Opinion of Sotomayor, J.
III
My disagreement with the Court runs far deeper than a quibble over how many defendants these petitioners may sue. The dispute is over whether States may nullify federal constitutional rights by employing schemes like the one at hand. The Court indicates that they can, so long as they write their laws to more thoroughly disclaim all enforcement by state officials, including licensing officials. This choice to shrink from Texas’ challenge to federal supremacy will have far-reaching repercussions. I doubt the Court, let alone the country, is prepared for them.
The State’s concessions at oral argument laid bare the sweeping consequences of its position. In response to questioning, counsel for the State conceded that pre-enforcement review would be unavailable even if a statute imposed a bounty of $1,000,000 or higher. Tr. of Oral Arg. 50–53. Counsel further admitted that no individual constitutional right was safe from attack under a similar scheme. Tr. of Oral Arg. in United States v. Texas, No. 21–588, pp. 59–61, 64–65. Counsel even asserted that a State could further rig procedures by abrogating a state supreme court’s power to bind its own lower courts. Id., at 78–79. Counsel maintained that even if a State neutered appellate courts’ power in such an extreme manner, aggrieved parties’ only path to a federal forum would be to violate the unconstitutional law, accede to infringement of their substantive and procedural rights all the way through the state supreme court, and then, at last, ask this Court to grant discretionary certiorari review. Ibid. All of these burdens would layer atop
flout its terms, even if it nominally binds other state officials, and it errs by implying as much now. The Court responds by downplaying how exceptional Texas’ scheme is, but it identifies no true analogs in precedent. See ante, at 11 (identifying only “somewhat” analogous statutes). S. B. 8 is no tort or private attorneys general statute: It deputizes anyone to sue without establishing any pre-existing personal stake (i.e., standing) and then skews procedural rules to favor these plaintiffs.
