State of Justice: October 2026 Cases in the Courts
Criminal Justice
Illinois
The Illinois Supreme Court announced that it amended two of the state judiciary’s criminal procedure rules to allow juveniles to file an immediate appeal if they want to challenge a juvenile court judge’s decision to transfer their case from juvenile to adult criminal court. Before the court announced the changes to the two rules, Rule 307 and Rule 660, the decision to order a minor to be tried as an adult could only be reviewed after their case was resolved, which frequently takes years and causes minors who became adults before their transfer could be challenged to lose access to vital training and rehabilitation resources that are reserved for juveniles. The rule changes are effective immediately.
Nevada
The Nevada Supreme Court, sitting en banc, unanimously reversed and remanded a public records disclosure order, concluding that the district court abused its discretion in compelling the city of Sparks’ police department to comply with the requests. The case arose after the victim of an incident involving a Reno police officer during a traffic stop asked to see records of a criminal investigation into the incident . After the Sparks Police Department took over the criminal investigation into the Reno officer’s conduct, the victim filed public records requests with both cities for records about the investigation. Reno and Sparks denied the requests because the investigation was active and ongoing. The victim sued both cities. A district court judge ordered the cities to provide the victim with some of the requested materials because of her status as a victim. Sparks appealed the order to the state’s highest court. After discussing the controlling Nevada law, the court declined to establish blanket confidentiality for criminal investigation records. The court ruled that aside from established Nevada law, the requester’s status as a victim is irrelevant in assessing her records requests.
Education
Wyoming
State of Wyoming v. Wyoming Education Association
In a 3-2 opinion, the Wyoming Supreme Court partially affirmed and partially reversed a lower court ruling ordering the legislature to adjust the state’s school funding scheme. The state’s teachers’ union filed a petition, alleging that the legislature violated Wyoming students’ equal protection rights by failing to annually adjust teacher and staff salaries to cover inflation costs as required by the state constitution. The lower court ordered the legislature to provide the funding necessary to cover the true costs and ordered the legislature to appropriate additional funding for computers, programs that provide funding for school resource officers and students’ nutrition, and statewide assessments to ensure that school facilities adequately meet educational needs. The state appealed the lower court’s ruling to the Wyoming Supreme Court, which affirmed that the legislature violated the state constitution by underfunding teacher and staff salaries, but reversed the lower court’s order requiring the state to appropriate additional funding for the computers, nutrition, resource officers, and facilities assessments.
Election Administration
Arizona
Lombardo v. Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission
On October 23, the Arizona Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the Citizens Clean Elections Commission lacks authority to overturn the secretary of state’s certification of qualifying contributions for public campaign financing. Green Party candidates Risa Lombardo and Duwayne Collier challenged the commission’s authority after its executive director questioned their qualification and threatened to seek repayment of public funds. The court held that state law assigns the certification process to the secretary of state and county recorders, not the commission. Because the executive director had withdrawn the allegation that Lombardo’s certification was incorrect, the court did not decide whether the commission could order repayment on that basis. The ruling did not halt the ongoing investigation or resolve the commission’s authority to investigate alleged misconduct and impose remedies; the court left those questions for review after an investigation and any resulting remedy.
California
The California Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco broke state election law when he seized more than 650,000 ballots after the November 2025 special election, in which voters adopted a proposal that sought to empower the state legislature to redraw congressional district maps in 2026, 2028, and 2030. The court ordered Bianco to return the ballots to the county’s elections administrator, holding that his actions created “a substantial risk to election integrity” by allowing law enforcement officers to access, handle, and count ballots in secret based on unregulated protocols. In a separate unanimous ruling issued the same day, the court reaffirmed that the California Constitution grants the state’s attorney general direct supervision over sheriffs, ruling that Bianco also broke the law when he ignored California Attorney General Rob Bonta’s directives to halt his office’s plans to seize the ballots last spring.
Delaware
In a unanimous ruling, the Delaware Supreme Court rejected efforts by two state legislators to overturn the state’s permanent absentee voting policy, affirming a lower court’s ruling that the state’s Department of Elections can continue to maintain a list of voters who are eligible to receive an absentee ballot through the mail for every election. The legislators argued that the current law could give some voters absentee voting privileges on a permanent basis even if their original reason for seeking permanent absentee voting status is no longer applicable, creating an unconstitutional expansion of voting rights. The lower court’s ruling rejected the legislators’ argument, holding that their position would require the state to recertify absentee voters for every election while in-person voters would face no such requirements, and ruling that the legislators’ concerns were already addressed because existing law requires absentee voters to assert their permanent absentee status under oath on their ballot and orders permanent absentee voters to notify the state of any changes that would impact their eligibility to vote absentee on a permanent basis. The court expedited its decision so that it will be in place for November’s midterm elections.
Montana
A unanimous Montana Supreme Court reversed several key provisions of a 2023 law that placed procedural and financial restrictions on the state’s direct democracy process. Voters challenged several provisions in the new law, which prohibited organizers from resubmitting defeated proposals for four years and imposed a $3,700 filing fee on initiative proposals before organizers could begin gathering signatures. The new provisions also gave legislative committees authority to review and vote on the initiative and have the Secretary of State include the results of that vote on the face of the ballot. A lower court struck down the provisions challenged in the voters’ complaint, and the state appealed the decision to Montana’s supreme court. That court affirmed the lower court, holding that the four-year ban created an unconstitutional content-based restriction, the legislative approval clause gave lawmakers improper authority to approve or reject proposals before voters could consider them, and the state could not make organizers’ efforts to place a proposal on ballots contingent on their ability to pay the $3,700 filing fee. The ruling reaffirmed Montana voters’ right to influence the state’s laws and constitution directly.
Nebraska
The Nebraska Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the district court’s dismissal of a challenge to ballot language describing an initiative that sought to amend Nebraska’s constitution to require all public K-12 schools, colleges, and universities to designate sports teams based on biological sex and expressly prohibit biological males from playing on female sports teams. A voter challenged the language of the object statement alleging that it was unconstitutionally vague because it did not clarify that the measure applied to schools. The court rejected the challenge, writing in a unanimous opinion that the language complied with the state constitution’s requirement to identify an overall purpose or goal that is consistent with the text of the proposal. The ruling cleared the final challenge to the proposal, allowing it to appear on ballots for November’s election.
Republican National Committee v. Evnen
The Nebraska Supreme Court maintained the rights of eligible U.S. citizens living abroad to vote in Nebraska elections in a 6-1 ruling affirming a lower court’s finding that state law permits certain Nebraskans living abroad and their children to vote in state elections. The Republican National Committee challenged the constitutionality of the law, simultaneously arguing that it impacts only a few dozen people and that allowing those people to vote dilutes the votes of Nebraskans residing within the state. The court ruled that the law was enacted to give the children of missionaries, military members, and civilian contractors the right to vote, and properly allows those who are eligible to register and vote in Nebraska elections.
Oklahoma
Brooks et al. v. Reynolds et al.
In a 5-4 ruling, the Oklahoma Supreme Court blocked an effort led by several current and former state legislators to begin collecting signatures for a proposed ballot initiative that would eliminate homestead property taxes for Oklahoma homeowners who live in the home they own. Most of the revenue collected from homestead property taxes in Oklahoma is dedicated to funding the state’s public school system. After the organizers publicized their intention to begin collecting signatures for the proposal, a group of homeowners and education advocates asked the Oklahoma Supreme Court to find that the proposal would be unconstitutional and block the organizers from collecting signatures to place the initiative on ballots. The court ruled that the proposal would violate a provision in the state constitution requiring real property to be assessed for taxation at a rate that is no less than 11% of its fair cash value and blocked organizers from beginning the signature gathering process to have the measure placed on any future ballot.
Wyoming
The Wyoming Supreme Court unanimously rejected a challenge brought by several voters, former candidates, and a retired lawmaker to a 2023 law prohibiting voters from changing their political party affiliation within 96 days of a primary election. The petitioners argued that the law violated their constitutional rights by burdening their right to vote and infringing on equal protection guarantees. The law’s prohibition on party affiliation changes aligns with the deadline for the state’s candidate filing period and requires voters to affiliate with a party before its slate of candidates is finalized. Prior to the law’s enactment, voters in Wyoming could change their party affiliation at the polls on Election Day. The court ruled that the legislature’s duty to “secure the purity of elections” and “prevent abuses of the elective franchise” outweighs any burden placed on voters and rejected the challengers’ arguments that the law violates equal protection provisions in the state constitution.
Environmental Protections
Washington
Climate Solutions v. State of Washington
The Washington Supreme Court affirmed a lower court’s ruling invalidating a 2024 voter-approved initiative to overturn several state laws enacted to discourage natural gas use and promote electrification through clean energy sources. The initiative expanded access to natural gas for utilities customers, prohibited the state’s utilities commission from restricting natural gas access, removed a zero-emission goal from the state’s energy code, and blocked the state’s building code council, local governments, and clean air agencies from restricting natural gas use. A coalition of environmental organizations challenged the initiative, arguing that it violated state constitutional rights pertaining to the citizen initiative process by addressing multiple subjects, failing to disclose all subjects in its titles, and amending existing laws without adequately publicizing how they would be impacted. A lower court agreed with the coalition’s arguments and invalidated the initiative. Organizers appealed to the state’s highest court, which affirmed the lower court’s ruling and restored the state’s ability to discourage natural gas use and encourage renewable energy use as part of efforts to meet its goal of achieving zero-emission homes and buildings by 2031.
LGBTQ+ Americans
Oklahoma
In a 6-3 ruling, the Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled that the state cannot update birth gender markers on birth certificates and has never had the legal authority to do so. The ruling came after a federal appeals court asked the state’s highest court for civil matters to clarify the impact of a 2021 executive order and a 2022 state law. The executive order blocked the state’s health department from allowing transgender and nonbinary people to update their gender markers on their birth certificates, and the state law declared that changes in sex or gender on a birth certificate or a designation of non-binary identity conflicts with state law. The federal appeals court is considering a challenge to both the executive order and the state law by a group of plaintiffs who argued that the executive order and the state law violated their due process and equal protection grounds. A federal district court dismissed the challenge, but the appeals court revived the plaintiffs’ equal protection claims and asked the Oklahoma Supreme Court to provide guidance on how it should interpret the executive order and state law. The state’s highest court ruled that the law bars any Oklahoma resident from changing or correcting the gender identity on their birth certificate, even in the case of a clerical error. Following the court’s ruling, the case will return to the federal appeals court to determine if the law and the executive order violate the plaintiffs’ equal protection rights.
