The rebels are largely the most conservative lawmakers who are passionate about slashing spending and debt. They hail from deep-red districts where a primary challenge is less of a danger.
The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to review a decision by the Wisconsin Supreme Court rejecting efforts by Catholic Charities to seek an exemption from the state’s unemployment tax. Catholic Charities contends that both it and the four agencies that operate under its umbrella qualify for the exemption because they are operated “primarily for religious purposes.” The group, which is controlled by the bishop of the diocese of Superior, says that the state supreme court’s contrary decision, which rested on its conclusion that the group’s activities are not “typical” religious activities, violates the First Amendment.
In a brief list of orders from the justices’ private conference earlier in the day, the justices also agreed to weigh in on whether a group of fuel producers have a legal right to sue, known as standing, to challenge California’s role in the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions.
An additional list of orders from Friday’s conference, including the list of cases that the justices have declined to review, is expected on Monday morning.
The Wisconsin dispute dates back to 2016, when the Catholic Charities Bureau in the Diocese of Superior, Wis., sought a determination that it and four of its agencies – which provide a variety of services to people with disabilities – were exempt from the state’s unemployment tax. The case made its way to the state supreme court, which earlier this year ruled for the state.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court explained that to determine whether an organization is “operated primarily for religious purposes” and therefore qualifies for the tax exemption, both the organization’s motivations and its activities are relevant.
In this case, the court accepted “at face value” assertions by Catholic Charities and the four agencies that their services were “based on gospel values and the principles of the Catholic Social Teachings.” But the court found it dispositive that the activities of Catholic Charities and the agencies were “primarily charitable and secular.” The groups do not “attempt to imbue program participants with the Catholic faith nor supply any religious materials to program participants or employees,” the court stressed.
Catholic Charities came to the Supreme Court last summer, asking the justices to weigh in. The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s decision, it argued, “thrusts state governments into a thicket of First Amendment questions,” “not least because it forces agencies and courts to second-guess the religious decisions of religious bodies.” The question matters, the group added, because it means that Catholic Charities and others like it must pay unemployment taxes with money “that otherwise could be helping the needy.”
The state urged the justices to stay out of the dispute, insisting that courts “routinely deny religious tax exemptions to entities that assert religious motivations without overly entangling themselves in religious matters.” In doing so, the state wrote, courts do not “regulate internal church governance or compel any church activity.”
After considering the case at two consecutive conferences, the justices granted the petition for review filed by Catholic Charities.
The justices also granted review in Diamond Alternative Energy v. Environmental Protection Agency, a challenge arising from a provision of the Clean Air Act that allows California to seek a waiver of the general bar on the adoption of emission standards by states. The waiver recognizes that California was the only state to regulate emissions before the CAA was enacted. In 2009, California began to set standards to curb greenhouse gas emissions, stepping beyond the localized pollution it had previously regulated. The Environmental Protection Agency granted a waiver, which was then partially withdrawn during the Trump administration and reinstated in 2022. The 2022 waiver allowed the state to set standards to limit greenhouse gas emissions, as well as require all passenger vehicles sold in the state to be zero-emission vehicles by 2035.
The justices on Friday agreed to hear an appeal filed by fuel producers, who seek review of a ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit holding that they did not have a legal right to challenge the waiver. The court declined, however, to hear the fuel producers’ challenge to the legality of the waiver itself.
Both cases will be argued sometime in the spring, with a decision to follow by late June or early July.
This article was originally published at Howe on the Court.
The post Justices take up cases on religious tax exemption and California climate change mandate appeared first on SCOTUSblog.
UPDATED: A group of TikTok users filed a separate application on Monday afternoon, also asking the court to block enforcement of the law.
Social media giant TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, on Monday asked the justices to block a federal law that would require TikTok to shut down in the United States unless ByteDance can sell off the U.S. company by Jan. 19. Unless the justices intervene, the companies argued in a 41-page filing, the law will “shutter one of America’s most popular speech platforms the day before a presidential inauguration.”
The request came three days after a federal appeals court in Washington turned down a request to put the law on hold to give TikTok time to seek review in the Supreme Court. A panel made up of judges appointed by Presidents Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and Ronald Reagan explained that the companies were effectively seeking to delay “the date selected by Congress to put its chosen policies into effect” –particularly when Congress and the president had made the “deliberate choice” to “set a firm 270-day clock,” with the possibility of only one 90-day extension.
Congress enacted the law, the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, earlier this year, and President Joe Biden signed it on April 24. The law identifies China and three other countries as “foreign adversaries” of the United States and bans the use of apps controlled by those countries.
TikTok, which has roughly 170 million users in the United States and more than a billion worldwide, ByteDance, and others filed challenges to the law in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
In an opinion by Senior Judge Douglas Ginsburg, a Reagan appointee, the court of appeals concluded that TikTok had a legal right to sue, known as standing, to challenge the enforcement of provisions of the law that specifically target the company and that the lawsuit could go forward.
But the court of appeals rejected the company’s argument that the law violates the Constitution, explaining that the law was the “culmination of extensive, bipartisan action by the Congress and by successive presidents.” The law, Ginsburg stressed, was “carefully crafted to deal only with control by a foreign adversary, and it was part of a broader effort to counter a well-substantiated national security threat posed by the People’s Republic of China.”
Chief Judge Sri Srinivasan, an Obama appointee, agreed the law does not violate the First Amendment, but he would have applied a less stringent standard of review in reaching that conclusion.
Calling the law an “unprecedented attempt to single out” TikTok and prohibit it from “operating one of the most significant speech platforms in” the United States, TikTok urged the justices to step in and put the law on hold while the company seeks review of the D.C. Circuit’s ruling. Represented by Noel Francisco, who served as the U.S. solicitor general during the first Trump administration, the company contended that blocking enforcement of the law would not “materially harm” the federal government. Even the government, Francisco observed, “asserts only that China ‘could’ engage in harmful conduct through TikTok, not that there is any evidence China is currently doing so or will soon do so.”
Moreover, Francisco added, Trump and his aides “have voiced support for saving TikTok,” so a “modest delay in enforcing” the law will give both the justices time to review the issues presented by the case and the new administration an opportunity to weigh in—“before this vital channel for Americans to communicate with their fellow citizens and the world is closed.”
Citing the need to “coordinate with their service providers to perform the complex task of shutting down the TikTok platform only in the United States” if the Supreme Court declines to intervene, TikTok asked the justices to act on its request by Jan. 6.
TikTok also suggested that the justices could treat its request as a petition for review and take up the case now, without waiting for additional filings.
TikTok’s request will go first to Chief Justice John Roberts, who handles emergency appeals from the D.C. Circuit. Roberts could act on the request himself, but he is more likely to call for a response from the Biden administration and to then send the matter to the full court.
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President-elect Donald Trump, with help from Elon Musk, quashed a bipartisan spending bill two days before a deadline to avert a full government shutdown. Here’s what a shutdown would mean for you if no deal is reached.
Matas Buzelis isn’t big on setting individual goals.
It’s just not quite his style. Buzelis tries not to get bogged down by the big picture. He likes to keep things day to day. Make a simple to-do list. Focus on the granular work. Let everything else come in time.
But when the Chicago Bulls drafted him this summer, Buzelis allowed himself two goals. Nothing too extensive. Just a two-step plan for the best version of his rookie season.
Step 1: Win as many games as possible.
Step 2: Win Rookie of the Year.
If that seems like a high bar — well, you just haven’t met the kid.
Buzelis isn’t easily intimidated. He never carried himself with the deference of a rookie. Buzelis isn’t necessarily the loudest guy in the locker room, but he can’t be backed down from a challenge — an argument, a bet, a one-on-one competition.
And that irreverence extends to the court, where Buzelis refuses to show any hesitation. Kristaps Porziņģis? Joel Embiid? Giannis Antetokounmpo? Buzelis shrugs them all off. It doesn’t matter who’s under the basket. If Buzelis can see a path to the rim, he’s getting there.
It’s not a lack of respect. It’s a mantra Buzelis repeats any time he’s asked about an opponent: “I’m not afraid of anyone.”
Nobody?
“Nobody.”
It might be easy to pass this off as the overconfidence of a first-round pick who just turned 20 last month. Or even as the arrogance of an unproven rookie trying to self-talk his way into success. But that’s not Buzelis.
He doesn’t want any of this to come off the wrong way. He just knows who he is, who he wants to become. And there’s never been a doubt in his mind — not as a top NBA prospect, not before his debut and certainly not now — that he could be the best player to come out of the 2024 draft.
“I’m just a basketball player who loves the game,” Buzelis told the Tribune. “I’m not doing any of this for anything else. I just love it.”
For Buzelis, the path to the NBA seemed simple.
After earning national attention at Hinsdale Central, he spent the final two years of high school playing for two of the top prep academies in the country — first Brewster Academy, then Sunrise Christian Academy. Then he joined a wave of fresh talent foregoing college to head straight to the pros, signing with the G League Ignite team with the sole goal of sidestepping to the NBA.
And then, of course, nothing went quite to plan.
Buzelis missed the start of the season with an ankle injury. He tried to shoulder that absence as a “blessing in disguise” that allowed him to learn the game from a different vantage point, but in reality it just meant a delayed debut. By the time he was cleared to play, the Ignite team was floundering.
Long before boosters pulled funding to shut the program down, the Ignite seemed doomed to fail. Buzelis and his team won only two games in the 2023-24 season. Injuries exposed the inexperience of the teenagers attempting to keep up against seasoned professionals. And although Buzelis felt players stayed close-knit as a group, their intention wasn’t always visible on the court.
“Sometimes it was like we weren’t really trying to win games all the time,” Buzelis said. “Guys were just worrying about getting to the league.”
It wasn’t anyone’s fault, Buzelis said. And he understood it. Ignite was a development program. Its primary goal was to develop players for the NBA, an objective the program accomplished by producing seven first-round draft picks in a four-year span. And Buzelis was a true success story, immediately elevating himself into a top-15 pick after impressing in only 26 games with Ignite.
Still, the way things ended with Ignite will always sting. For Buzelis, it was a lesson in losing — one that he didn’t want to repeat in Chicago.
Every Bulls practice ends the same way for Buzelis — find the most creative way to get the ball into the basket.
It’s an experiment in resisting gravity. Buzelis cradles the ball behind his head, tucks it under his knee, skips it behind his back before throwing it down through the rim. Sometimes, a teammate will try to meet him at the rim. Normally, they just stand to the side and watch, arms tucked across their chest, grins wide as the rookie goes flying again.
This part of the game has always come naturally to Buzelis. He loves to dunk — and he loves to dunk on someone even more, seeking a body in the air and the awkward fall that follows, taking that extra second to flex and pose and stare.
Buzelis typically doesn’t attempt tricky finishes in a live game — the best he can ever remember landing was a windmill — but he already is visualizing his first truly spectacular dunk in the NBA.
“If I’m getting out on a fast break and we’re up some points — I’m going to do something,” Buzelis promised.
He still isn’t sure what that signature finish will look like. Double-clutch? A 360 spin? Reverse?
“I’ll do anything,” Buzelis said. “Trust me. I will do anything.”
Now that the dunks are out of the way, coach Billy Donovan would like to talk about some basketball.
It’s not that Donovan doesn’t like the dunking. He loves it, actually. When Buzelis flashes to the rim with decisive brutality, Donovan sees glimpses of the long-term success he believes the rookie can build for himself.
But since the first day he met the rookie, Donovan has tried to make one thing clear — dunking can’t be the foundation of a player’s identity in the NBA.
“Everybody gets wowed by the dunks, right?” Donovan said. “And he will have some incredible, athletic highlight plays. But you’re probably at the end of the year going to count those on one or two hands out of all the possessions he plays. So yes, he’s got to attack, he’s got to use his athleticism in every way possible — but he has to have a game outside of that.”
Buzelis wasn’t a strong 3-point shooter when the Bulls drafted him. That had to change this season — and quickly — to fit into a new high-volume-shooting style.
Like every other Bulls player, Buzelis quickly became an attentive student of shooting specialist Peter Patton. The pair spent hours together in the gym, perfecting the way that his pointer finger traced the ball on the downward swipe of his follow-through, analyzing and correcting the way he held his hand aloft as he watched the ball sink through the net.
Buzelis quickly learned that no shot was ever truly perfect. There was always something to fix — the proximity of his hand to his right eye, the positioning of his feet in correlation to his hips, the weight of the breath he inhaled before releasing his shot.
“The attention to detail here — you don’t even realize how different it can be,” Buzelis said.
The payoff has been nearly immediate. Donovan maximizes the shot-making potential of his youngest players such as Buzelis and Julian Phillips by creating their 3-point opportunities in the corner, leaving above-the-break 3s to sharpshooters Zach LaVine and Coby White. And as a result, Buzelis is shooting 34.3% on 3-pointers, averaging at least one made 3 in the last 10-game stretch.
Shooting isn’t the solution for Buzelis. The Bulls drafted him for his decisiveness, his willingness to charge headfirst to the rim. But in the early weeks of the season, this part of his game mostly stalled out. Buzelis couldn’t figure out how to get around or shoot over or fight through NBA defenders, who were bigger and stronger and faster than any competition he had ever faced.
“It sounds obvious but, like, everyone in the NBA is so good,” Buzelis said.
Part of the challenge is bulking up. Buzelis is no pushover, but he weighed in at only 209 pounds (on a 6-foot-10 frame) when he entered the NBA. That’s a fairly standard challenge for a teenager — and one that only can be fixed in the kitchen. The Bulls didn’t put Buzelis on a diet, but they instructed the rookie to consume as many calories as possible, packing snacks and endless protein shakes into his daily routine.
But the issue is also tactical. For a while, Buzelis couldn’t get on the court because he couldn’t keep up mentally. He couldn’t create anything off the dribble, got lost in defensive rotations. Donovan would insert him into a rotation, then yank him when he clearly was flailing underwater.
Fans began to grow impatient after Buzelis went down to the G League to play in the season opener for Windy City. But Buzelis wasn’t worried. He knew what was coming — he just needed a little time.
“You can always grow,” Buzelis said. “You don’t have to be on the court. You can watch the whole game and learn. Of course you can learn a lot more when being on the court — but every opportunity, you can learn something.”
After the Dec. 13 win over the Charlotte Hornets, Donovan couldn’t help but crack a wry smile. Buzelis was frustrated. He had shot 1-for-11 from the floor. But to Donovan, it was the best 9.1%-shooting game he could have envisioned for the rookie.
Buzelis never stopped trying to get to the rim. He threw himself straight into the brick wall of Mark Williams’ chest, tried and failed to dodge through traffic in the lane. None of it worked. And that was OK. All that mattered to Donovan was the trying and what came of it — five rebounds, three blocks, three assists — even in the face of frustration.
“At 19 years old, he’s going to get hit — and he’s going to get hit in a way he’s never been hit before,” Donovan said. “It’s not quite finding a new identity, but it’s finding a new way to do things. And I’m not worried about him finding it.”
There’s a third step, of course, to Buzelis’ plan: Become a star.
Buzelis doesn’t talk much about this part of the equation. It’s still early, after all. He’s still trying to figure out who he wants to be in the NBA — as a person and a public figure, not just a basketball player. But that doesn’t detract from how seriously Buzelis takes the business of being an NBA player.
Earlier this year, he connected with NBA legend Shaquille O’Neal while filming a documentary after his draft process. O’Neal immediately bought into Buzelis as a player. Within months, O’Neal had brought Buzelis on board with Reebok, a brand attempting to reenter the basketball shoe industry after years of detachment from the game.
Reebok doesn’t have much of a foothold in the NBA yet — in fact, Buzelis is the only Reebok athlete in the league. But that’s perfect for Buzelis. He doesn’t want to blend in.
“I’m trying to start a new trend,” Buzelis said. “I’m not trying to be like everyone else.”
At his core, Buzelis wants to stay the same person he always has been — which is why he doesn’t mind keeping close to home.
A small sliver of ink wraps around Buzelis’ left wrist, an intricate outline of a rosary detailed with the names of his father, mother, brother and sister — Aidas, Kristina, Vincas and Sophia. The tattoo was a new addition for Buzelis before his rookie season, a reflection of the crucial role his family played in his development on and off the court.
His father and mother — both former basketball players in Lithuania — operated as part of his management team ahead of the draft, preparing him for interviews and workouts alike. His little brother was the first to hear his decision to try for an NBA roster, a plan that started as a dream wished up on their hoop at home.
Now, Buzelis is living that dream — but he’s quick to remind that this is just the beginning.
The Bulls are in a transitional period as they consider a future without star Zach LaVine. And that future will most likely be centered around young talent like Buzelis. The rookie understands the potential underlying this moment — both for himself and for the Bulls as a franchise.
“We’re building something,” Buzelis said. “People just gotta watch.”