Revisiting My Authorship Predictions And Making More Predictions

Today the Court decided four more cases, including three opinions by Justice Alito. How did my predictions from Tuesday fare?

There were no cases decided today from December. I still think the Chief Justice has Trump v. Slaughter. Now that Alito has six opinions for the term, I think he is done. Justice Kavanaugh almost certainly has NRSC v. FEC. But if Alito has NRSC, then my theory about his losing the majority in Hamm fails.

Today the Court decided Wolford from the January sitting. Alito wrote the majority opinion. Outstanding are the two transgender sports cases and Cook. So far, Roberts, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh have not written from that sitting. I think Gorsuch is done for the term with seven majority. My thought on Tuesday was that Barrett, a former student athlete, would write both athletics cases while the Chief writes Cook. (Clarification: Barrett did not play college sports, but did participate in track and field in middle school.) But maybe Roberts may write the transgender cases, as he wrote Skrmetti. Then, Justice Kavanaugh may write a “The Fed is different” opinion for Cook.

The February sitting is done.

No new cases today were decided from March. I still think Roberts has Barbara. I wrote that Alito has Watson, but he wrote Al Otroe Lado from that sitting. I think it unlikely that Justice Thomas has the majority in Watson, so the election case will likely go to Justice Barrett. I’m not sure how ACB votes here, so it is a tossup.

For April, my prediction on Monsanto was completely wrong. I thought there might be a shot the plaintiffs win, but it wasn’t close. They only got Gorsuch and Jackson. Justice Kagan has Chartie. It should be a fun Fourth Amendment case to read.

There are seven remaining cases. We know there is a session on Monday, and maybe the Court will wrap up on Tuesday to avoid spilling into July.

May the odds ever be in your favor.