Is Mootness How The Travel Ban Dies?

Ever since the Ninth Circuit put the kibosh on Donald Trump’s initial travel ban, lawyers have been bubbling that “mootness” might allow the Supreme Court to kick the case without deciding it on its merits. Ever since the Court teed up the mootness issue in its per curiam opinion, those who oppose the ban have been hoping that mootness would lead conservative justices to throw out the travel ban without giving the executive branch blanket authority to order religious bigotry.