The Supreme Court entered the final stretch of its October Term 2025 this week, handing down three argued cases on June 18 — led by a narrow Second Amendment ruling for a marijuana user prosecuted for gun possession — while adding new cases for next term and fielding a fresh batch of emergency applications. Below the high court, a Ninth Circuit panel revived a parental-notification challenge to a California school law, a federal judge in Idaho partially blocked the state’s new criminal bathroom statute, and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court narrowed a workers’-compensation anti-referral rule. Here is the week in the courts.
Supreme Court
United States v. Hemani: a narrow Second Amendment win
On June 18, the justices ruled in United States v. Hemani (No. 24-1234) that the federal government cannot prosecute a Texas man under the statute barring “unlawful user[s]” of controlled substances from possessing firearms — at least as the law was applied to him. Writing for the Court, Justice Neil Gorsuch held that the government’s historical analogues — chiefly early American laws targeting “habitual drunkards” — were not sufficiently similar to justify automatically stripping Ali Danial Hemani of his Second Amendment rights based only on regular marijuana use, according to the opinion.
Applying the framework from New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen (2022) and United States v. Rahimi (2023), Gorsuch wrote that the older statutes “targeted different kinds of people, did so for different reasons, and operated in different ways.” The Court stressed that the ruling was “a narrow one” that did not address prosecutions of drug addicts, the felon-in-possession ban, or cases in which the government proves a particular individual’s drug use makes him dangerous.
All nine justices agreed Hemani’s prosecution could not stand, though the reasoning splintered. Justice Clarence Thomas concurred on Commerce Clause grounds; Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, wrote that the Bruen framework is “unworkable”; and Justice Samuel Alito, joined by Justice Elena Kagan, concurred only in the result. SCOTUSblog’s analysis is here.
Hunter v. United States: appeal waivers yield to “miscarriage of justice”
Also on June 18, the Court ruled 8-1 in Hunter v. United States (No. 24-1063) that a defendant’s agreement to waive appeal is unenforceable when enforcing it would produce a “miscarriage of justice” — that is, leave in place the kind of egregious error that would bring the judicial system into disrepute. Justice Kagan wrote for the majority; Justice Thomas dissented alone, per the opinion.
The case arose after Munson Hunter pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting wire fraud and accepted a sentence that included compelled mental-health treatment and medication as conditions of supervised release. Legal analysts noted the decision expands the limited exceptions to plea-deal appeal waivers, a recurring issue in federal criminal practice. SCOTUSblog’s write-up is here.
T.M. v. University of Maryland Medical System: Rooker-Feldman clarified
In a 5-4 decision the same day, the Court held in T.M. v. University of Maryland Medical System Corp. (No. 25-197) that the Rooker-Feldman doctrine — which bars lower federal courts from reviewing state-court judgments — applies regardless of whether the state judgment is final or remains subject to further state appellate review. Justice Sotomayor wrote the majority opinion; Justice Amy Coney Barrett dissented, joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Kagan and Gorsuch, arguing the ruling left an already confusing doctrine “worse off,” according to SCOTUSblog’s analysis. The unusual lineup crossed the Court’s typical ideological lines.
Orders list: new grants and notable denials
From its June 11 conference, the Court on June 15 added three cases for next term, per the order list. In Genalo v. Black (No. 25-886), the justices will decide whether noncitizens subjected to “unreasonably prolonged” immigration detention are entitled to a bond hearing — a question the federal government brought to the Court after the Second Circuit required such hearings. In Kian v. Florida (No. 25-6623), the Court will consider whether to overrule Williams v. Florida (1970) and hold that the Sixth Amendment requires 12-person juries. And in Guerrero v. Johnson (No. 25-1003), it took up a technical question on second federal habeas petitions in a Texas capital case.
The same order list drew dissents from Justice Alito. He would have summarily reversed in Alabama v. Powell (No. 25-848), where a state court threw out a capital conviction over a prosecutor’s remark, and he dissented from the denial of review in E.D. v. Noblesville School District (No. 25-906), a student-speech case. The Court also declined to hear Page v. Comey (No. 25-705), former Trump adviser Carter Page’s suit over surveillance warrants issued under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act; Justice Jackson was recused. SCOTUSblog’s summary is here.
Emergency docket: Roy Moore and a TPS dispute
On the emergency docket, former Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore filed an application on June 17 asking the justices to intervene in an $8.2 million defamation award entered against him, according to SCOTUSblog. Separately, Haitian nationals on June 16 asked the Court to dismiss as moot a dispute over the administration’s wind-down of their Temporary Protected Status, filings indicate. Both matters remain pending.
Federal Appeals Courts
Ninth Circuit revives parental-notification challenge to California’s AB 1955
On June 19, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit entered a preliminary injunction shielding seven parent-plaintiffs from enforcement of two sections of California’s AB 1955, the 2024 law that bars school districts from requiring staff to disclose a student’s gender identity to parents without the student’s consent, according to reporting on the ruling. The panel — which had twice declined similar relief — said it reconsidered in light of the Supreme Court’s intervening decision in Mirabelli v. Bonta and concluded the parents were likely to succeed on claims that the Constitution protects their role in decisions about their children.
The injunction is preliminary and, records indicate, shields only the named plaintiffs while litigation continues. California Attorney General Rob Bonta has said his office expects to prevail on appeal. The dispute is one of several nationwide testing how far schools may go in withholding gender-identity information from parents. See coverage of the ruling and case background from Courthouse News.
District Courts
Idaho’s criminal bathroom law partially blocked
On June 16, U.S. District Judge Amanda Brailsford partially enjoined Idaho’s House Bill 752, which would have made it a misdemeanor — and a felony on repeat offenses — to use a restroom in a public facility or private business designated for another biological sex, according to the Idaho Capital Sun. Brailsford found the statute likely “unconstitutionally vague,” writing that its undefined “dire need” exception “invites arbitrary and discriminatory enforcement” and citing concerns the Idaho Chiefs of Police Association had raised before passage.
The order, which also granted class certification, is narrow: it protects transgender Idahoans seeking single-user restrooms, or multi-user restrooms when no single-user option is available, while a separate changing-room provision was allowed to take effect July 1. Judge Brailsford acknowledged the state’s “inherent” interest in restroom privacy but said Idaho could pursue it “without infringing upon Plaintiffs’ constitutional rights.” Attorney General Raúl Labrador said he will appeal, calling the injunction “narrow.” The order is posted here.
State Courts
Pennsylvania Supreme Court narrows workers’-comp anti-referral rule
On June 16, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled 5-2 in 700 Pharmacy v. Bureau of Workers’ Compensation (No. 101 MAP 2024) that the Workers’ Compensation Act’s anti-referral provision — which bars physicians from steering patients to certain businesses in which they hold a financial interest — reaches only the eight categories of services the statute enumerates, and that prescription drugs and pharmaceutical services are not among them. As a result, the Court held, an employer or carrier cannot refuse to pay for medications a claimant fills at a pharmacy in which the prescribing physician has a financial stake.
The decision, which resolved five consolidated cases, turned on the statute’s plain text; the majority declined to read the provision’s reference to “goods or services” as a catchall sweeping in unlisted categories. Analysts said the ruling carries implications for medical-cost containment in the state’s workers’-compensation system. See the opinion and trade coverage.
Cases to Watch
The Supreme Court has scheduled additional opinion days for June 23 and June 25 as it works through roughly 17 remaining merits cases before its summer recess, according to SCOTUSblog’s term tracker. Among the biggest still outstanding: the challenge to the executive order narrowing birthright citizenship; Wolford v. Lopez, a Second Amendment challenge to Hawaii’s restrictions on carrying firearms onto private property; and disputes over campaign-finance limits and mail-in ballots that could affect the 2026 midterms, as NPR reports. Watch, too, for the Court’s response to Roy Moore’s emergency application and for any movement on pending mifepristone litigation. The Investigative Journal will track each ruling as it lands.