The Supreme Court Changed. What Now? (youtube.com)
‘Shadow docket’. US law made without being public. Deporting men to countries they aren't even from. Immigration agents can racially profile people. Allowing states to redraw election lines while an election is underway. Justices don't even have to sign their names to the votes. Alito tried to use the term ‘emergency docket’ instead, ‘but that doesn’t really capture what's happening here, but appealing to the ‘emergency docket’ lets you bypass the lengthy, public, recorded and rationalized merit docket (oral arguments and levels of courts).
There's no real way to know how many cases have been done on the Shadow Docket. 2003-2025 around 27k applications, mostly boring (extending deadlines, capital punishment cases, which are actual emergencies). In 2025 ‘Substantive Shadow Dockets' with all 9 justices vote had 63 cases and 56 on merits docket, the first year it became more common.
Pattern is they are used to 'enable Trump.' Politically motivated votes.