US Supreme Court weighing presidential powers in new term

The Supreme Court’s return for its fall term on Monday will test Donald Trump’s unprecedented expansion of the US presidency. “The crucial question will be whether it serves as a check on President Trump or just a rubber stamp approving his actions,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California Berkeley Law School. If history is any indication, the Republican leader is likely to win more legal victories from a conservative-dominated bench that includes three of his own appointees. The docket includes cases pertaining to voting rights, state prohibitions on transgender athletes’ participation in girls’ sports, and a religious freedom case involving a Rastafarian who had his knee-length dreadlocks forcibly shorn while incarcerated.