November 17, 2025

 The most important news from today is that, in the previously scheduled order list released this morning, the Court granted exactly one petition for certiorari: Noem v. Al Otro Lado, No. 25-5. The question presented is "whether an alien who is stopped on the Mexican side of the U.S.-Mexico border "arrives in the United States" within the meaning of those provisions." The provisions in question are certain sections of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), also known as Title 8 of the United States Code, specifically, 8 U.S.C. 1158(b)(1)(A), 1225(a)(1) and (3). 

It matters if aliens "arrive[] in the United States" because these provisions require that if they have done so, they must be permitted to apply for asylum and inspected by DHS. The current administration, of course, wants to make the asylum process as difficult as possible, so it is no surprise that they want the Supreme Court to reverse the lower court's decision, which had held that aliens who present themselves on the Mexican side of the border do in fact "arrive" in the country and are thus eligible to apply for asylum. 

The lower court (which in this case was the Ninth Circuit, surprise surprise) had specifically struck down a now-rescinded "metering policy" of turning away aliens who present themselves at the border on the Mexican side. According to the divided Ninth Circuit panel: "We agree with Plaintiffs that a noncitizen stopped at the border is eligible to apply for asylum under § 1158. We next conclude that a border official must process such a noncitizen under § 1225. We reject the Government's contrary interpretations, including its argument based on the presumption that statutes do not apply extraterritorially." Al Otro Lado v. EOIR, 120 F. 4th 606, 615 (CA9 2024).

Interestingly, this case began under the Biden administration, so on the 2024 Ninth Circuit decision I just cited, you won't find the names of any Trump administration officials like you do now. This suggests that there may be a bipartisan desire to reverse the Ninth Circuit's decision and make it easier to turn asylum seekers away at the border. However, of the two amicus briefs filed so far, both are from right-wing individuals or organizations (one from Senator Ted Cruz and a smattering of other Republican members of Congress, and one from right-wing think tank America's Future). 

Since the policy has been rescinded, it's no longer in effect, which suggests that this case could be moot. Al Otro Lado did not explicitly say that this case was moot, but downplayed the ongoing significance of the dispute, suggesting if the Court granted certiorari and issued an opinion, this would be "little more than an advisory opinion". As their brief in opposition argued, "the government rescinded the metering policy years ago, the district court essentially vacated the transit-rule class injunction, and the remaining declaratory judgment has no bearing on the legal justification for the government’s current management of the southern border." The Trump administration's reply brief argued that this case is not moot, stating as follows: "The district court’s judgment affects more than just metering; even as to metering, the judgment subjects DHS to ongoing obligations; and, in all events, DHS’s voluntary cessation of metering practices cannot moot this case when DHS has explained that it would likely resume the use of metering as soon as changed border conditions warrant that step."

What else happened at the Court today? Numerous cert petitions were denied in the order list, of course. We got a dissent from the denial of certiorari in exactly one of these, Hutson v. United States, No. 24-1022. Gorsuch noted his dissent from the denial without writing or joining a dissenting opinion. Alito wrote an opinion dissenting from the denial of certiorari, which he only got Thomas to join. This case concerned the Prison Litigation Reform Act and a court order that supposedly violated a provision of that law which prevented courts from ordering a state to build prisons.

The Court also denied a high-profile petition for certiorari in today's order list, Cambridge Christian School v. Florida High School Athletic Association, No. 24-1261, despite there being a whopping 21 amicus briefs filed. The petition was only relisted once after the court called for (and received) a brief in opposition, so apparently that was all the Court needed to hear. Today, there was not even a single noted dissent from the denial of certiorari here. The case concerned a Christian school in Florida that wanted to broadcast a prayer, but was prohibited from doing so by the Florida High School Athletic Association. This denial got a fair bit of media coverage, e.g. from CBS News. Also, this seems to set a record for the most amicus briefs submitted on a cert petition that is nevertheless denied, at least during October Terms 2024 or 2025. The previous record was Apache Stronghold v. United States, No. 24-291, where there were a total of 16 amicus briefs filed.

Among the petitions that are still pending, the one that has been relisted more times than any other appears to be Jeffrey Clyde Pitts v. Mississippi, No. 24-1159, which was relisted for the 7th time today. So something is probably brewing there--perhaps a cert grant, perhaps an opinion dissenting from denial of cert, perhaps something else. We'll just have to wait and see. 

This petition specifically concerns a man, Jeffrey Clyde Pitts, who was convicted of sexual battery against his four-year-old daughter. Pitts is now challenging his conviction on the basis that, according to his lawyers, his constitutional rights were violated. Specifically, Pitts argues that it was unconstitutional for the trial court to place a screen between him and his daughter during her testimony "without any individualized finding by the trial court that the screen is necessary to prevent trauma to the child." This, he claims, violates the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment, which provides defendants in criminal prosecutions the right to be "confronted with the witnesses against him".