Vallejos v Commissioner of Registration
On 30 September 2011, Justice Johnson Lam of the Court of First Instance of the High Court (CFI) ruled in Vallejos' case that existing legislation restricting FDHs from qualifying for permanent residence contravened the Hong Kong Basic Law. Lam also found that Vallejos and Domingo, but not the three other applicants, had fulfilled the condition of taking Hong Kong as their only permanent home and being ordinarily resident in Hong Kong for seven years. The Court of Appeal of the High Court overturned the CFI's decision on Vallejos' case on 28 March 2012. Vallejos and Domingo then jointly appealed to the Court of Final Appeal (CFA), which heard their case on 26–28 February 2013; the CFA rejected their appeal on 25 March 2013.
Alejandro García Padilla
On June 28, 2014, Governor García Padilla signed into law the Puerto Rico Public Corporation Debt Enforcement and Recovery Act, which sought to allow corporations owned by the Commonwealth, such as the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, the Puerto Rico Aqueducts and Sewers Authority, and the Puerto Rico Highways and Transportation Authority to declare bankruptcy. However, in February 2015, U.S. District Judge Francisco Besosa found the Act was void because it was preempted by the U.S. Bankruptcy Code. In July 2015, that ruling was affirmed by the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, with Judge Juan R. Torruella concurring only in the judgment. The following June, in "Puerto Rico v. Franklin California Tax-Free Trust" (2016), that ruling was additionally affirmed by a U.S. Supreme Court in a vote of 5-2, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissenting.