Jonathan F. Mitchell | |
---|---|
Solicitor General of Texas | |
In office December 10, 2010 –January 5, 2015 | |
Attorney General | Greg Abbott |
Preceded by | James C. Ho |
Succeeded by | Scott A. Keller |
Personal details | |
Born | Jonathan Franklin Mitchell September 2,1976 Upland,Pennsylvania,U.S. |
Education | Wheaton College (BA) University of Chicago (JD) |
Jonathan Franklin Mitchell (born September 2,1976) [1] is an American lawyer,academic,and legal theorist [2] [3] who served as the Solicitor General of Texas from 2010 [4] to 2015. He has argued seven cases before the Supreme Court of the United States. [5] Mitchell has served on the faculties of Stanford Law School,the University of Texas School of Law,the George Mason University School of Law,and the University of Chicago Law School. [1] In 2018,he opened a private solo legal practice in Austin,Texas. [6]
Mitchell devised the novel enforcement mechanism in the Texas Heartbeat Act,also known as Senate Bill 8 (or SB 8),which outlaws abortion after cardiac activity is detected and avoids judicial review by prohibiting government officials from enforcing the statute and empowering private citizens to bring lawsuits against those who violate it. [7] [8] On September 1,2021,the Supreme Court of the United States refused to enjoin the enforcement of SB 8,marking the first time that a state had successfully imposed a pre-viability abortion ban since Roe v. Wade . [9]
Mitchell also represented former president Donald Trump when Colorado tried to exclude him from the 2024 presidential ballot. [10]
Mitchell was born and raised in Pennsylvania and is the oldest of seven brothers. [11] He graduated from Wheaton College in 1998 with a B.A.,summa cum laude. [12] He then graduated from the University of Chicago Law School,where he was an articles editor for the University of Chicago Law Review . [13] He graduated in 2001 with a Juris Doctor with high honors and Order of the Coif membership. [14]
After graduating from law school,Mitchell worked as a law clerk for Judge J. Michael Luttig of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit from 2001 to 2002 and for Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia from 2002 to 2003. [1] After clerking,Mitchell became an attorney-adviser in the Office of Legal Counsel of the United States Department of Justice,where he worked from 2003 through 2006. [15]
After leaving the Department of Justice,Mitchell served as a visiting professor at the University of Chicago Law School from 2006 to 2008. [1] He then worked as a professor at the George Mason University School of Law (now Antonin Scalia Law School) until his appointment as Solicitor General of Texas in 2010. [1] After leaving the Texas Solicitor General's office in 2015,Mitchell served as the Searle Visiting Professor of Law at the University of Texas School of Law,before joining the Hoover Institution as a visiting fellow in 2015. [1] Mitchell also served as a visiting professor of law at Stanford Law School before opening his own law firm in 2018. [1] [15] [16]
Mitchell has published scholarship on textualism,national-security law,criminal law and procedure,judicial review,judicial federalism,and the legality of stare decisis in constitutional adjudication. [1] [17]
In 2017,President Donald J. Trump nominated Mitchell to chair the Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS). [15] Mitchell’s nomination was voted out of committee,but never received a vote on the Senate floor. [18]
Mitchell has argued seven times before the Supreme Court of the United States [5] and authored the principal merits brief in ten Supreme Court cases.
Mitchell has also written and submitted more than 20 amicus curiae briefs in the Supreme Court. In Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization ,Mitchell and Adam K. Mortara urged the Supreme Court to overrule Roe v. Wade ,and their brief argued that overturning Roe should undermine and eventually lead to the reversal of other "lawless" court decisions such as Obergefell v. Hodges ,which created a right to same-sex marriage. At the same time,Mitchell and Mortara distinguished and defended the right to interracial marriage recognized in Loving v. Virginia ,and argued that the federal right to interracial marriage should be grounded in congressional statutes such as the Civil Rights Act of 1866 rather than court-created substantive-due-process doctrines. [19] [20]
Mitchell also submitted an amicus brief in Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College ,which urged the Supreme Court to declare race-based affirmative action unlawful solely under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964,without reaching the "much closer question" concerning the constitutionality of affirmative action under the Equal Protection Clause. [21] [22]
On February 8,2024,Mitchell represented former president Donald J. Trump before the Supreme Court in Trump v. Anderson , [23] and urged the Court to reverse the Colorado Supreme Court's decision that declared Trump ineligible for the presidency under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. [10] In an unsigned per curiam opinion issued March 4,2024,the Court unanimously ruled in favor of former President Trump,holding that Congress has the exclusive ability to enforce Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment. [24] [25]
On July 2,2024,Mitchell sued Northwestern University over its alleged use of race and sex preferences in faculty hiring. [26] In this lawsuit,Mitchell is representing an organization called Faculty,Alumni,and Students Opposed to Racial Preferences (or FASORP), [27] which litigates against race and sex preferences and opposes practices that subordinate academic merit to diversity considerations. The complaint accuses Northwestern University of violating numerous federal anti-discrimination statutes,including Title VI, [28] Title IX, [29] and 42 U.S.C. §1981. [30]
In 2021,the Texas legislature enacted the Texas Heartbeat Act or Senate Bill 8 (SB 8),which bans abortion at approximately six weeks of pregnancy and includes an unusual enforcement mechanism designed to insulate the law from judicial review. Rather than allowing state officials to enforce the ban,the statute authorizes private citizens to sue anyone who performs or assists a post-heartbeat abortion,while forbidding the state and its officers to enforce the law in any way. [31] By designing the statute in this manner,the legislature sought to make it impossible for abortion providers to challenge SB 8 in pre-enforcement lawsuits. [32]
On September 1,2021,the Supreme Court of the United States refused to enjoin the enforcement of SB 8 on account of the “complex and novel antecedent procedural questions”presented by this enforcement mechanism. [9] The courts eventually ruled that abortion providers could not challenge the constitutionality of SB 8 in pre-enforcement lawsuits;they must instead wait to be sued in state court by a private individual and assert their constitutional claims as a defense in those state-court proceedings. [33] [34] News outlets reported that Mitchell designed the enforcement mechanism that allowed SB 8 to evade judicial review and outlaw abortion in Texas despite the statute’s incompatibility with Roe v. Wade . [7] [8]
SB 8's efforts to stymie judicial review have been a matter of intense controversy. [35] Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor denounced the statute as “a breathtaking act of defiance”that hinders the judiciary from counteracting a “flagrantly unconstitutional law”, [9] while anti-abortion commentators have praised the statute for its novel design and its successful circumvention of Roe v. Wade . [36] The success of SB 8 was a major blow to Roe v. Wade ,as it enabled other states to ban abortion and evade judicial review by copying the statute's novel enforcement mechanism. [37] [38]
Roe v. Wade,410 U.S. 113 (1973),was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the Constitution of the United States protected a right to have an abortion. The decision struck down many abortion laws,and it sparked an ongoing abortion debate in the United States about whether,or to what extent,abortion should be legal,who should decide the legality of abortion,and what the role of moral and religious views in the political sphere should be. The decision also shaped debate concerning which methods the Supreme Court should use in constitutional adjudication.
Lawrence v. Texas,539 U.S. 558 (2003),is a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that U.S. state laws criminalizing sodomy between consenting adults are unconstitutional. The Court reaffirmed the concept of a "right to privacy" that earlier cases had found the U.S. Constitution provides,even though it is not explicitly enumerated. It based its ruling on the notions of personal autonomy to define one's own relationships and of American traditions of non-interference with any or all forms of private sexual activities between consenting adults.
In the United States,abortion is a divisive issue in politics and culture wars,though a majority of Americans support access to abortion. Abortion laws vary widely from state to state.
John Glover Roberts Jr. is an American jurist serving since 2005 as the 17th chief justice of the United States. He has been described as having a moderate conservative judicial philosophy,though he is primarily an institutionalist. Regarded as a swing vote in some cases,Roberts has presided over an ideological shift toward conservative jurisprudence on the high court,in which he has authored key opinions.
Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of Northern New England,546 U.S. 320 (2006),was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States involving a facial challenge to New Hampshire's parental notification abortion law. The First Circuit had ruled that the law was unconstitutional and an injunction against its enforcement was proper. The Supreme Court vacated this judgment and remanded the case,but avoided a substantive ruling on the challenged law or a reconsideration of prior Supreme Court abortion precedent. Instead,the Court only addressed the issue of remedy,holding that invalidating a statute in its entirety "is not always necessary or justified,for lower courts may be able to render narrower declaratory and injunctive relief."
The Roberts Court is the time since 2005 during which the Supreme Court of the United States has been led by John Roberts as Chief Justice. Roberts succeeded William Rehnquist as Chief Justice after Rehnquist's death.
The legality of abortion in the United States and the various restrictions imposed on the procedure vary significantly,depending on the laws of each state or other jurisdiction,although there is no uniform federal law. Some states prohibit abortion at all stages of pregnancy,with few exceptions;others permit it up to a certain point in a woman's pregnancy,while some allow abortion throughout a woman's pregnancy. In states where abortion is legal,several classes of restrictions on the procedure may exist,such as parental consent or notification laws,requirements that patients be shown an ultrasound before obtaining an abortion,mandatory waiting periods,and counseling requirements.
Abortion in Oklahoma is illegal unless the abortion is necessary to save the life of a pregnant individual.
Abortion in Texas is illegal in most cases. There are nominally exceptions to save the mother's life,or prevent "substantial impairment of major bodily function",but the law on abortion in Texas is written in such an ambiguous way that life-threatening or harmful pregnancies do not explicitly constitute an exception. Attempts to clarify and codify these exceptions into law have been rejected by Republican lawmakers in Texas.
Matthew Joseph Kacsmaryk is an American lawyer who serves as a United States district judge in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas. He was nominated to the position by President Donald Trump in 2017 and sworn in for the position in 2019.
Abortion in Connecticut is legal up to the point of fetal viability,or after that if necessary to preserve the life or health of the pregnant individual. A poll by the Pew Research Center found that 67 percent of adults in the state believed that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. The 2023 American Values Atlas reported that,in their most recent survey,72% of people from Connecticut said that abortion should be legal in all or most cases.
Abortion in Mississippi is illegal. The new law took effect on July 7,2022,after Mississippi State Attorney General Lynn Fitch certified on June 27,the Supreme Court decision on Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization on June 24 of that year. State Attorney General Lynn Fitch's certification made Mississippi's 2007 'trigger law' go into effect and ban all abortions in the state,“except in the case where necessary for the preservation of the mother's life or where the pregnancy was caused by rape".
Abortion in Nevada is legal up to the 24th week of pregnancy,under the Nevada Revised Statutes chapter 442,section 250;and after 24 weeks if the pregnancy could be fatal for the mother. 62% of adults said in a 2014 poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal while 34% said it should by illegal in all or most cases. The 2023 American Values Atlas reported that,in their most recent survey,76% of Nevadans said that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Legislation by 2007 required informed consent. Attempts were successfully made to pass abortion legislation in May 2019,being pushed through a largely Democratic controlled state legislature. The number of abortion clinics in Nevada has declined over the years,with 25 in 1982,seventeen in 1992 and thirteen in 2014. There were 8,132 legal abortions in 2014,and 7,116 in 2015. Due to the high level of support for abortion rights in the state,continued access to abortion is supported by all parties,including the Republicans.
Abortion in North Dakota is technically legal,but with no current providers. The state's sole abortion clinic,the Red River Women's Clinic,relocated to Minnesota.
Abortion in Utah is legally performed under a temporary restraining order blocking enforcement of the state's trigger law,which bans abortion. According to HB136,which is effective state law from June 28,2022,abortions are banned following 18 weeks of gestation. Abortion was banned following the Supreme Court case,Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization on June 24,2022. Utah State Legislation enacted SB 174 in May 2020,which,upon the overturn of Roe v. Wade,made inducing an abortion a second-degree felony. The law includes exceptions for pregnancies "caused by rape or incest," pregnancies that put the mother's life at risk,or "if two doctors say the fetus has a lethal defect." Rape and incest exceptions will only be viable if the crimes were previously reported to law enforcement officials.
Abortion in Wisconsin has been legal since September 18,2023,before which its legal status had been unclear since the overturn of Roe v Wade,and is performed in Madison,Milwaukee and Sheboygan through 22 weeks gestation. However,elective abortions in Wisconsin are under dispute after the overturning of Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court of the United States on June 24,2022. Abortion opponents cite an 1849 law that they claim bans the procedure in all cases except when the life of the mother is in danger. However,lower level courts have argued that the law only applies to infanticide and not consensual abortions. The enforceability of the law is disputed and being considered by the state courts. Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin announced that they would resume abortion services in Madison and Milwaukee on September 18,2023. Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin later announced that they would resume abortion services in Sheboygan on December 28,2023.
Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization,597 U.S. 215 (2022),is a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the court held that the Constitution of the United States does not confer a right to abortion. The court's decision overruled both Roe v. Wade (1973) and Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992),returning to the federal and state legislatures the power to regulate any aspect of abortion not protected by federal statutory law.
The Texas Heartbeat Act,Senate Bill 8,is an act of the Texas Legislature that bans abortion after the detection of embryonic or fetal cardiac activity,which normally occurs after about six weeks of pregnancy. The law took effect on September 1,2021,after the U.S. Supreme Court denied a request for emergency relief from Texas abortion providers. It was the first time a state has successfully imposed a six-week abortion ban since Roe v. Wade,and the first abortion restriction to rely solely on enforcement by private individuals through civil lawsuits,rather than having state officials enforce the law with criminal or civil penalties. The act authorizes members of the public to sue anyone who performs or facilitates an illegal abortion for a minimum of $10,000 in statutory damages per abortion,plus court costs and attorneys' fees.
Whole Woman's Health v. Jackson,595 U.S. ___ (2021),was a United States Supreme Court case brought by Texas abortion providers and abortion rights advocates that challenged the constitutionality of the Texas Heartbeat Act,a law that outlaws abortions after six weeks. The Texas Heartbeat Act prohibits state officials from enforcing the ban but authorizes private individuals to enforce the law by suing anyone who performs,aids,or abets an abortion after six weeks. The law was structured this way to evade pre-enforcement judicial review because lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of state statutes are typically brought against state officials who are charged with enforcing the law,as the state itself cannot be sued under the doctrine of sovereign immunity.
United States v. Texas,595 U.S. ___ (2021),was a United States Supreme Court case that involved the Texas Heartbeat Act,also known as Senate Bill 8 or SB8,a state law that bans abortion once a "fetal heartbeat" is detected,typically six weeks into pregnancy. A unique feature of the Act,and challenges to it,is the delegation of enforcement to any and all private individuals who are authorized by the Act to file civil actions against abortion providers who violate it,and aiders and abetters,while state and local officials are prohibited from doing so. Opponents stated that the Act went against the landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade,which,prior to its overturn in 2022,banned states from prohibiting abortions during the first trimester of pregnancy in favor of the woman's right to privacy guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.