The Supreme Court’s Spring 2026 term produced a series of decisions that are likely to influence the regulatory, enforcement and litigation landscape for years to come.
The Court redrew the lines of power between the White House and the agencies that regulate American business, freeing presidents to fire most independent agency heads at will, while carving out a narrow exception for the Federal Reserve. Alongside those separation-of-powers rulings, the Court closed off several paths for private lawsuits, extended Fourth Amendment protection to cellphone location data and strengthened federal preemption defenses for regulated manufacturers.
In this Q&A, Bracewell’s appellate team breaks down 10 consequential decision from the 2026 term. Together, these rulings provide important guidance for businesses, regulated entities, financial institutions and litigants navigating an increasingly complex legal environment.
At a Glance
- Trump v. Slaughter – Overruled Humphrey’s Executor, holding for-cause removal protections for FTC commissioners unconstitutional.
- Trump v. Cook – Denied a stay blocking Trump’s removal of Fed Governor Lisa Cook, suggesting the Fed may be exempt from Slaughter.
- FS Credit Opportunities v. Saba Capital – Held Investment Company Act Section 47(b) creates no implied private right of action.
- Sripetch v. SEC – Held the SEC can seek disgorgement without proving actual investor losses.
- FCC v. AT&T/Verizon – Held FCC forfeiture penalties don’t violate Seventh Amendment jury trial rights.
- Fernandez v. United States – Held conviction challenges must proceed under habeas, not compassionate-release motions.
- Abouammo v. United States – Held venue for document falsification lies where the falsification occurred.
- Hunter v. United States – Held appellate waivers are unenforceable when they would cause a miscarriage of justice.
- Chatrie v. United States – Held geofence warrant data collection constitutes a Fourth Amendment search.
- Keathley v. Buddy Ayers Construction – Held judicial estoppel requires a totality-of-the-circumstances analysis, not an automatic bar.
- Monsanto Co. v. Durnell – Held FIFRA preempts state failure-to-warn claims contradicting EPA’s cancer-risk determinat.
Regulatory
What Does Trump v. Slaughter Mean for Independent Federal Agencies?
Trump v. Slaughter (No. 25-332)
The Court held, 6-3, that statutory restrictions on the president’s ability to remove Federal Trade Commission (FTC) commissioners without cause violate the separation of powers.
In March 2025, President Trump removed FTC Commissioners Rebecca Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya without invoking any of the “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance” grounds the FTC Act requires, telling them only that their continued service was “inconsistent with [his] Administration’s priorities.” On June 29, 2026, the Court agreed the removal was lawful, overruling the nearly 90-year-old precedent of Humphrey’s Executor v. United States and holding that commissioners at commission-style agencies exercising executive power serve at the President’s pleasure.
- Key Takeaway: The decision significantly reduces the independence of so-called independent regulatory agencies and could reshape the structure and operation of agencies that have historically operated with limited political oversight. However, Trump v. Cook (No. 25A312), decided the same day as Slaughter, provides a potentially important limitation on Slaughter’s scope.
Can the President Remove Federal Reserve Governors at Will?
Not for now. The Court declined, 5-4, to stay an injunction that prevents the President from removing Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook.
In August 2025, President Trump attempted to fire Cook over mortgage-fraud allegations Cook denies. A federal district court blocked the removal, and on June 29, 2026, the same day it decided Slaughter, the Court left that injunction in place while the case proceeds, emphasizing the Federal Reserve’s unique historical independence and Cook’s entitlement to notice and an opportunity to respond before any for-cause removal takes effect. The Court concluded that the Governor was entitled to statutory protections and procedural safeguards before termination.
- Key Takeaway: While Slaughter expanded presidential removal authority over many agencies, Cook suggests that the Federal Reserve may remain a special case due to its historical independence and unique role.
Can Private Investors Sue Under Section 47(b) of the Investment Company Act?
FS Credit Opportunities Corp. v. Saba Capital Master Fund, Ltd. (No. 24-345)
No. The Court held, 6-3, that Section 47(b) of the Investment Company Act (ICA), which authorizes claims to rescind contracts allegedly violating the Act, does not create an implied private right of action for investors.
Activist investor Saba Capital sued several closed-end funds after they adopted Maryland control-share provisions limiting large shareholders’ voting power, arguing the provisions violated the ICA and seeking rescission under Section 47(b), which says a “court may not deny rescission” of a contract that violates the Act. On June 11, 2026, the Court held that this language governs remedies rather than creating a cause of action — and that because the ICA already grants two other express private rights of action elsewhere, Congress “knew how” to create one when it wanted to and chose not to here.
- Key Takeaway: The ruling narrows private enforcement of the ICA and may reduce litigation risk for investment funds and other regulated entities subject to the Act.
Can the SEC Obtain Disgorgement Without Proving That Investors Lost Money?
Yes. The Court unanimously held that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) may obtain disgorgement without showing that investors suffered a pecuniary loss.
Ongkaruck Sripetch and several associated penny-stock companies were sued by the SEC for orchestrating a pump-and-dump scheme, and the agency sought disgorgement of more than $4.1 million in ill-gotten gains even though it could not identify specific investors who lost money as a result. Sripetch argued that disgorgement requires proof of investor pecuniary loss, but on June 4, 2026, the Court held that disgorgement is available as an equitable remedy regardless of whether investors can show a quantifiable financial loss.
- Key Takeaway: The ruling preserves a powerful SEC enforcement tool and makes disgorgement available even when investor losses cannot be readily quantified.
Can the FCC Impose Monetary Penalties Without a Jury Trial?
FCC v. AT&T/Verizon (No. 25-406)
Yes. The Court held, 8-1, that the FCC’s forfeiture process does not violate the Seventh Amendment.
After investigating AT&T’s and Verizon’s handling of customer location data, the FCC issued forfeiture orders of approximately $57 million and $47 million, respectively. The carriers argued the process was unconstitutional because the agency itself finds the facts, interprets the law and sets the penalty without a jury. On June 4, 2026, the Court disagreed, finding that an FCC forfeiture order isn’t self-executing, since a carrier can refuse to pay and force the Department of Justice to sue in federal court, where the carrier gets a full jury trial and the agency’s findings carry no special weight.
- Key Takeaway: The decision preserves the FCC’s current enforcement framework and rejects a significant constitutional challenge to agency penalty proceedings.
Criminal
Can Defendants Use Compassionate Release Motions to Relitigate Their Convictions?
Fernandez v. United States (No. 24-556)
No. The Court held that defendants challenging the validity of their convictions must proceed through habeas and post-conviction procedures under 28 U.S.C. § 2255, rather than through compassionate-release motions under 18 U.S.C. § 3582.
Joe Fernandez is serving a mandatory life sentence for a murder-for-hire conviction he maintains he did not commit. After losing a habeas challenge, he sought compassionate release, and the sentencing judge — citing “disquiet” about the verdict’s reliability and disparities between Fernandez’s sentence and his co-defendants’ — reduced his sentence. On May 28, 2026, the Court held that the “supposed invalidity of a conviction” is not an “extraordinary and compelling reason” for compassionate release, no matter how genuine a judge’s misgivings about the underlying trial.
- Key Takeaway: The Court reinforced the distinction between requests for compassionate release and challenges to convictions themselves, limiting efforts to use compassionate-release provisions as an alternative avenue for raising claims of actual innocence.
Can Criminal Defendants Be Prosecuted Wherever a Federal Investigation Is Located?
Abouammo v. United States (No. 25-5146)
No. The Court unanimously held that a defendant charged with falsifying a document to obstruct a federal investigation must be tried where the alleged falsification occurred, not where the investigation was located.
Ahmad Abouammo, a former Twitter employee, was under FBI investigation in San Francisco. While meeting agents in Seattle, he fabricated an invoice and emailed it to an agent who opened it in San Francisco, and prosecutors tried him there. On June 11, 2026, the Court held that venue for falsification under 18 U.S.C. § 1519 lies only where the falsification itself took place — in this case, Seattle — because that is the only conduct the statute actually proscribes; the government cannot rely on where an investigation is headquartered, or where a document happens to land, to fix venue.
- Key Takeaway: The decision limits the government’s ability to venue shop in criminal cases by invoking the intended effects of a defendant’s conduct.
When Can Courts Disregard Criminal Appeal Waivers?
Hunter v. United States (No. 24-1063)
The Court held, 8-1, that appellate waivers contained in plea agreements are unenforceable when enforcing them would result in a miscarriage of justice.
Munson Hunter pleaded guilty to bank and wire fraud and waived his right to appeal his sentence. He later tried to challenge a forced-medication condition of that sentence as unconstitutional, but the Fifth Circuit held its only recognized exceptions to appeal waivers were ineffective assistance of counsel and a sentence exceeding the statutory maximum. On June 18, 2026, the Court adopted the view already held by most federal circuits: a waiver is unenforceable when it would leave in place “the kind of egregious error that would bring the judicial system into disrepute,” and sent the case back for the Fifth Circuit to decide whether Hunter’s claim clears that high bar.
- Key Takeaway: The decision creates a significant limitation on criminal appeal waivers and may increase appellate litigation concerning plea agreements and sentencing conditions.
Do Geofence Warrants Constitute a Fourth Amendment Search?
Chatrie v. United States (No. 25-112)
Yes. The Court held, 6-3, that law enforcement conducts a Fourth Amendment search when it obtains location-history data through a geofence warrant.
After a 2019 armed robbery of a Virginia credit union, police obtained a warrant compelling Google to identify every cellphone within 150 meters of the crime scene during a one-hour window, then — without seeking a new warrant — expanded the request to a two-hour window for certain devices; that process led investigators to Okello Chatrie. On June 29, 2026, the Court held that individuals keep a reasonable expectation of privacy in their location history even when a third-party technology company holds the data, so a geofence warrant is a search. The Court did not decide whether this particular warrant was valid, or disturb Chatrie’s conviction, sending those questions back to the lower courts.
- Key Takeaway: The decision establishes important constitutional limits on law enforcement’s use of geofence warrants and location-tracking technologies.
Other Important Decisions
How Should Courts Evaluate Claims a Litigant Failed to Disclose in Bankruptcy Proceedings?
Keathley v. Buddy Ayers Construction, Inc. (No. 25-6)
The Court unanimously held that courts must evaluate the totality of the circumstances to determine whether litigants are estopped from asserting claims they previously failed to disclose in a bankruptcy. The Court rejected a rigid rule that automatically barred debtors from pursuing claims omitted from bankruptcy schedules whenever a debtor had knowledge of the claim and a theoretical motive to conceal it.
Thomas Keathley filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy in 2019. Two years later, while the case remained open, he was in a car accident with a Buddy Ayers Construction employee and sued for negligence without amending his bankruptcy schedules to disclose the claim. Buddy Ayers moved for summary judgment on judicial estoppel, and the Fifth Circuit — applying a rule that treated knowledge of the claim plus any potential motive to conceal it as automatically disqualifying — barred the suit. On June 11, 2026, the Court held that rule was “simultaneously too rigid and too broad,” and that courts must instead weigh all the circumstances surrounding an omission to decide whether it was truly inadvertent.
- Key Takeaway: The decision makes it more difficult to invoke judicial estoppel and requires courts to examine, among other things, whether an omission was truly intentional or merely inadvertent.
How Did the Court Resolve the Roundup Failure-to-Warn Litigation?
Monsanto v. Durnell (No. 24-1068)
In Monsanto’s favor. The Court held, 7-2, that the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) preempts state-law failure-to-warn claims based on allegedly inadequate labeling.
John Durnell developed non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma after decades of using Roundup and won a $1.25 million Missouri jury verdict on the theory that the product’s label should have warned of cancer risk. The EPA, however, has repeatedly evaluated glyphosate, concluded it is not likely to cause cancer, and never required a cancer warning on Roundup’s label. On June 25, 2026, the Court held that FIFRA’s preemption clause bars a state-law claim that would force a manufacturer to add a warning the EPA has decided is not warranted, resolving a split among the circuits and reversing the verdict.
- Key Takeaway: The ruling significantly strengthens federal preemption defenses for manufacturers whose products are subject to federally approved labeling requirements.
Conclusion
The Spring 2026 Supreme Court term, like every other term, addressed a diverse set of legal issues. However, several common themes emerged. The Court continued to scrutinize the scope of federal agency authority, showed continued reluctance to recognize implied rights of action, refined important procedural safeguards in both civil and criminal litigation and addressed the application of longstanding legal doctrine to emerging technologies.
For companies and practitioners, the practical impact of the term’s decisions will extend well beyond the specific disputes that were before the Court. Whether the issue involves agency oversight, enforcement risk, litigation strategy, corporate compliance, product liability or digital privacy, the decisions the Court issued in early 2026 offer important insight into the legal questions that will continue to shape the regulatory and business landscape in the years ahead.
