OT 2026 Orders & Decisions

Most of the Court's work runs on the merits docket: it grants a petition, the parties brief the case over months, the Justices hear argument and issue a signed opinion. The emergency docket (critics call it the "shadow docket"; the Court increasingly calls it the interim docket) handles requests for fast, temporary relief while a case is still being litigated below. These requests are applications, numbered with an "A" (26A124), not petitions.

How an application moves

1. To one Justice. Each federal circuit is assigned to a Justice (the "circuit Justice"), who receives applications from it. Rule 22
2. Alone or with the Court. That Justice can rule alone — routine matters such as extensions of time are handled this way — or refer the application to the full Court, which is what happens in contested cases. A denied application can be renewed to another Justice, though that is disfavored.
3. Relief below first. A stay application must show that relief was sought in the lower courts first, except in the most extraordinary circumstances. Rule 23
4. Fast and usually unexplained. The Court typically calls for a response within days, holds no argument, and often rules in a short unsigned order. Votes are known only when Justices note a dissent or write separately.

What applicants ask for

• A stay pauses a lower-court order — most often an injunction blocking a government policy — while the appeal continues. It holds the ruling in abeyance; it does not decide the case.
• An administrative stay is a brief freeze, entered by the circuit Justice alone, to give the Court time to consider the stay request itself. No rule defines its standard or length.
• An injunction or vacatur of a stay asks the Court to act affirmatively — to block a policy, or to lift a lower court's stay (as in capital cases).
• Occasionally the Court treats an application as a petition and grants full review, as it did in DHS v. D.V.D.

The legal tests

• Stays generally (Nken v. Holder, 2009): a strong showing of likely success on the merits, irreparable harm without a stay, the harm a stay would do to the other side, and the public interest — the first two weigh most.
• Stays pending a cert petition (Hollingsworth v. Perry, 2010): a reasonable probability the Court will grant review, a fair prospect it will reverse, and likely irreparable harm, with the equities balanced in close cases.
• Injunctions from the Court itself carry a higher bar: the applicant's right to relief must be "indisputably clear" (Turner Broadcasting v. FCC, 1993, Rehnquist, C.J., in chambers).

Why it is debated

The docket was long dominated by last-minute capital cases. Since about 2017 it has become the main route by which presidential administrations — first Trump's, then Biden's, and Trump's again — seek to keep policies in force while lower-court challenges proceed, and the Court has granted many of those requests. Critics, including Justices in dissent, argue that consequential questions are being resolved without full briefing, argument or explanation, and that the government gets a more forgiving irreparable-harm analysis than other applicants. Defenders, including Justice Alito, call the "shadow docket" label misleading, argue that the Court must act when lower courts block federal policy nationwide, and point out that it also rules against the government. The orders below let you check the record for yourself.

Further reading: Brennan Center explainer · Brennan Center tracker · SCOTUSblog interim docket · SCOTUSblog: what happens behind the scenes · Vladeck on administrative stays · Bayefsky, Administrative Stays (Notre Dame L. Rev.)