Appellate Circuit Roundup: A weekly, non-exhaustive digest of federal appellate rulings

Federal wrong-door raids, federal vigilantes, and federal prosecutions in Indian country.

Please enjoy the latest edition of Short Circuit, a weekly feature produced by a team at the Institute for Justice.

A fresh case is in the mix! Last year, Texas enacted a measure preventing municipalities from banning home-based businesses, as long as they do not create parking or traffic issues. Yet the City of Venus maintains that IJ client Rosi Paredes cannot operate a home daycare (with a maximum of six children) because a few minutes of street parking for pickup and drop-off would disturbed the neighborhood. Rosi is state-licensed and inspected; she has substantial experience; and her neighbors are eager to enroll their children with someone they trust close to their homes. Click here to learn more.

New on the Short Circuit podcast: curious about how to conceal several kilos of contraband in a minivan but pressed for time to watch The French Connection? Our episode is shorter.

A California conservation group releases a report urging people not to eat American lobster, arguing that fishing practices endanger right whales. Maine lobster fishers push back, as expected. Many would call this mere disagreement; but for litigious lobstermen, it becomes defamation. First Circuit: The “group defamation rule” bars this suit because general statements about a broad group typically aren’t defamatory toward individual members.
You might wonder what might have happened to Sebastian Flyte from Brideshead Revisited if London police hadn’t caught him drunken driving. The same thought applies to a Pennsylvania man who was convicted of two DUIs over twenty years ago and is now barred from owning a firearm. Third Circuit (en banc): Wonder no more—disarming him is unconstitutional. Concurrence: For this individual, yes; but going forward, the government has built an administrative process that could save us from ruling on these. Dissent: Cars, like guns, are dangerous.
An old DUI may be forgivable, but a conviction for “terroristic threats” leaves you without gun rights forever, says the Third Circuit (en banc). And this remains true even though some states previously blocked certain people from gun ownership because they were “outside the social and political order.” Concurrence 1: Felons are all the same. Concurrence 2: Perhaps we shouldn’t rely on outdated laws that excluded minorities from bearing arms? Dissent: The offense sounds severe, but the person did his time and now just wants his rights back.
Fairfax County and Arlington, Va. school districts implement policies allowing students to use restrooms and overnight facilities in line with the student’s gender identity. Feds: That’s a Title IX violation. Schools: Not having those policies would be a Title IX violation. Feds: Fine, we’ll cut your funding. The schools sue. District court: Too bad I’m not the Court of Claims. Fourth Circuit: An injunction from the district court is acceptable. Remanded. Dissent: “Plaintiffs cannot bypass Congress’ choice and sneak into district court by dressing a contractual claim in statutory clothing.”
Since 1998, USAC, a private corporation established by the FCC, has collected billions from telecom companies to fund universal service in rural and underserved areas. Fifth Circuit: But Congress did not explicitly authorize USAC, nor did Congress ratify its pandemic-era programs. Thus, the FCC will need to reexamine its Fourth Quarter 2025 contribution factor.
A home renter in Jackson, Mich., objects to code inspectors entering her residence for a suspicionless inspection under an administrative warrant. She is arrested for obstruction, later the charges are dropped, and she sues the arresting officials for violating the Fourth Amendment by making an arrest without probable cause. Sixth Circuit (unpublished): May I remind you of the “clearly established” prong of qualified immunity?
A Milwaukee officer runs a red light, killing a driver. He claims distraction from a phone—he’d been texting on a dating app—or a computer. District court: This could be a substantive due process violation. Seventh Circuit: Dismiss the trial. This behavior doesn’t shock the conscience. (Negligence claims reportedly settled for the state-law maximum, $500k.)
In 2019, a mother wins a custody battle, but both children want to live with their father. A Taney County, Mo. judge—now off the bench—overhears the kids’ argument in the courthouse lobby and threatens to place them in foster care. When they still refuse to depart with mom, the judge has them kept in holding cells. (They leave with mom.) Eighth Circuit (2023): No judicial immunity. Eighth Circuit (2026): And no qualified immunity. That outcome was so plainly unconstitutional that a prior on-point decision wasn’t required. The jury verdict remains intact. (IJ filed an amicus brief at each stage urging these outcomes.)
California’s No Vigilantes Act requires non-uniformed federal law-enforcement officers in the state to wear visible identification. Feds: Intergovernmental immunity! Ninth Circuit: Intergovernmental immunity. A preliminary injunction must issue.
A man is convicted of federal murder for his involvement in the shooting and drowning death of a man on a fishing boat about three miles offshore of California. The Ninth Circuit first guides us through two centuries of federal jurisdiction over crimes at sea, determining that the feds can prosecute murders at sea. Nevertheless, the court vacates the conviction because the district court dismissed a holdout juror who was experiencing a mental-health crisis. Because her crisis stemmed from pressure from other jurors to reach a verdict, a mistrial was the only viable path forward. (Her co-defendant fared less well in her appeal.)
The federal government generally has authority to prosecute crimes committed in Indian country, but not when both victim and defendant are Indians. Tenth Circuit (en banc): Reversing precedent, we now require the defendant to prove their Indian status. So these two men—whose convictions for crimes against Indian children were vacated because the government failed to prove their non-Indian status—will now have to demonstrate their ancestry, tribal connections, etc.
This unpublished Tenth Circuit decision is notable less for denying collateral relief to a federal inmate on an ineffective-assistance claim, and more for being unusually helpful in including Westlaw links to the cited authorities.
Tenth Circuit: It is clearly established that officers must not shoot nonthreatening individuals who are armed with something other than a gun. The distinctions this Oklahoma officer draws between prior cases and his fatal shooting of a man holding a bat are too minor to trigger qualified immunity. The case must go to trial.
To vote by mail in Kansas, a voter must first submit a written request to their county election office for a mail ballot. In 2021, the state enacted a law prohibiting private entities from partially pre-filling those requests before sending them out. District court: The law was enacted with an improper purpose, inferred from widespread contemporaneous hostility to mail-in voting. Tenth Circuit: The law’s justifications, text, and enactment history show no such purpose, so the inference was unreasonable. The law survives intermediate scrutiny.
Following a pair of wrong-door federal raids in Collinsville, Ill., in 1973, Congress amended the Federal Tort Claims Act to ensure victims of such raids can sue the federal government as well as the individual agents. Eleventh Circuit (2024): This Atlanta family, whose home was mistakenly raided by an FBI SWAT team in 2017, does not have a claim. Supreme Court (2025): Try again. Eleventh Circuit (2026): In fact, the SWAT team leader does not have qualified immunity, and the case should be reheard en banc to reconsider FTCA precedent. (This is an IJ case.)
Florida imposes age restrictions on social-media platforms that employ “addictive features.” Platforms sue, alleging a First Amendment violation, and obtain a preliminary injunction. Eleventh Circuit: Reversed! The law is likely to survive—subject to intermediate scrutiny. (Ed.: Judge Newsom writes a thought-provoking concurrence about the ongoing viability of as-applied challenges under intermediate scrutiny in light of a peculiar footnote in the Supreme Court’s West Virginia v. B.P.J. decision.)
Déjà vu! Georgia imposes age restrictions on social-media platforms. Platforms sue, alleging a First Amendment violation, and secure a preliminary injunction. Eleventh Circuit: Reversed! Plaintiffs put all their bets on a facial challenge at the PI stage and failed to build the necessary record.
Admission to the Florida Bar costs $700 if you apply soon after law school. But if you’ve been admitted to another state’s bar for more than a year, the fee jumps to about $1,600 and can reach as high as $3,000 depending on how long you’ve been admitted. Members of New Jersey’s and Michigan’s bars sue, arguing the rule violates the Dormant Commerce Clause. Eleventh Circuit: No. The rule treats applicants alike, and “there’s simply more to investigate for experienced applicants than for new ones.”
And in en banc news, the Fifth Circuit (10-7) will not revisit its decision that Texas’s ban on snapping pictures in bathrooms likely does not infringe the First Amendment rights of a woman who photographed a transgender politician washing her hands in the women’s restroom of the Texas State Capitol.

Bananas! The City of Grapevine, Texas has told a learning pod led by a teacher with almost three decades of experience to vacate its rented space in a local museum’s offices until ten pages of outrageous and costly demands—such as rezoning and renovation—are satisfied. This month, IJ sent the city a letter urging it to stop.

Nuts! Ogunquit, Me.—a tourist town famous for whimsical yard art—has fined a family nearly $2,000 for having tin roosters in their yard, claiming the roosters are unpermitted advertising for the family’s small business, a breakfast restaurant attached to their home. In reality, the roosters are lawn art that have become symbols of autism awareness; their six-year-old autistic daughter has found comfort in them during transitions to and from the school bus. This month, IJ sent the town a letter urging them to drop the penalty.