Thomas, J., dissenting
Elections Clause issue could make any difference to the final judgment “adjudicating all the claims and the rights and liabilities of all the parties” in this case. N. C. Rule Civ. Proc. 54(b). That should be the end of the discussion. Because the question presented “cannot affect the rights of [the] litigants in the case before [us],” we “are without power to decide” it. North Carolina v. Rice, 404 U. S. 244, 246 (1971) (per curiam).
Nonetheless, the majority finds that the judgment below still presents a live Article III case or controversy; it then further concludes that the question presented has survived and requires decision under Cox Broadcasting.[1] See ante, at 6–11. In doing so, it relies extensively on petitioners’ “representations” that they “remain bound by the judgment in Harper I.” Ante, at 10; see also ante, at 5, 7, 11. But, of course, parties’ mere representations that they are injured never carry their “burden of demonstrating that they have standing” in this Court. TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, 594 U. S. ___, ___ (2021) (slip op., at 15) (emphasis added). Nor can such representations affect our “independent obligation to assure ourselves that jurisdiction is proper before proceeding to the merits.” Plains Commerce Bank v. Long Family Land & Cattle Co., 554 U. S. 316, 324 (2008).
To ensure that it has jurisdiction here, the majority must explain how petitioners’ federal defense could still affect “the rights of [the] litigants in th[is] case.” Rice, 404 U. S., at 246. It fails to do so. Instead, it mostly points to irrele-
- ↑ In this case, these two inquiries are identical, making the majority’s bifurcated analysis somewhat artificial. To say that an issue “will survive and require decision,” as Cox Broadcasting uses the phrase, simply means that it will not become moot, generally through some other issue independently resolving the case (precisely what happened here). See, e.g., Pierce County v. Guillen, 537 U. S. 129, 141, n. 5 (2003); Florida v. Thomas, 532 U. S. 774, 779 (2001); Jefferson v. City of Tarrant, 522 U. S. 75, 82–83 (1997); Cox Broadcasting, 420 U. S., at 478, 480–481, and n. 9.
