10 cases, 2 weeks, 1 Supreme Court holding audio arguments

WASHINGTON (AP) — The coronavirus pandemic has changed the way the Supreme Court is doing business. For the foreseeable future the court will be announcing its opinions not in the courtroom but by posting decisions online. And the justices are holding their private conferences by phone.

Over the past two weeks, the court heard arguments in 10 cases by telephone, with the audio of arguments broadcast live for the first time. The changes made for an extraordinary set of arguments.

It's unclear when the justices will actually take the bench again. Normally, the justices hear arguments from October through April and issue opinions in all argued cases by the end of June. Then they take a summer break and begin the cycle again with arguments resuming in October.

Here are five things to know about the recent telephone arguments:

THE CASES

The biggest cases the Supreme Court heard over the past two weeks involved President Donald Trump's bid to keep certain financial records private. But after nearly three and a half hours of arguments on Tuesday, it was unclear how the cases would come out. The court appeared likely to reject Trump’s claim that he is immune from criminal investigation while in office. But the court seemed less clear about how to handle subpoenas from Congress and the Manhattan district attorney for Trump’s tax, bank and financial records.

The Trump cases and two others the court heard, about people selected to be members of the Electoral College, have potential implications for the 2020 election. In the electors case on Wednesday, the court seemed concerned about potential chaos that could result if states can't remove electors who decline to vote for their state's popular vote winner. The court also heard two cases involving the separation of church...