Senate Confirms DOJ Official Emil Bove To 3rd Circ.

By Courtney Bublé

The Senate voted 50-49 on Tuesday night to confirm Emil Bove, one of President Donald Trump's former attorneys and a top official at the U.S. Department of Justice, as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

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Wash. Atty Disbarred In Del. For 'Pattern Of Misconduct'

By Rose Krebs

Delaware's Supreme Court has barred a Washington attorney from practicing law in the First State, saying he "engaged in a pattern of misconduct" and "acted with a selfish or dishonest motive" by not informing a state court that granted him a temporary admission that there were pending disciplinary proceedings against him in another jurisdiction.

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Del. Justices Undo Amazon's Chancery Win In Docs Row

By Jeff Montgomery

A Delaware Supreme Court panel has reversed a Court of Chancery decision tossing a suit from Amazon stockholders seeking company documents to probe alleged anticompetitive behavior, wrongdoing and mismanagement, finding the lower court declared the claims "overbroad" without considering their credibility.

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Del. Judge Lets Realtek Beat IP Suit With Alice Invalidation

By Dani Kass

A Delaware federal judge has invalidated the communications patent Media Content Protection LLC accused Realtek Semiconductor Corp. of infringing, finding it doesn't meet patent eligibility requirements.

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Chancellor Partly Reverses Toss Of Pioneer Merger Doc Suit

By Jeff Montgomery

A Pioneer Natural Resources stockholder has won a battle but lost the war in a Delaware Court of Chancery review of a senior magistrate's denial of expanded access to books and records on Pioneer's $59.5 billion May 2024 merger with Exxon-Mobil.

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22 States Sue To Block Defunding Of Planned Parenthood

By Dan McKay

California and more than 20 other states on Tuesday launched their own legal challenge to budget legislation that halts federal Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood, alleging the measure illegally targets the organization and violates its First Amendment rights.

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States Sue To Block Feds' Demand For Benefit Recipient Data

By Allison Grande

Nearly two dozen state attorneys general are fighting the USDA's directive for states to turn over private information about millions of food assistance benefit recipients, arguing in a new lawsuit filed in California federal court that this demand violates multiple privacy laws and the U.S. Constitution.

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Analysis

Justices Can Fix Circuit Split On Compassionate Release

By Matthew Santoni

The First Step Act drastically reduced the mandatory minimum sentences for certain federal crimes, but it will be up to the U.S. Supreme Court to settle a 6-4 circuit split over whether courts can consider those changes when weighing a prisoner's compassionate release, attorneys tell Law360.

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Affirmed Energy Says FERC Unlawfully Cut Auction Rights

By Tom Lotshaw

Affirmed Energy LLC told the D.C. Circuit the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission can't justify orders approving PJM Interconnection LLC's proposal to bar energy efficiency resources from participating in its electricity capacity auctions.

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Prime Core Ch. 11 Trust Seeks Return Of $2.1M In Transfers

By Emily Lever

The litigation trust for Prime Core Technologies has sued to claw back $2.1 million in cash and cryptocurrency paid out to customers in the weeks before its bankruptcy filing, saying other creditors are facing a serious recovery shortfall worsened by the payments.

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3rd Circ. Says DOL H-2A Case Should Have Been In Fed. Court

By Irene Spezzamonte

A New Jersey farm was entitled to have a federal court weigh in on the U.S. Department of Labor's allegations that it flouted H-2A visa program requirements, the Third Circuit ruled Tuesday, finding the DOL improperly relied on in-house administrative proceedings to impose over $580,000 in fines.

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OxyChem, Nokia Tell 3rd Circ. Passaic Cleanup Deal Is Unfair

By Juan-Carlos Rodriguez

Occidental Chemical Corp. and Nokia of America Corp. on Monday asked the Third Circuit to reverse a New Jersey federal district court's approval of a $150 million settlement to clean up the Lower Passaic River.

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Insurer Says Misrepresentations Void Real Estate Co.'s Policy

By Hope Patti

Material misrepresentations in a commercial real estate firm's insurance renewal application mean the insurer has no duty to defend the firm or a former director against a $6.5 million claim related to the sale of a client's properties, the insurer told an Indiana federal court.

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Loeb & Loeb NY Office Safe After Shooting In Its Building

By Kevin Penton

Loeb & Loeb LLP's attorneys and staff are all safe and accounted for after a shooter on Monday killed four people at the Midtown Manhattan building where the law firm has an office, according to the firm.

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Trump Calls 'Blue Slip' Process 'Probably Unconstitutional'

By Courtney Bublé

President Donald Trump on Tuesday railed against the long-standing tradition for home state senators to have essentially veto power over U.S. attorney and district court nominee picks and called on U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to abandon the process.

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Jackson Walker Gets Another Deal On Judge-Romance Claims

By Bonnie Eslinger

Jackson Walker LLP has reached another settlement with former bankruptcy clients to resolve fee disputes related to the concealed romance of a former partner with the firm and former Texas bankruptcy Judge David R. Jones, according to a motion filed Tuesday in Texas federal court.

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DOJ's Top Antitrust Deputy, Merger Chief Both Fired

By Bryan Koenig

The U.S. Department of Justice has ousted two of its top Antitrust Division officials, citing insubordination amid growing signs of tension between merger enforcers and the wider Trump administration.

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Miss. AG Says Judge's TRO Over State DEI Ban Full Of Errors

By Gina Kim

Mississippi's attorney general wants a federal judge to explain "indisputable factual inaccuracies" in his decision pausing enforcement of a state law prohibiting diversity, equity and inclusion in public schools, saying Monday that the judge's original order contained nonexistent allegations, wrongly identified plaintiffs and defendants, and quoted terms that don't appear in the legislative text.

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Mich. Judge Sanctions Attys For False Case Quotations

By Matt Perez

A Michigan federal judge on Monday ordered plaintiffs' attorneys in two cases against a robotics company to pay for the time opposing counsel took in filing an additional briefing because of false case quotations.

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Judge Breaks Up Review Of Challenge To New Jersey US Atty

By Jake Maher and Lauren Berg

The chief judge for Pennsylvania's Middle District, who is overseeing a drug trafficking case in New Jersey, on Tuesday evening issued a directive bifurcating a challenge to acting U.S. Attorney Alina Habba's authority in order to analyze whether the defendants are entitled to relief if she was illegally appointed.

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What To Watch As Deadline Looms For Jay Clayton At SDNY

By Phillip Bantz

The clock is ticking closer to the expiration of Jay Clayton's appointment as interim U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, setting him on a likely collision course with the district's judges, who have the power to vote on whether he can continue overseeing one of the top prosecutorial offices in the country.

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Attys Blast 'Chilling Message' Of Judge Shopping Sanctions

By Ryan Boysen

Three attorneys sanctioned for judge shopping while challenging an Alabama statute that criminalizes gender-affirming care have asked the Eleventh Circuit to clear their names, castigating the process that led to their censure as "so extraordinary as to approach unprecedented."

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Md. Bar Warns DOJ Suit Risks Undermining Legal Norm

By Britain Eakin

The Maryland State Bar Association on Tuesday warned of sweeping impacts if a federal judge doesn't dismiss the Trump administration's suit over a standing order that prohibits the immediate removal of immigrants challenging their detention, saying it will compromise cornerstone pillars of the legal system.

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Judiciary Advises Not Filling Next 10th Circ. Vacancy, For Now

By Lauren Berg

The Judicial Conference of the United States is recommending not filling the next vacancies on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit and a handful of district courts, for now, citing a "consistently low per-judgeship caseload" in those jurisdictions.

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DOJ Says Wis. Judge Not Immune To Charges In ICE Incident

By Jack Karp

A Wisconsin state judge cannot duck criminal charges for allegedly helping an undocumented immigrant evade arrest in her courtroom, because judicial immunity applies only to civil suits and official judicial acts, the U.S. Department of Justice told a federal judge Tuesday.

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Posner Wage Theft Claims Should Be Revived, 7th Circ. Told

By Emily Sawicki

A former staffer for retired U.S. Circuit Judge Richard Posner has asked the Seventh Circuit to review federal court rulings in his loss of wage theft claims against the ex-judge, arguing an Indiana federal judge permitted a botched discovery process and prematurely dismissed claims while fact issues remained.

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Seeger Weiss Named Lead Negotiation Counsel In J&J MDL

By Carla Baranauckas

A New Jersey federal judge overseeing long-running multidistrict federal litigation against Johnson & Johnson over its talcum powder products has appointed Christopher A. Seeger of Seeger Weiss LLP to lead a negotiation team to guide plaintiffs through settlement talks.

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Ga. Senators Accuse DA Of 'Stonewalling' In Testimony Fight

By Emily Johnson

A Georgia Senate committee investigating Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis' prosecution of President Donald Trump and others in an election interference case told the state's Supreme Court that her bid to escape its subpoena for her to testify before the committee seeks "to reward her stonewalling" and "delay tactics."

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Brief

Former US Atty Named New Chief Judge For Eastern Mich.

By Danielle Ferguson

U.S. District Judge Stephen J. Murphy III became the newest chief judge for the Eastern District of Michigan on Monday, succeeding U.S. District Judge Sean F. Cox, who retired from the bench the same day, the district court announced Tuesday.

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