In Crowther v. Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia, the justices granted certiorari to resolve a circuit split on the issue. The case involves an art professor and a women’s basketball coach at two public Georgia universities who alleged they were victims of sex discrimination. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit dismissed their claims, with Chief Judge William Pryor writing that the statute’s text bars exclusion from participation or denial of benefits but contains no indication of congressional intent to allow employees to sue.
"[N]othing about that language," Pryor wrote, "indicates congressional intent to provide a private right of action to employees of educational institutions."
The employees appealed to the Supreme Court, which asked the Trump administration to weigh in. In a brief filed on April 9, U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer agreed that the court should take up the case. He sided with the university that the court of appeals’ decision was correct, but he contended that because the lower courts are divided on this question, the justices should nonetheless grant the employees’ petition for review.
The justices will hear arguments sometime on the issue.
In a separate order released Monday, the court sent two Voting Rights Act cases back to the lower courts for reconsideration in light of its April 29 decision in Louisiana v. Callais, which substantially narrowed the reach of Section 2 of the act.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented in both cases, Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians v. Howe and State Board of Election Commissioners v. Mississippi State Conference of the NAACP. She indicated she would have left the lower court’s ruling in the Mississippi case in place and reversed the decision in the Native Americans’ case, based on the Supreme Court’s 1996 decision in Morse v. Republican Party of Virginia.
In her dissents, Jackson wrote that the cases "present[] only the question of Section 2’s private enforceability, which our decision in Louisiana v. Callais … did not address."
The court also turned down a group of cases filed by drug companies challenging the Drug Price Negotiation Program, a 2022 program that instructs the Health and Human Services Secretary to negotiate prices with drug manufacturers. The companies argued the law violates the nondelegation doctrine and the Constitution’s guarantee of due process. The lower courts rejected those arguments, and the Supreme Court denied their petitions without comment.
The justices also denied review in a lawsuit seeking to hold X, formerly known as Twitter, responsible for its role in allowing child pornography to remain on its platform.
The justices will meet for another private conference on Thursday, May 21. Orders from that conference are expected on Tuesday, May 26, at 9:30 a.m. EDT.