Justices Press Inmate on Their Authority to Hear Habeas Appeals

The US Supreme Court heard argument Tuesday in a case about how federal prisoners access courts to challenge their sentences, but questions around Congress’s power to cabin the high court’s jurisdiction took center stage.

The primary question before the court—going to the merits of Petitioner Michael Bowe’s case—asked whether the bar on previously raised claims in second or successive habeas corpus applications extends to federal prisoners’ second or successive motions to vacate their sentences. The focus of the argument, however, was whether the high court had jurisdiction to even review a decision granting or denying such a motion.

“I don’t want you to give up your first argument on jurisdiction,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor said to Andrew Adler, the federal public defender arguing on behalf of Bowe. “I know that in a previous statement I made in this very case, I suggested that it was wrong, but your brief gave me great pause—don’t give up on it.”

Bowe raised several arguments for why the jurisdiction-stripping provision, narrowly construed, doesn’t apply to motions to vacate, but said that even if it does apply, it wouldn’t strip the court of jurisdiction in this particular case.

Even assuming the Eleventh Circuit’s dismissal qualified as a grant or denial for purposes of the certiorari bar, it isn’t the subject of Bowe’s petition, Adler argued. It’s instead an antecedent question about whether Bowe had to clear the gate keeping requirements at all.

The provision bars certiorari where an appeals court denies authorization on the merits for failure to make a prima facie showing of meeting applicable gatekeeping requirements for second or successive motions to vacate filed by federal inmates. Here, the court didn’t consider the merits of Bowe’s request to authorization to proceed. It instead dismissed his request for lack of jurisdiction based on an inapplicable gate keeping requirement—that is, the bar on second or successive habeas corpus applications filed by state prisoners.

Bowe pleaded guilty in 2008 to conspiracy to commit Hobbs Act robbery, attempt to commit Hobbs Act robbery, and discharging a firearm during and in relation to a “crime of violence.” A series of later Supreme Court decisions invalidated the grounds for his firearm conviction, but he’s been unable to obtain relief due to jurisdictional hurdles imposed by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act.

The government conceded the Eleventh Circuit got it wrong and shouldn’t have extended the jurisdictional bar on habeas corpus applications to Bowe’s motion to vacate, but says the high court lacks the power to correct the error under AEDPA’s certiorari bar.

But that could create serious constitutional questions under Article III’s exceptions clause—which grants Congress significant control over the Supreme Court’s appellate jurisdiction—by preventing the court from performing its “essential function” under Article III to resolve circuit splits and ensure uniformity in federal law, Bowe said.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.—who asked him to address the argument—appeared skeptical. The court has never held that the exceptions clause “does not mean what is says,” Roberts said.

‘Mini Supreme Courts’

Justice Amy Coney Barrett similarly pressed Adler on why the essential function argument wouldn’t “completely eviscerate the exceptions clause,” given that it’s possible to have a circuit split on any question of law.

“There’s no other statute like this,” Adler said. “There are plenty of statutes that bar judicial review across the board, but there is no statute like this that targets this Court’s certiorari jurisdiction.”

There’s at least a serious question about whether Congress can deprive the court of certiorari to resolve questions of federal law, he said.

“That’s because whenever lower courts are deciding issues of federal law and this court cannot step in, then this court ceases to be the Supreme Court—the courts of appeals then become their own mini Supreme Courts,” he said.

Because the government agreed with petitioner on the merits, the high court appointed amicus curiae—Kasdin Mitchell of Kirkland & Ellis LLP—to argue in defense of the judgment below. The Eleventh Circuit’s reading of AEDPA followed from simple statutory cross-references and “makes perfect sense in light of Congress’s clear goals,” she said.

There’s no reason to think that Congress didn’t intend its “number one finality provision” to apply to federal prisoners, she said.

Bowe is represented by the Roderick and Solange MacArthur Justice Center and the Southern District of Florida Federal Public Defender’s Office.

The case is Bowe v. United States, U.S., No. 24-5438, argument held 10/14/25.