SCOTUS Cert Recap: SCOTUS Adds Eight Issues to Its Docket, Including Appellate Procedure, Religious Accommodations in Employment, Civil Forfeiture, Free Speech, and the False Claims Act

On January 13, the Supreme Court agreed to consider the following questions:

To preserve the issue for appeal, must a party reassert, in a post-trial motion, a purely legal issue rejected at summary judgment?

Should the Court overrule its earlier decision that Title VII does not require an employer to grant a religious accommodation where doing so would impose “more than a de minimis cost” and instead adopt a standard that would require such accommodations in more circumstances? 

Do the Takings and Excessive Fines clauses allow the government to forfeit property to satisfy a debt, sell the property for more than the amount of the debt, and retain the surplus?

To establish that a statement is a “true threat” unprotected by the First Amendment, must the government show the speaker subjectively knew or intended the statement to be a threat, or merely that an objectively reasonable person would perceive the statement as threatening?

Are a defendant’s subjective beliefs about the lawfulness of its conduct relevant to whether it “knowingly” submitted a false claim under the False Claims Act?

Does a foreign plaintiff state a cognizable civil claim under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) when it alleges an injury to intangible property?

Does the U.S. Bankruptcy Code abrogate Indian tribal sovereign immunity?

To qualify as “an offense relating to obstruction of justice” that renders an alien subject to removal under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), must the offense have a nexus with a pending investigation or judicial proceeding?