How Appealing



Thursday, October 15, 2026

“Frustrated by Losses in the Courts, Missouri Republicans Want to Change How Top Judges Are Selected; For 86 years, Missouri has held on to a nonpartisan system of selecting its top judges; But after the state Supreme Court overruled the GOP’s redistricting push, some Republican lawmakers are calling for the system to be overturned”: Jeremy Kohler of ProPublica has this report.

Posted at 9:22 PM by Howard Bashman



“James Ho Ponders Auditions, Ambitions, and the Crushing Meaninglessness of Human Existence; The Fifth Circuit’s most embarrassing try-hard can feel his shot at the Supreme Court slipping away; So he blogged about it”: Jay Willis has this essay online at Balls and Strikes.

Posted at 9:14 PM by Howard Bashman



“Trump Cancels Planned Livestream of Fort Hood Shooter’s Execution; The president said only immediate families of the victims of the mass shooting in 2009 would witness the execution of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan”: Katie Rogers, Tyler Pager, John Ismay, and Greg Jaffe of The New York Times have this report.

And Dan Lamothe and Tara Copp of The Washington Post report that “Trump cancels Hegseth’s plan to live-stream Fort Hood shooter’s execution; The decision is a rebuke of the defense secretary, who has remained in the president’s good graces through numerous controversies.”

Posted at 8:55 PM by Howard Bashman



“Slapping Down an Insubordinate Court; The Justices rebuke the Fourth Circuit for its election gamesmanship”: This editorial will appear in Friday’s edition of The Wall Street Journal.

Posted at 8:50 PM by Howard Bashman



“How Claims of Widespread Noncitizen Voting Fall Apart”: Amy Schoenfeld Walker, Jeremy White, and Seamus Hughes of The New York Times have this report.

Posted at 8:25 PM by Howard Bashman



“$815.8M Benzene Verdict Against ExxonMobil Survives Pa. Appeals Court Challenge; Many of the company’s key arguments were waived because they had not been properly preserved at the trial court level, including attacks on causation and expert testimony, the majority said”: Riley Brennan of The Legal Intelligencer has this report.

Today’s decision of the Superior Court of Pennsylvania consists of an unpublished, non-precedential memorandum opinion and a concurring/dissenting statement.

Posted at 4:38 PM by Howard Bashman



“8 in 10 Americans oppose live-streaming execution of Fort Hood shooter; A slim majority of the public supports using a firing squad to execute Nidal Malik Hasan, but most are against broadcasting it, a Post-ABC-Ipsos poll finds”: Amy B Wang and Alauna Safarpour of The Washington Post have this report.

Posted at 10:24 AM by Howard Bashman



“A Houseboat Vacation and a Failed Courtship; How Sandra Day O’Connor made Reagan’s shortlist”: Ed Whelan has this post at his “Confirmation Tales” Substack site.

Posted at 10:22 AM by Howard Bashman



“Bonus 257: Hard Questions About Court Expansion; Those who maintain that any Supreme Court reform *must* include Court expansion should have to answer some difficult questions about the precedent it would set and the effects it would produce.” Steve Vladeck has this post at his “One First” Substack site.

Posted at 10:18 AM by Howard Bashman



“DC urges appeals court to end yearlong National Guard deployment in capital; In the 13 months since their deployment, patrolling troops have become a part of daily life in the District, with constant patrols and units stationed in metro stations and public spaces”: Ryan Knappenberger of Courthouse News Service has this report.

You can access the audio of yesterday’s oral argument before a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit at this link.

Posted at 10:14 AM by Howard Bashman



“Progressive Buyer’s Remorse; The left is rediscovering century-old arguments for crippling the Supreme Court”: Paul Moreno has this book review post at the “Law & Liberty” blog.

Posted at 10:07 AM by Howard Bashman



“Ninth Circuit strikes down California ‘No Vigilantes Act’ as unconstitutional; The appellate panel found the California law is void insofar as it seeks to regulate the federal government without congressional authorization”: Edvard Pettersson of Courthouse News Service has this report.

You can access yesterday’s decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit at this link.

Posted at 10:04 AM by Howard Bashman



“Tillis mocked the Comey seashell prosecution. He OK’d Trump’s judicial nominees who worked on it. The North Carolina senator’s support is notable given his often-caustic relationship with the president.” Josh Gerstein of Politico has this report.

Posted at 9:56 AM by Howard Bashman



Wednesday, October 14, 2026
Tuesday, October 13, 2026

“DoJ’s Doomed Pursuit of Cassidy Hutchinson”: Elie Honig has this post online at the “Intelligencer” blog of New York magazine.

Posted at 1:23 PM by Howard Bashman



“Private Prosecutors: The Supreme Court says everyone who wields executive power must answer to the president; The False Claims Act remains, for now, an odd exception.” Cory L. Andrews has this post at the “Law & Liberty” blog.

Posted at 1:11 PM by Howard Bashman



“The Establishment Clause at the Second Founding; The relevant time frame to best understand the Establishment Clause for state religion cases should be 1868, not 1791”: Josh Blackman has this post at Civitas Outlook.

Posted at 1:09 PM by Howard Bashman



“What Does ‘History and Tradition’ Require? The Court’s shift from Lemon to history and tradition raises a new set of interpretative challenges.” Mark David Hall has this post at the “Law & Liberty” blog.

Posted at 1:08 PM by Howard Bashman



“Gun Ban for Those With Violent Felonies Upheld by Appeals Court”: Megan Crepeau of Bloomberg Law has this report.

You can access today’s en banc decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit at this link.

Update: The Third Circuit issued two related en banc Second Amendment decisions today, causing Bloomberg Law to publish the updated headline “Felon Disarmament Law Gets Split Decisions at Appeals Court.”

You can access the second en banc decision at this link.

Posted at 1:02 PM by Howard Bashman



“Trump Fifth Circuit Pick Met With Early Conservative Scrutiny”: Olivia Alafriz and Jacqueline Thomsen of Bloomberg Law have this report.

Posted at 8:35 AM by Howard Bashman



Monday, October 12, 2026

“Abbott Appointees Stock State Supreme Court Ballot for the First Time Ever; Three of the four Democratic challengers hail from the same Austin-based appellate court”: Isaiah Mitchell of The Texan has this report.

Posted at 9:27 PM by Howard Bashman



“Are Warrantless Phone Searches at the Border Constitutional? The Supreme Court May Soon Decide. The case of George Anibowei, a U.S. citizen who has had his phone searched at least five times at the border, shows just how invasive border agents have become.” Amy Peikoff has this post online at Reason.

Posted at 9:25 PM by Howard Bashman



“Kalshi Seeks Full 6th Circuit Review of States’ Regulation Win”: Eric Heisig of Bloomberg Law has this report (subscription required for full access).

You can access the court filing at this link.

Posted at 8:14 PM by Howard Bashman



“The Case for Firing Squads: Lethal injection only looks humane, and it blurs the distinction between healing and killing.” Alex Kozinski has this essay online at The Wall Street Journal.

Posted at 7:40 PM by Howard Bashman