AT&T and Verizon lose Supreme Court case over fines for selling location data
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Clarence Thomas is simply one of the most disgusting human beings on the face of the Earth.
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Is anybody surprised who the "1" was in the 8-1 decision? Have there been any decisions lately that were 8-1 and the 1 wasn't the Lord High Shitbag of the SCOTUS?
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Thomas is lying.
His only principle is: Corporations are more important than people, so money must flow toward corporations, never away from them.
His only principle is: Corporations are more important than people, so money must flow toward corporations, never away from them.
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I see it was Clarence “no conduct is too egregious for me to approve of” Thomas who sided with the carriers.
No shock there.
No shock there.
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I'm more stunned that someone - anyone - actually paid an FCC fine. They have a grand history of ignoring them not being paid in the first place.
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Oh, Clarence, Clarence... If only you would bring your brand of judicial activism more in line with the Constitution.
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His speech just recently in Texas is an interesting one to listen too.
It shows how incredibly unhinged his views are, particularly given how he will bow to the corporations... every. single. time.
It shows how incredibly unhinged his views are, particularly given how he will bow to the corporations... every. single. time.
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So basically all governmental agency penalties are now reduced to "pay up or take us to court or we'll take you to court". I suppose that's still better than vacating all power for regulatory agencies to actually regulate, but boy does it mean a lot more cases will go to court giving violators yet more chances to weasel out of being held responsible
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I remember watching the congressional hearings when he was nominated. He's a sexist fuck who was sued by Anita Hill for sexual harassment during his confirmation hearings.
Instead of answering to multiple the allegations he diatribed about a miscarriage of justice.
Remember, this highly conservative fuckwit was nominated by GHW Bush as a token for the Democrats to put up or shut up about equality. He's been a disgrace to the judiciary ever since.
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Term Limits, mandatory retirement age and strict ethics requirements.
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The Bill of Rights means what it says, there's a right to due process and to jury trials in civil cases. Otherwise there's not anything stopping Congress from more or less arbitrarily fining people (or inflicting other types of administrative punishment).
You'd think that after a year or two of Trump people would have realized that giving the federal government such wide and arbitrary powers over commerce was a bad idea!
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Finally John Roberts makes sense. Probably a neo-luddite texted him and said we know where you are. The fine is a pittance.
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Lately is always tricky with SCOTUS, but Samuel Alito has some crazy ones. Keep in mind he wrote an aggressive screed implicating that nobody should be able to stop Trump, but wrote a crazy solo dissent that Texas should be able to sue the Biden admin to require them to arrest more immigrants.
And he's always good for being angry that criminals have any rights or the government must follow any rules with regards to them. This one is a little obscure, but on point. Of that any search might be illegal: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4501697/collins-v-virginia/
Also very upset that the Affordable Care Act might actually work: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4748669/maine-community-health-options-v-united-states/
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He is just one of a long line of misogynistic harassers that have conned their way into positions of power in our "glorious" 250-year history while also claiming to defenders and protectors of the vision of our founding fathers who were also of the same ilk, just not all of them.
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Does anyone think a jury trial with angry Verizon and ATT customers would be a better outcome than the industry friendly FCC?
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At least for the crazy solo dissent, @Tobold could you elaborate why it was crazy? I am not even remotely a lawyer, but it actually reads as sensible to me (scary, because I am not a fan of Alito). His argument seemed to be "We can prove Texas had financial impacts because of the decision, and the Feds have to be held responsible for them." But I'd love more context from someone better informed. It's certainly daffy in light of any other verdicts that Trump shouldn't be stopped.
How does the ACA dissent show he is upset it could actually work? Again, asking because I don't understand and am curious, not because I think you are wrong. It reads to me like some really dense minutiae about what sets up a requirement to pay for laws. If Congress passed a law that required an expenditure, how could it be interpreted that they didn't allocate the funds? Unless it goes back to our ridiculous system of Congress making financial commitments and then separately having to fund them, maybe?
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Seeing as the SCOTUS is Article III core, it'd take a pretty solid set of amendments to do this. Once you start trying to make one of the three co-equal branches not...it gets sticky. Not impossible, we changed how Senators are elected but I don't think we'll ever see another amendment.
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I guess they didn't donate pay enough to the current administration to have the case dismissed.
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UndulatingKittenTail
Smack-Fu Master, in training
for context, the relevant part of Article 3: "The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their Offices during good Behaviour, and shall, at stated Times, receive for their Services, a Compensation, which shall not be diminished during their Continuance in Office."
I'm not a lawyer or constitutional scholar, but it does seem like amendments would be required [for the proposed changes above] unless Congress decides to start being creative with how they write the laws and enforcement mechanisms governing the court (and got the executive to play along), or they packed the court along with the executive with people who believe the "good Behaviour" is a different standard than the impeachment standards outlined in Article 2 and use that to legislature more stringent requirements of what it means.
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More possible would just be to cut back their jurisdiction back to only those things required by the Constitution... and maybe if we're feeling generous they can also have appellate jurisdiction over 18th amendment cases as well...
Ultimate appellate jurisdiction for everything else could be done by some form of randomly selected panel of circuit judges.
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Texas was suing to force the federal government to choose a particular policy choice. Imagine if Maine sued to force the US to sign a treaty or Iowa sued to force the US to support Palestine. Our Constitution leaves that choice to the Feds and the idea that states could sue the federal government is fucking nuts. It's why no other justice was willing to sign onto his rant.
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That isn't necessarily true. See https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/19/opinion/supreme-court-tenure.html. There is a difference of between between constitutional experts as to whether a simple law is sufficient.
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OK, but that law would be appealed to... well, you know where that's going.
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Unnecessary. this is just theatrics. The fines are insignificant compaired to the massive government handouts given to telecoms. AT&T is still on target to be the largest recipient of BEAD.
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If Congress made it a crime to hold a SCOTUS seat for more than a certain number of years, that would mean any justice failing to resign before that time period is now committing a criminal act, which surely is not Good Behavior.
But SCOTUS would probably rule that such an act is unconstitutional since it's trying to do an end run around the constitution's explicit lack of a term limit.
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SubWoofer2
Ars Tribunus Militum
In plain English, AT&T and Verizon's own lawyers went in to bat using an argument which says "Our clients' reputations are worth less than $20".
This is their own lawyers saying that.
If the people you are paying are saying your reputation is not worth shit, you really are in a bad place.
All those people who are Verizon and At&T customers can now feel validated. And validated by biglaw lawyers, no less!
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If I squint, this looks like they're saying that all fines without a trial are requests, and can only be enforced after a trial with a jury, for amounts over $20. Applied to traffic fines...
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Fines imposed by the FCC. The only traffic ticket they’ll give you is for using a cell jammer while driving.
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The Reich Wing may actually try for an amendment to bring slavery back, since so many of them still remain quite angry that the confederacy lost the civil war. Note their quite extensive efforts today to remove black voters from the ability to vote in presidential elections. And moronic Mark Robinson isn't the only pro-slavery goon in politics, although he may be the only black one. He is quite insane, but that is a solid requirement in today's GQP.
https://tucson.com/news/nation-worl...cle_4c01edc7-585d-5c43-bdd2-4c60af5edf54.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/05/opinion/voting-rights-act-black-voters-south.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...d-soon-lose-their-seats-they-wont-go-quietly/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/interactive/2022/congress-slaveowners-names-list/
https://people.com/politics/new-pro...-the-u-s-congressmen-who-owned-slaves-offers/
https://247wallst.com/special-repor...s-who-served-in-congress-in-the-20th-century/
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The way it usually works with traffic fines is that if you don't pay the fines, your license gets suspended or revoked. And then if you continue to drive, that's a big kid crime.
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Isn't the whole point of these Commissions to NOT gum up the works in the Judiciary and/or need to write a law for EVERY potential issue in Legislature?
And then they would complain that it's taking so long to figure out what to do with the money and they would spend how much on lawyers and the government's taxpayer dollars to prevent the fine? Then when they won for some godawful reason they'd ask for the cost of Defense to be funded back to them.
Ain't no party like the Republican Party I guess.
And then they would complain that it's taking so long to figure out what to do with the money and they would spend how much on lawyers and the government's taxpayer dollars to prevent the fine? Then when they won for some godawful reason they'd ask for the cost of Defense to be funded back to them.
Ain't no party like the Republican Party I guess.
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It would be nice if Clarence "Uncle" Thomas's RV skidded on some loose gravel and fell off a cliff.
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There's a difference between being smart, and being wise.
Being smart (Clarence Thomas) is using your intelligence to benefit yourself (no matter whether that be at someone else's expense).
Being wise is using your intelligence to benefit others, and benefit yourself only as long as it doesn't occur at someone else's expense.
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You do have a right to a trial in case of traffic tickets. Always have. Or you can just pay it voluntarily. If Ive read correctly, this is also like that.
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