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So what is after the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals? Supreme Court?
Exactly. You have:
- Federal district courts
- 3-judge panels of the relevant United States Circuit Court of Appeals (that's what hears appeals from district courts). Appeals are by right -- the Circuit Court cannot refuse to hear them.
- The relevant United States Circuit Court of Appeals sitting en banc (en banc is when all/many of the judges in the Circuit Court re-hear a panel decision. En banc review is discretionary and rare.
- If the 9th Circuit is involved than there is (for lack of a better term) "super-duper" en banc. The 9th Circuit has so many judges that even en banc review only involves (IIRC) around a third of them. So the 9th has a procedure for a "real" en banc review that really involves everyone (or most of them). It is discretionary and super-duper rare .
- The United States Supreme Court. Virtually all SCOTUS review is discretionary, though every now and then Congress provides by law that cases can go straight from the 3-judge Circuit Court panel right to SCOTUS and SCOTUS has to hear it. If my memory serves correctly, some internet censorship-related laws (the CDA and/or COPA) provided that any review would go from the panels straight to SCOTUS).