Mr. Chief Justice, may it please the court.

I'm John Carlo Canoparo.

I'm Zach Smith.

And welcome to SCOTUS 101, where we break down what's happening at the Supreme Court, what the justices are up to, and other things related to our favorite branch of government.

Welcome back to SCOTUS 101, both listeners and Zach, who was out last week.

Zach, tell us about this week at the Soup and Court.

Well, it's good to be back, G.C.

We have two, maybe three weeks left in this term.

We have a bunch of opinions left to go.

And there are several significant ones that are

still outstanding. So without further ado, G.C., let's get into the opinions this week.

All right, starting with Thursday's opinions, the biggest decision was Holland v. Brackeen.

This case concerns the Indian Child Welfare Act, and a seven to two decision by Justice Barrett,

the court rejected a multi-pronged attack on that statute.

By way of background, the Indian Child Welfare Act requires, among other things,

that state courts place Indian children with Indian caregivers if ones available,

even if the child is already living with a non-Indian family, even if the

child's birth parents would like the child to stay there, and even if it would be in the child's

best interest not to be placed with an Indian family. This might strike you as strange, after all,

shouldn't the child's best interests matter above anything else, but the act specifically subordinates

an Indian child's personal interests to the interests of the Indian tribes in preserving their

racial and cultural homogeneity. So you can see the equal protection problem from a mile away.

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