Who's writing what: OT 2026 opinion assignments

Each Justice writes about the same number of majority opinions from every sitting, so the Justices who have not yet written for a sitting are the likely authors of its remaining cases. In a backtest over OT2010–OT2024 (924 opinions), knowing the majority, the model's top pick was the author 28% of the time and its top three 62%, against 15% for a random majority Justice.

October sitting

6 cases. Justices without a majority opinion from this sitting yet: Roberts, Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor, Kagan, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barrett, Jackson.

Suncor Energy (U.S.A.) Inc. v. Commissioners of Boulder County — argued or scheduled 2026-10-05, author not yet known
Johnson v. United States Congress — argued or scheduled 2026-10-05, author not yet known
Anderson v. Intel Corp. Investment Policy Committee — argued or scheduled 2026-10-06, author not yet known
Department of the Air Force v. Prutehi Guahan — argued or scheduled 2026-10-07, author not yet known
Beaird v. United States — argued or scheduled 2026-10-13, author not yet known
Salazar v. Paramount Global — argued or scheduled 2026-10-14, author not yet known

November sitting

9 cases. Justices without a majority opinion from this sitting yet: Roberts, Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor, Kagan, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barrett, Jackson.

December sitting

6 cases. Justices without a majority opinion from this sitting yet: Roberts, Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor, Kagan, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barrett, Jackson.

Jouppi v. Alaska — argued or scheduled 2026-12-01, author not yet known
Viramontes v. Cook County — argued or scheduled 2026-12-02, author not yet known
International Partners for Ethical Care, Inc. v. Ferguson — argued or scheduled 2026-12-07, author not yet known
Republican National Committee v. Mi Familia Vota — argued or scheduled 2026-12-08, author not yet known
Grand v. City of University Heights — argued or scheduled 2026-12-09, author not yet known
Department of Homeland Security v. D.V.D. — argued or scheduled 2026-12-09, author not yet known

Who's Writing What

After each argument session (a "sitting"), the senior Justice in the majority — usually the Chief Justice — assigns the majority opinions, and by long practice each Justice gets about the same number from every sitting. So as opinions from a sitting come out, the Justices who have not yet written for it become the likely authors of the rest. This page tracks that for the current term, using our predictions of who will be in each majority.

Who's Writing What

This term, by sitting

How well does this work?

The norm in practice