From WNYC Studios.

I'm Brian Lehrer.

This is my daily politics podcast.

It's Wednesday, April 17th.

It's becoming high season at the Supreme Court and high season for criminal trials involving defendant Donald J. Trump.

Between now and June, the Supreme Court will decide on landmark cases from the legal status of the

abortion pill, Mifiphristone, to where the presidents have immunity from prosecution,

no matter their attempts at insurrection or any other crime.

They'll decide on the limits of power of federal agencies to make rules based on acts of Congress. That could be the most important case who've never heard of, called Loper Bright Enterprises versus

Raimondo will discuss.

They just decided on Monday that a ban on gender affirming care for trans teenagers

by the state of Idaho can mostly take effect, that ban left in place, at least for now, while the

underlying case continues to be argued. And yesterday, the justices heard oral arguments in a case

that could throw out hundreds of January 6th-related

convictions of people who invaded the Capitol, who juries found guilty of a law that makes it a

crime to obstruct or impede an official proceeding, including a congressional proceeding.

Justice Neil Gorsuch expressed skepticism of those convictions in this question about how

serious an act has to be to be classified as obstruction. Would a sit-in that disrupts a trial

or access to a federal courthouse qualify? Would a heckler in today's audience qualify or at the

State of the Union address? We'll hear more excerpts from yesterday's hearing, including the

response to Gorsuch's question there from United States Solicitor General Elizabeth

Prelager, who represented the Justice Department. And joining us for this is University of

...