Supreme Court’s birthright citizenship ruling could help Apple

Apple’s last-ditch effort to overturn the punitive antisteering injunction in the Epic “Fortnite” case uses a recent Supreme Court birthright citizenship ruling to try and pare down the scope of the original judge’s power.

After being told it willfully violated a 2021 injunction, Apple has made it known that it finds Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rodgers’ injunction “fundamentally unfair.” The case centers around the one count Epic one in its trial against Apple, which regulates Apple’s ability to prevent steering away from App Store apps.

Apple’s initial solution proved unsatisfactory and resulted in a punitive judgement requiring Apple to abandon all efforts to block external linking or purchase options. However, Apple seems to believe it has found the perfect legal loophole via a recent precedent set by the Supreme Court.

According to a court filing shared by Reuters, Apple is seeking to have the civil contempt order overturned on the grounds that it exceeds the authority of the 9th Circuit Court’s authority since the case only involves Epic and Apple.

The mandate, however, applies to every developer doing business with Apple in the United States. That’s the hitch Apple hopes will get it control over external payments and linking back.

It’s a stretch. All of the lawyers we spoke to on Wednesday about it believe it is on shaky legal ground.

The ruling was part of a case that dealt with President Trump’s attempts to end birthright citizenship and deport United States citizens. While it didn’t address the President’s ability to do so, it did halt the lower courts from stopping him via universal injunctions.

Basically, the Supreme Court said that the lower courts can’t enforce injunctions outside of the scope of an individual case.

So, Apple’s logic is if courts can’t stop nationwide deportation of US citizens under Trump’s administration, then it can’t force Apple to let all US developers run external shops without compensation.

Apple won’t give up in its fight against Epic. Image source: Epic

Riding the President’s coattails

If Apple’s appeal works, it means that it will still be required to allow Epic to link externally and enable users to make purchases outside of the App Store without compensation, but no one else. Epic chose to pursue the lawsuit on its own, not as a class action involving all US developers.

The move is likely to be seen as controversial, as Apple is using what is widely viewed as a biased abuse of power in the Supreme Court to promote the President’s agenda to achieve its own goals. However, the effort may be in vain, as the Supreme Court ruling seems to try and apply directly to the lower court’s ability to stop executive orders via universal injunctions.

From the Supreme Court ruling:

Respondents contend that universal injunctions— or at least these universal injunctions— are simply an application of the principle that a court of equity may fashion a remedy that awards complete relief. But “complete relief” is not synonymous with “universal relief.” It is a narrower concept, long embraced in the equitable tradition, that allows courts to “administer complete relief between the parties.”

It goes on to say that in some party-specific injunctions, sometimes nonparties are also advantaged. That may be enough to suggest that the court’s civil contempt order against Apple will hold since it applies to Epic, but it advantages all developers inadvertently.

Legal battles are always lengthy affairs, and Apple has had its fair share. If its latest attempt to overturn the antisteering rulings fails, it will likely continue to attempt to appeal until every angle is exhausted.