnowBe4’s board — not KnowBe4 itself — meaning the MNPI originated from advisory work one step removed from the target company.

Material non-public information is the central concept in insider trading law. Information is “material” if a reasonable investor would consider it important in deciding whether to buy or sell a security — pending merger announcements are the textbook example, because they almost always cause significant price movement. Information is “non-public” if it has not been disseminated broadly enough for the market to absorb it. Trading while in possession of MNPI is not itself illegal; what makes it illegal is trading on MNPI that was obtained through a breach of a duty of trust or confidence. This is the “misappropriation theory” of insider trading, established by the Supreme Court in United States v. O’Hagan (1997). Here, the duty was owed by CC-1 to his employer (Law Firm A) and its clients.

The indictment charges two different types of lying to the government, and the distinction matters. Counts Six through Eight charge Milik, Rudela, and Vinski under 18 U.S.C. § 1001(a)(2) — the general false statements statute — for lying to FBI agents during interviews. Those statements were not made under oath; § 1001 criminalizes any materially false statement to any branch of the federal government. Count Eleven charges Makary under 18 U.S.C. § 1623(a) for lying under oath before a grand jury. Section 1623 is narrower (it applies only to testimony under oath in federal court proceedings) but carries a unique defense: a witness can avoid conviction by recanting the false testimony before it substantially affects the proceeding. No such recantation defense exists under § 1001. Both statutes carry maximum penalties of five years imprisonment.

The use of coded language is significant for two reasons. First, it is powerful evidence of “consciousness of guilt” — a legal concept meaning that the defendants’ own efforts to conceal their conduct demonstrate they knew it was illegal. If the trading were legitimate, there would be no need for code words. Second, the specific code is visible throughout the indictment’s overt acts: CC-2 messaged L. Nourafchan “Good morning coffee” (paragraph 51) and “Coffee tomorrow” (paragraph 66), and after the KnowBe4 announcement, “Coffee was Very good this morning” (paragraph 71). The SEC’s related complaint reveals additional coded language in the broader scheme, including references to stock tips as airline “flights” and deal dates as when a “rabbi” was scheduled for “surgery.” Courts have long held that the use of coded language supports the inference that the speakers knew they were engaged in illegal activity.

In insider trading law, a “tipping chain” refers to the sequence of people through whom MNPI passes from its original source to the ultimate traders. The Supreme Court established in Dirks v. SEC (1983) that a person who receives a tip (“tippee”) can be liable for insider trading if (1) the tipper breached a fiduciary duty by disclosing the information, (2) the tipper received a personal benefit from the disclosure, and (3) the tippee knew or should have known about the breach. In Salman v. United States (2016), the Court held that a gift of MNPI to a close relative — like a brother — satisfies the personal benefit requirement. Here, the chain ran: CC-1 (attorney) to L. Nourafchan (brother) to CC-2 (intermediary) to Milik (trader/recruiter) to Rudela, Makary, and others. Each link in the chain is independently liable if they knew the information originated from a breach of duty.

The indictment charges two different obstruction theories under two different subsections of the same statute. Count Nine charges Milik under § 1512(b)(1) for corruptly persuading a witness — specifically, instructing CC-7 (a former employee subpoenaed before the grand jury) to provide false testimony. This is witness tampering in its classic form: coaching a witness to lie. Count Ten charges Vinski under § 1512(b)(3) for corruptly persuading a person not to communicate information about a federal offense to law enforcement — specifically, instructing CC-11 not to answer the FBI’s questions. This is a different kind of obstruction: not coaching false testimony, but inducing silence. Both carry a maximum sentence of 20 years — substantially higher than the underlying false statements charges (5 years), reflecting Congress’s judgment that corrupting the investigative process is a particularly serious offense.

The conspirators used an elaborate system of travel-related code words throughout the scheme. “Flights” referred to insider trading opportunities based on MNPI about upcoming M&A deals. “Booking tickets” meant purchasing securities. “The airport” and “brokerage account” were used interchangeably. “Taking off” meant a deal announcement was imminent or had occurred. “The pilot” and “travel agent” referred to the source of the MNPI — ultimately Nourafchan. Silverstein’s response to this message included the word “Otisville,” a reference to the Federal Correctional Institution in Otisville, New York — a minimum-security federal prison known for housing white-collar offenders and for accommodating religiously observant Jewish inmates. The aside suggests Silverstein was aware of the criminal exposure even as he participated in the scheme.

Beyond travel metaphors, the conspirators layered in religious and medical code words. “The Rabbi” referred to the target company or the deal itself. “Surgery” referred to the M&A transaction closing. “Donating towards the surgery” meant investing money to trade on the tip. “When the surgery is scheduled” meant when the deal would be announced. “Dr. Jackson” (used later in the iRobot discussion) appears to be another code name for the deal or the source. This passage is especially striking because it shows S. Fensterszaub pressing Silverstein for deal timing while maintaining the fiction of discussing a charitable donation — and Silverstein responding in kind, referring to “the doctor’s blood pressure” needing to “stabilize” before “surgery.”

CC-3 used a separate system of construction metaphors as code. “The package” referred to money — likely a kickback payment. “Construction project” meant the insider trading scheme. “Pouring concrete” meant executing trades. The “laborers” who “messed it up” likely referred to traders whose positions lost money on the Plantronics deal, which collapsed when Logitech publicly terminated acquisition discussions. “Finding a new construction crew” meant recruiting replacement traders, and “building skyscrapers” meant executing large, profitable trades. Each co-conspirator appears to have developed their own metaphorical vocabulary — travel, construction, religion — which complicated surveillance but also created distinctive linguistic fingerprints that prosecutors could use to map the network.

This exchange shows how the conspirators communicated stock ticker symbols. CC-6’s response — “Mntv” — is the NASDAQ ticker for Momentive Global Inc. Immediately after, in a message to CC-7, CC-6 encoded the same ticker using the first letters of Hebrew names: Menachem, Nachman, Tuvya, Vladmir — spelling out M-N-T-V. This technique of disguising tickers as Hebrew or Yiddish names was one of several encoding methods. Elsewhere in the indictment, Silverstein sent M. Fensterszaub Hebrew letters representing iRobot’s ticker symbol (IRBT), and the conspirators used code words like “the Rabbi” or “tuition increase” as stand-ins for deal-related terminology. The government’s ability to decode these communications — likely with the help of cooperating witnesses — is reflected in the detailed translations throughout the indictment.

“Chavrusa” (also spelled “chevruta”) is a Hebrew/Yiddish term for a study partner in traditional Jewish religious learning — two people who study Talmud or other texts together. In the conspirators’ code, a “chavrusa” referred to a source of MNPI at a law firm or investment bank. “Learning” meant receiving or trading on inside information. “Davening” (praying) and “torahs and mitzvahs” (Torah study and commandments) referred to providing tips and generating trading profits. “A good parasha” (the weekly Torah reading) meant a profitable deal. “Shul” (synagogue) referred to a law firm or other source of MNPI. This passage captures a moment where Silverstein is pressing for Nourafchan’s law firm sources to produce a new deal — but Nourafchan, then unemployed, responds that there are “no chavrusas right now” because he has no access to confidential deal information.

Material non-public information (MNPI) is information about a company that has not been disclosed to the public and would be considered significant by a reasonable investor in deciding whether to buy or sell that company’s securities. In the M&A context, advance knowledge that a company is about to be acquired is quintessential MNPI because acquisition announcements almost always cause the target company’s stock price to jump — often 20–50% or more — creating immediate profit for anyone who purchased shares or call options beforehand. Trading on MNPI, or “tipping” it to others who trade, violates federal securities law. The legal theory here is the “misappropriation theory,” established by the Supreme Court in United States v. O’Hagan (1997), which holds that a person commits fraud when they misappropriate confidential information from someone to whom they owe a duty of trust and confidence and use it to trade securities. Nourafchan’s duty ran to his law firm employers and their clients.

This allegation is central to the government’s case. Major law firms use document management systems (such as iManage or NetDocuments) that log every user’s access to files — who opened what document, when, and for how long. The indictment repeatedly alleges that Nourafchan accessed confidential deal documents on matters he was not assigned to — a pattern that continued even while he was on a “leave of absence” from Law Firm C and after he had been notified of his termination from Law Firm B. These access logs likely constitute some of the strongest evidence in the case: they create an irrefutable digital trail showing exactly which deals Nourafchan previewed, how soon before the public announcement, and whether he had any legitimate business reason to be looking. The recurring phrase “which was a deal that NOURAFCHAN did not work on” appears dozens of times in this indictment and underscores the unauthorized nature of his access.

Federal indictments in insider trading cases routinely identify victim companies by letter designations rather than by name. The identities of the specific firms are not legally relevant to the charges — what matters is that the defendants traded on MNPI misappropriated from them. However, the indictment provides identifying details (headquarters location, rank by revenue, specific deals the firm worked on) that allow readers to narrow the possibilities. For example, Law Firm A is headquartered in Illinois and is “one of the largest corporate law firms in the world by revenue.” Law Firm C, headquartered in Massachusetts, is where Nourafchan worked from approximately 2021 to 2023 and is the source of much of the alleged MNPI. The firms are designated as “victims” because the misappropriation of their clients’ confidential information is the legal basis for the fraud charges — the law firms’ clients were harmed when deal information leaked and trading patterns potentially disrupted deal negotiations.

This intercepted phone call is one of the most damaging passages in the indictment. Silverstein is openly marveling at the fact that Nourafchan — a Yale Law School graduate — deliberately chose to work in M&A law specifically because it gave him access to material non-public information about upcoming deals. The statement that “it’s the only reason why he did it, that type of law” is essentially a confession that the entire career path was instrumental to the insider trading scheme. Silverstein’s characterization of this as “genius” and S. Fensterszaub’s agreement further confirms that both understood the scheme’s architecture. By March 2024, when this call took place, Nourafchan had already been terminated by Law Firm C and was seeking new employment at firms with M&A practices — which Silverstein and S. Fensterszaub discussed as the key to resuming the flow of tips.

This describes a common law enforcement technique in securities fraud investigations: an undercover agent posing as a representative of FINRA (the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority) or the SEC contacts a target to observe their reaction and potentially elicit false statements. B. Fensterszaub’s immediate reaction — calling Silverstein to warn him and say “I just got a terrible call...We might need a meeting” — was itself captured on a wiretap or other surveillance. B. Fensterszaub then made false statements during a second call from the undercover agent, and Silverstein made similar denials when he was contacted the next day (the basis for the false statements charges in Counts Six through Eight). During the panicked call between B. Fensterszaub and Silverstein, B. Fensterszaub also told Silverstein to “Google ‘S-A-R’” — referring to Suspicious Activity Reports that banks are required to file with the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) — showing awareness of anti-money-laundering controls that could expose the conspiracy.

Rucho v. Common Cause (2019) was the 5–4 decision in which the Supreme Court held that partisan gerrymandering claims are nonjusticiable political questions beyond the reach of federal courts. Chief Justice Roberts, writing for the majority, argued that courts should not “risk assuming political . . . responsibility for a process that often produces ill will and distrust.” The decision was widely criticized for leaving voters with no federal judicial remedy against even extreme partisan map manipulation. Justice Jackson quotes this language to underscore an irony: the same Court that declared it should stay out of partisan redistricting disputes is now accelerating its involvement in one.

In Abbott v. LULAC, decided in December 2025, the Supreme Court reversed a federal district court that had ordered Texas to redraw its congressional map during an active election cycle. The per curiam opinion criticized the lower court for “improperly insert[ing] itself into an active primary campaign.” That case involved a challenge to Texas’s maps on racial gerrymandering grounds. Justice Jackson’s citation highlights what she characterizes as a five-month-old contradiction: the Court told a federal district court it was wrong to disrupt an ongoing election with a redistricting order, and is now expediting its own judgment to facilitate exactly that in Louisiana.

The Purcell principle comes from Purcell v. Gonzalez, 549 U.S. 1 (2006), in which the Supreme Court held that federal courts should not change election rules close to an election because of the risk of voter confusion and administrative chaos. The principle has become one of the Court’s most frequently invoked doctrines in election law, typically used to block lower courts from ordering changes to voting procedures in the weeks or months before an election. The Court has applied Purcell aggressively in recent years, including to block racial gerrymandering remedies in Alabama (Merrill v. Milligan, 2022) and Louisiana itself (Ardoin v. Robinson, 2022) from taking effect before elections. Justice Jackson’s point is that the Court is now facilitating the very kind of mid-election disruption that Purcell is supposed to prevent.

Governor Jeff Landry issued Executive Order JML 26-038 on April 30, 2026 — one day after the Callais opinion was released and before the Court had issued its formal judgment. This was an unusually aggressive move: state officials typically wait for the Court’s certified judgment before taking implementing action, precisely because the 32-day waiting period exists and a petition for rehearing could theoretically alter the outcome. The Governor’s unilateral decision to suspend an active election based on an opinion without a transmitted judgment created the very urgency that the majority then cited as justification for issuing the judgment forthwith — a sequence Justice Jackson characterizes as the tail wagging the dog.

Louisiana v. Callais, 608 U.S. ___ (2026), was decided on April 29, 2026 — just five days before this order. The Court held that Louisiana’s 2024 congressional redistricting map was an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander. As Justice Alito notes in a footnote, the case had been argued and conferenced nearly seven months earlier, in October 2025. The opinion was released after Louisiana had already mailed primary ballots to overseas and military voters (April 1) and to domestic absentee voters (April 26), and after some voters had already returned their completed ballots. The timing gap — seven months of deliberation followed by a decision five days before the primary — is part of the backdrop for the urgency debate in this order.

The two prior instances Justice Jackson identifies are Whole Woman’s Health v. Jackson (2021), involving Texas’s S.B. 8 abortion law, and Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl (2013), an Indian Child Welfare Act case involving the custody of a specific child. Both involved circumstances where delay threatened concrete, immediate, and irreversible harm — an abortion ban taking effect or a child’s custodial placement being disrupted. By contrast, here Louisiana’s Governor had already suspended the primary election before the Court acted, and the general election was six months away. In a quarter century of cases, the Court had never previously used this mechanism to accelerate the implementation of a redistricting decision during an active election cycle.

“Forthwith” is a legal term meaning immediately, without any delay. In Supreme Court practice, issuing the judgment forthwith means sending the certified judgment to the lower court right away instead of observing the standard 32-day waiting period. The practical effect here is significant: by issuing the judgment immediately, the Court enabled Louisiana to begin the process of redrawing its congressional map in the middle of an ongoing election cycle — with primary ballots already mailed and some already returned — rather than after the primary had concluded. The per curiam order is unsigned, meaning the Court acted collectively without attributing authorship to any individual Justice.

The 32-day waiting period serves two functions. First, it gives the losing party time to file a petition for rehearing — essentially asking the Court to reconsider its decision. Second, and less obviously, it creates a buffer between the Court’s legal ruling and its practical implementation. During this window, the opinion exists as law but the formal mandate has not been transmitted, meaning lower courts and state officials typically wait before taking implementing action. This cooling-off period is especially significant in politically charged cases, where it prevents the Court’s decision from being weaponized for immediate tactical advantage before all parties have had time to respond through proper legal channels.

This allegation is significant because it means Meta was not merely downloading pirated content — it was actively redistributing it to other users on the torrent network. BitTorrent’s default behavior uploads pieces of files to other users while downloading (“seeding”), effectively making every downloader also a distributor. The complaint alleges Meta did not disable this default. To put 40 TB in perspective: the entire text collection of the U.S. Library of Congress is approximately 20 TB, meaning Meta allegedly redistributed roughly twice the Library of Congress in copyrighted material to unknown third parties over a three-month period. This is the factual basis for Count IV (distribution by torrenting), a separate cause of action from the reproduction claims.

This is the Copyright Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which grants Congress the power “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.” It is the constitutional foundation for all federal copyright and patent law. The clause is notable for its explicit statement of purpose — “to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts” — which courts have interpreted as making copyright not merely a property right for authors but a system designed to benefit the public by incentivizing the creation and dissemination of new works.

Fair use (17 U.S.C. § 107) is a legal defense that permits limited use of copyrighted material without authorization for purposes such as criticism, commentary, teaching, and research. Courts evaluate fair use by weighing four factors: (1) the purpose and character of the use, (2) the nature of the copyrighted work, (3) the amount used, and (4) the effect on the market for the original. The employee’s comment reveals a strategic calculation: if Meta had licensed even one book, it would undermine Meta’s ability to argue that its copying was fair use, because the existence of a licensing market is strong evidence against factor four. Several AI companies, including OpenAI, have raised fair use as a defense in pending copyright cases. No court has yet ruled definitively on whether training an AI model on copyrighted works constitutes fair use.

Yann LeCun is a French-American computer scientist and one of the founding figures of modern deep learning. He shared the 2018 ACM Turing Award — often called the Nobel Prize of computing — with Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio for their pioneering work on neural networks. LeCun is best known for developing convolutional neural networks (CNNs), which became foundational to image recognition. He joined Facebook (now Meta) in 2013 to lead its AI research lab, FAIR (Facebook AI Research), and has served as Meta’s Chief AI Scientist since then. He is also a professor at New York University. His long tenure and stature make him a central figure in Meta’s AI strategy.

Turow’s significance as a named plaintiff extends beyond his book sales. He served as president of the Authors Guild from 2010 to 2014 — the nation’s oldest and largest professional organization for writers — and has been one of the most prominent public advocates for authors’ rights in the digital age. During his tenure, the Authors Guild litigated Authors Guild v. Google (2d Cir. 2015), which established key fair use precedent for book digitization. Turow has published extensively on the economics of authorship and the threats posed by digital piracy. His presence in this lawsuit signals that this is not merely a publisher-driven case but one with significant author backing. Turow is also a Harvard Law School graduate who practiced law at Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal (now Dentons) for over two decades.

Section 1202(b) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act makes it unlawful to intentionally remove or alter “copyright management information” — defined as titles, author names, copyright notices, and other identifying information — when the person knows or has reasonable grounds to know that doing so will facilitate infringement. This is a separate claim from copyright infringement itself, with its own statutory damages: $2,500 to $25,000 per violation under 17 U.S.C. § 1203(c)(3). The complaint alleges Meta selectively stripped this information from pirated works while leaving it intact on public domain works from Project Gutenberg, suggesting the removal was deliberate rather than routine data processing.

The statutory damages the plaintiffs are seeking can be substantial. Under 17 U.S.C. § 504(c), a copyright owner may elect statutory damages instead of proving actual damages. The amounts are: $750 to $30,000 per work infringed, at the court’s discretion. For willful infringement — which this complaint alleges — the maximum increases to $150,000 per work. Because the proposed class potentially includes millions of copyrighted works, the theoretical statutory damages exposure is enormous. Even at the baseline $750 per work, one million infringed works would yield $750 million; at the willful maximum, the figure reaches into the trillions — though courts have discretion to reduce awards that would be constitutionally excessive.

Books3 was created in 2020 by Shawn Presser, an independent AI researcher, who compiled it from the Bibliotik private torrent tracker. The dataset was subsequently incorporated into a larger collection called “The Pile,” assembled by the nonprofit AI research group EleutherAI for language model training. Books3 has been used to train numerous AI models beyond Llama, including models by Bloomberg and other companies. After multiple copyright lawsuits, the dataset was removed from public distribution in August 2023, though copies continue to circulate. Books3 is also at issue in Kadrey v. Meta (N.D. Cal.) and Tremblay v. OpenAI (N.D. Cal.), among other pending cases.

Common Crawl is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in 2007 that maintains an open repository of web crawl data. It releases monthly snapshots of its crawls, each containing data scraped from billions of web pages. The dataset is freely available and has become a foundational data source for AI model training across the industry — it was used in training GPT-3, Google’s T5, and many other large language models in addition to Llama. Its nonprofit status and the fact that it provides data freely have made it difficult for copyright holders to pursue enforcement, even though the dataset contains vast quantities of copyrighted material scraped without authorization.

Sci-Hub was founded in 2011 by Alexandra Elbakyan, a Kazakhstani researcher, to provide free access to academic journal articles behind paywalls. It operates by using leaked or shared institutional login credentials to bypass publisher paywalls and download articles, which it then hosts permanently. Elsevier obtained injunctions against Sci-Hub in 2015 and 2017, with a $15 million damages award in the latter case (Elsevier v. Sci-Hub, No. 17-cv-6323, SDNY). The American Chemical Society obtained a separate $4.8 million judgment in 2017 (E.D. Va.). Despite these judgments, Sci-Hub remains operational and hosts over 85 million articles. It is estimated to cover more than 85% of all articles published in toll-access journals.

Beyond the domain seizures mentioned in this complaint, Z-Library was the subject of a federal criminal prosecution. In November 2022, the Department of Justice charged its alleged operators, Anton Napolsky and Valeriia Ermakova, both Russian nationals, with criminal copyright infringement, wire fraud, and money laundering. They were arrested in Argentina at the request of U.S. authorities. The DOJ described Z-Library as a massive piracy operation that had distributed more than 11 million copyrighted books and 84 million articles without authorization. Despite the prosecution and seizure of over 350 domains, Z-Library has continued to operate via alternative domains and the Tor network.

Library Genesis (LibGen) is a file-sharing repository founded around 2008 that hosts millions of books, journal articles, and other texts without authorization from copyright holders. In 2015, Elsevier — one of the plaintiffs in this case — won a default judgment against LibGen in the Southern District of New York (Elsevier Inc. v. Sci-Hub, No. 15-cv-4282), resulting in a permanent injunction and $15 million in damages. Despite that judgment, LibGen has continued to operate by shifting domains and using mirror sites hosted outside the United States. It is one of the most frequently cited sources in AI training data controversies.

The distinction matters for several concrete reasons. A salary is a fixed amount paid by a single employer on a regular schedule, regardless of specific transactions. A commission is a variable payment tied to specific transactions, often paid by or originating from third parties. On a financial disclosure form, “salary from [Employer]” identifies one source of income — the employer. “Commission from [Employer]” signals that third-party clients or customers are the ultimate source of funds, which in turn identifies a wider universe of entities whose financial interests are intertwined with the filer’s household. In the judicial context, it is the identity of these third-party payors — here, specific law firms — that triggers the recusal analysis under 28 U.S.C. § 455.

DC Bar Rule XI governs the attorney disciplinary process in the District of Columbia. The process works as follows: the Office of Disciplinary Counsel investigates complaints (Section 6), may request a written response from the attorney (Section 8), and if warranted, files formal charges before the Board on Professional Responsibility. The Board conducts a hearing, makes findings of fact, and recommends a sanction. The DC Court of Appeals makes the final decision. Section 6(a)(2) specifically provides that Disciplinary Counsel “shall investigate” misconduct from any source — meaning there is no standing requirement for the person filing the complaint.

Collateral estoppel (also called “issue preclusion”) is a legal doctrine that prevents a party from re-litigating a factual issue that has already been decided against them in a prior proceeding. In the Alessandro context, it meant that once the judicial conduct commission found that Judge Alessandro intentionally withheld financial information, the bar disciplinary proceeding could treat that finding as established fact without requiring new proof. The doctrine is relevant here because if any proceeding — judicial conduct, congressional, or otherwise — were to make factual findings about Roberts’s disclosure practices, those findings could carry over into a bar disciplinary case.

In re Slattery involved a federal Administrative Law Judge who was disciplined by the DC Bar for dishonest conduct unrelated to his judicial duties. The DC Court of Appeals held that a federal judicial officer remains subject to DC Bar disciplinary jurisdiction for personal misconduct occurring outside the courtroom. The case is significant here because it establishes the jurisdictional principle that a judge’s status as a federal judicial officer does not shield him from bar discipline for off-bench conduct — the same principle the complaint invokes against Chief Justice Roberts.

Porteous is one of only eight federal judges in American history to be convicted by the Senate and removed from office through impeachment. The House voted to impeach him on March 11, 2010, and the Senate convicted him unanimously on all four articles on December 8, 2010. The Senate also voted to permanently bar him from holding future federal office — a separate penalty that has been imposed on only three federal judges in history. The fact that false financial disclosures formed a standalone article of impeachment (not merely supporting evidence for another charge) establishes that Congress treats EIGA violations as independently impeachable conduct.

Kendal B. Price is a former Major, Lindsey & Africa recruiter who filed a whistleblower complaint alleging that Jane Roberts leveraged her position as the Chief Justice’s wife to generate business from law firms with matters before the Supreme Court. Price alleged he was fired after raising internal concerns about the arrangement. The complaint was filed with the Department of Justice and members of Congress and included internal MLA financial records as supporting evidence. Price’s allegations were subsequently corroborated by Business Insider’s independent reporting in April 2023, which obtained and published the MLA commission spreadsheets.

Bennett Gershman is a legal ethics and prosecutorial misconduct scholar who has taught at Pace Law School since 1978. He previously served as an assistant district attorney in the New York County DA’s office under Frank Hogan, working on the corruption investigation of former Vice President Spiro Agnew. He has authored multiple treatises on prosecutorial misconduct and trial advocacy and is frequently cited in judicial ethics and government accountability matters.

Major, Lindsey & Africa (MLA) is one of the world’s largest legal recruiting firms, founded in 1982 and now a subsidiary of Allegis Group. MLA specializes in placing partners and senior attorneys at major law firms, with offices across the United States, Europe, and Asia. The firm’s partner-placement practice is particularly relevant here: commissions on partner placements are typically calculated as a percentage (often 20–25%) of the placed attorney’s first-year compensation, which at major firms can range from $1 million to $5 million or more.

This section provides both civil penalties and a mandatory referral mechanism. The civil penalty of up to $50,000 applies per violation — meaning that 16 years of filings could theoretically expose the filer to up to $800,000 in civil penalties, and the three additional filings with equity omissions could add another $150,000. Separately, subsection (b) requires the Judicial Conference (for judges) to refer any individual it has “reasonable cause to believe” has willfully falsified disclosure information to the Attorney General for potential criminal prosecution.

Section 1001 is the general federal false statements statute, one of the most frequently charged federal crimes. It criminalizes knowingly making false statements to any branch of the federal government, with a maximum penalty of five years imprisonment. It has been used in numerous high-profile prosecutions, including Martha Stewart (2004), Michael Flynn (2017), and multiple defendants in the Mueller and January 6th investigations. The statute is notable for its breadth: it covers any “material” false statement in any “matter within the jurisdiction” of the federal government, regardless of whether the statement was made under oath.

This is the federal judicial recusal (disqualification) statute. Section 455(a) requires a judge to disqualify himself “in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned.” Section 455(b)(4) requires disqualification when the judge knows that the judge’s spouse has “a financial interest in the subject matter in controversy or in a party to the proceeding, or any other interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome.” The complaint’s theory is that by labeling commission income as “salary,” the disclosure forms obscured the financial relationships that would have triggered recusal analysis under this statute.

The Ethics in Government Act was enacted in 1978 in response to the Watergate scandal. It requires senior federal officials — including all Article III judges — to file annual public financial disclosure reports detailing income, assets, liabilities, transactions, and outside positions for themselves and their spouses. The Act's purpose is to enable public scrutiny of potential conflicts of interest. The original codification was at 5 U.S.C. App. §§ 101–111; Congress recodified it to §§ 13101–13111 in 2022 without substantive changes. The statute is administered for the federal judiciary by the Administrative Office of the United States Courts under the supervision of the Judicial Conference.

Loan rehabilitation allows a borrower in default to restore their loan to good standing — removing the default from their credit report and regaining eligibility for deferment, forbearance, and repayment plans. Under the prior rule, a borrower could only rehabilitate a given loan once; a second default meant the borrower's only options were full repayment or loan consolidation (which does not remove the default notation). Allowing a second rehabilitation gives borrowers who experience repeated financial hardship another path back to good standing.

Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) is a federal program created in 2007 that forgives the remaining balance on Direct Loans after the borrower makes 120 qualifying monthly payments (10 years) while working full-time for a qualifying employer — typically a government agency or 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. The confirmation that RAP payments count toward PSLF is significant because not all repayment plans have historically qualified.

The income-driven repayment plans being phased out include: Income-Contingent Repayment (ICR), Income-Based Repayment (IBR), and Pay As You Earn (PAYE). The SAVE/REPAYE plan was already blocked by court order. After July 1, 2028, borrowers on these legacy plans will need to transition to either the Tiered Standard plan or the Repayment Assistance Plan (RAP). The standard 10-year repayment plan and graduated repayment plan — which are not income-driven — are also being replaced by the Tiered Standard plan for new loans as of July 1, 2026.

CIP codes are a standardized taxonomy maintained by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) that classifies every academic program in the United States. Each program is assigned a six-digit code organized into broad groups, subgroups, and specific programs. The requirement that qualifying professional degrees share an "intermediate group" with the 11 core fields limits which additional programs can qualify — they must be academically related to an already-listed field, not merely expensive or professionally oriented.

Notable by their absence from this list: MBA programs, Master of Architecture (M.Arch), engineering master's and doctoral programs, Master of Fine Arts (MFA), Master of Public Health (MPH), Master of Social Work (MSW), and advanced law degrees such as the LL.M. Students in these programs — many of which carry tuition comparable to the listed professional degrees — will be subject to the lower graduate student loan limits ($20,500/year, $100,000 aggregate) rather than the higher professional limits ($50,000/year, $200,000 aggregate). Some of these programs may qualify under the multi-part test described below, but only if they meet all four criteria, including being "generally at the doctoral level."

This is a new concept in federal student lending. Previously, there was no single lifetime cap across all federal student loan programs — undergraduate and graduate limits were tracked separately, and Grad PLUS and Parent PLUS had no aggregate limits at all. The $257,500 figure combines the maximum possible undergraduate borrowing ($57,500) with the professional student aggregate ($200,000). A borrower who maxes out undergraduate loans and then enters a professional program would hit this ceiling.

Prior to this rule, Parent PLUS loans had no annual or aggregate borrowing limit — parents could borrow up to the full cost of attendance for each dependent child, with no ceiling. This made Parent PLUS one of the most permissive federal lending programs. The new $20,000 annual cap and $65,000 per-dependent aggregate represent the first-ever federal limits on parent borrowing for undergraduate education.