MEMO: THE SUPREME COURT HAS TARGETED CORE RIGHTS BY REVOKING REMEDIES

While the American people were focused on disastrous Supreme Court rulings on abortion, gun safety, and climate action, the right-wing majority issued a series of decisions hamstringing our rights through remedies restrictions.

This summer, all eyes have rightfully been on three hugely influential (and disastrous) rulings from the Supreme Court on abortion, gun safety, and climate protections. But that means some of the right-wing Court’s other heinous decisions have garnered much less attention — despite their frightening implications.

Before attention turns to the next term, we want to draw focus to a steady, insidious, and dangerous pattern the Supreme Court engaged in across its 2021-2022 term: revoking remedies. 

Remedies are a means of enforcing rights by taking cases to courts. But this term, the Supreme Court issued a series of decisions that hamstrung core rights through remedies restrictions. 

This term, the Court swung at: 

  • The Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel

  • The Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable search and seizure

  • Miranda rights read during arrests

  • The rights of asylum applicants and other noncitizens

  • The habeas rights of those fighting wrongful convictions

  • The rights of people with disabilities and those facing discrimination

By making it more difficult to vindicate our rights — and by removing consequences for those who violate them — the Court made it more likely that those rights will be trampled. These backdoor methods are an attempt to obfuscate the Court’s attacks on uncontroversial precedent and protections that have been in place for generations.