Public Policy

  • August 18, 2026

    Hesai Deprived Due Process Over DOD List, DC Circ. Says

    A D.C. Circuit panel held Tuesday that a Department of Defense decision to include Shanghai lidar-maker Hesai on a list of Chinese military companies didn't give the company due process, reversing a lower court's ruling while also allowing the designation to remain in effect.

  • August 18, 2026

    Big Tech, PTAB Attys Urge Justices To Fix USPTO Power Grab

    The Federal Circuit's refusal to curb the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office director's power over instituting Patent Trial and Appeal Board challenges has allowed leaders to "wreak havoc" without accountability, top tech companies have warned the U.S. Supreme Court.

  • August 18, 2026

    11th Circ. Says Clerk's Notice Fail Sank Fla. Funds Seizure

    The Eleventh Circuit ruled Monday that a Florida county court clerk violated the Fifth and Fourteenth amendments by taking funds deposited in a court registry as part of an eviction proceeding, because the clerk's notice to the owner of the funds was not reasonably calculated to reach him.

  • August 18, 2026

    Texas AG Asks 1st Circ. To Revive ActBlue Suit

    The Texas attorney general has asked the First Circuit to revive his Texas-based lawsuit against Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue after a Massachusetts federal court blocked it, saying the federal judge improperly stymied his state-based fraud claims.

  • August 18, 2026

    Microsoft Harvests K-12 Student Data, Class Action Claims

    Microsoft Corp.'s partnerships with K-12 schools in Washington have allowed the technology giant to collect and profit from swaths of personal student data in violation of state and federal law, according to a proposed class action filed by four minor students who attend public schools in Spokane, Washington.

  • August 18, 2026

    5th Circ. Rejects Texas Water Case Against River Authority

    The Fifth Circuit refused Tuesday to revive a private water utility's antitrust case targeting Texas' San Jacinto River Authority contract fees designed to reduce groundwater use, concluding that the contract was not designed to fix prices.  

  • August 18, 2026

    ATF's Ghost Gun Rule Found Unconstitutional By Texas Judge

    A Texas federal judge has ruled that a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives rule restricting so-called ghost gun kits violates the Second Amendment because it runs counter to America's colonial tradition of home gunsmithing.

  • August 18, 2026

    Trump Admin Moves To Cut Roadless Rule Forest Protections

    The U.S. Forest Service on Tuesday said it's moving ahead with a plan to repeal a decades-old rule that has protected tens of millions of acres of national forest from road building and logging, asserting it has unacceptably hampered efforts to reduce wildfire risk.

  • August 18, 2026

    Trump Names 9 Judicial Picks Across 6 States

    President Donald Trump announced nine nominees Tuesday for judicial spots in Florida, Texas, Louisiana, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Alaska. 

  • August 18, 2026

    Squires Says RPIs Must Be Named If They Can Control Cases

    The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office director explained why he rejected Viance LLC's challenge of a Koppers Performance Chemicals Inc. patent, faulting Viance for failing to disclose real parties in interest and writing that a company's mere ability to control a challenger makes it an RPI.

  • August 18, 2026

    Conn. Pans DOJ's Injury Claims In Use-Of-Force Law Dispute

    The state of Connecticut has challenged the U.S. Department of Justice's attempt to invalidate recent laws on use of force, identification and face covering that two state officials said could affect federal officers, arguing the DOJ failed to allege "concrete harm" or validly claim federal officers can't be prosecuted for crimes.

  • August 18, 2026

    Ex-Meta Worker Says His EB-2 Letter Concerns Got Him Fired

    A former Meta Platforms Inc. product design manager sued the social media giant and his former supervisor in New Jersey federal court, claiming that he was fired after refusing to sign an immigration support letter for a colleague because he believed it contained inaccurate or unsupported facts.

  • August 18, 2026

    House GOP Still Pushing For Broadband Permit Bill This Year

    Despite months of delays, Republican leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives are still pressing for legislation that would compel local governments to act faster on broadband permit applications, a top congressional aide said Tuesday.

  • August 18, 2026

    Alaska Judge Voids 500-Acre Land Swap For Refuge Road

    A district court judge vacated an Interior Department decision to exchange 500 acres to allow road construction on Izembek National Wildlife Refuge lands for failing to comply with the provision of a federal Alaskan land law, saying in a Tuesday order that the transaction has no "force or effect."

  • August 18, 2026

    10th Circ. Revisits Banks' Challenge To Colo. Opt-Out Law

    The Tenth Circuit on Tuesday reconsidered a challenge from banking groups to a Colorado law intended to curb high-cost lending by out-of-state banks, pressing counsel on the practicality of Colorado's law and the history of a federal interest rate law.

  • August 18, 2026

    Exchanges Ask SEC To Delay Trade-Through Rule Withdrawal

    Some of the largest stock exchanges are urging the SEC to hold off on eliminating a rule that prohibits exchanges from executing trades at lower prices than the best displayed price available on other exchanges, saying the agency should first consider how the rule's elimination could impact broader market structure.

  • August 18, 2026

    Are Trump Diamond Tariff Breaks Tied To Gift? Wyden Asks

    Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., on Tuesday demanded answers about President Donald Trump granting a tariff exemption for diamonds shortly after being given a gem-coated watch, claiming the circumstances may be tantamount to bribery, while also raising concerns about potential conflicts of interest in a separate duty investigation.

  • August 18, 2026

    NCUA Board Left Sitting Empty As Trump Pick Waits In Wings

    The National Credit Union Administration has entered its second week with an empty governing board, an unusual leadership vacuum that could limit the agency's ability to take certain formal actions until President Donald Trump's newly confirmed board pick assumes office.

  • August 18, 2026

    Pennsylvania Now Requires Local Approval For Data Centers

    Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said Tuesday he has signed an executive order imposing additional requirements on developers seeking to build data centers in the state, including a mandate that projects must obtain approval by local municipalities before the state will allow them to advance.

  • August 18, 2026

    DOJ Says 'Heroes' Garden Too Hypothetical To Support Suit

    The Trump administration's plans to install a National Garden of American Heroes in the capital's West Potomac Park remain too much of a preliminary concept to support a challenge brought by conservation and historic preservation groups, the U.S. Department of Justice told a Washington, D.C., federal judge.

  • August 18, 2026

    DEA Blasts Marijuana Foes' Objections To Rescheduling

    The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration on Monday told an administrative law judge that federal restrictions should be loosened on marijuana and that opponents of cannabis reform brought a meritless challenge to health regulators' assessment of the drug's medical use.

  • August 18, 2026

    Dems Urge DOJ To End 'Mega Master' Immigration Hearings

    Democratic lawmakers from Illinois urged the U.S. Department of Justice on Tuesday to cease scheduling dozens of immigrants for hearings at the same time in Illinois and other states, a practice they say fuels the administration's "mass deportation campaign."

  • August 18, 2026

    Publishers Target Google's 'Fake Privilege' In Ad Tech MDL

    A group of website publishers targeting Google's advertising placement technology dominance in a wider multidistrict litigation asked a New York federal judge Monday to force discovery into corporate policies allegedly hiding evidence that have continuously haunted the technology giant across antitrust cases from government and private plaintiffs.

  • August 18, 2026

    Charlotte Transit Lost Millions To Fare Evasion, Auditor Says

    The public transit system in Charlotte, North Carolina, lost millions of dollars on riders who don't pay for tickets and left $1.7 million in unspent safety dollars on the table, according to a state watchdog report penned in response to the fatal stabbing of a 23-year-old Ukrainian woman on the city's light rail system last year.

  • August 18, 2026

    Judge Rejects Bid To Stop Plan To Fully Paint EEOB

    A federal judge has denied a preservationist law firm's request for a preliminary injunction in its bid to stop the Trump administration from fully painting over a historic granite office building near the White House.

Expert Analysis

  • Assessing The Benefits Of Fla.'s Newest Business Structure

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    As of July 1, Florida business owners can create protected series LLCs to shield assets from liability while avoiding increased costs and wasted time, but burdensome recordkeeping obligations are crucial to maintaining the very protection that makes them attractive in the first place, says Gregory Ritter at Moritt Hock.

  • Key Post-Proposal Shifts Likely In CFPB Loss Mitigation Rule

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    Mortgage servicers, borrowers and consumer advocates should prepare for a likely narrowed version of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's loss mitigation rule, which is likely to permit sequential reviews, defer to investor guidelines, extend compliance timelines and preempt conflicting state standards, say attorneys at Goodwin.

  • Series

    Teaching SEC Investigations Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Instructing a law school course on U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission investigations has made me a more thoughtful, deliberate practitioner because it requires me to continually reassess and challenge what I know about securities law enforcement, how I know it and how best to explain it, says David Chase at Miami Law.

  • Noncompete Laws Show States Focusing On Bans, Healthcare

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    The first half of 2026 confirms that state legislatures are driving the most consequential changes in noncompete law, including a few state bans and several healthcare-specific laws, making a one-size-fits-all approach increasingly untenable for multistate employers, say attorneys at Faegre Drinker.

  • What's Inside Proposed, Expanded NY Stablecoin Regulations

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    New York's recently proposed regulations for payment stablecoin issuers would, if adopted, increase the regulatory burdens of a state license, and midsize issuers considering a conversion to a federal charter should weigh the associated costs of both options, say attorneys at Lowenstein Sandler.

  • Justices' Tax Sale Ruling Tees Up Auction Fairness Battles

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    The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Pung v. Isabella County, Michigan, that taxpayers are not entitled to fair market value of real property seized to satisfy a tax debt shifts attention to the fairness of state and local auction procedures, and whether taxpayers claiming surplus proceeds face unwarranted hurdles, say attorneys at Miller Canfield.

  • What Corporate Counsel Can Learn From OpenAI Test Breach

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    The significance of the recent artificial intelligence testing breach involving OpenAI and Hugging Face lies in what it reveals about the path of AI’s evolution, because legal professionals must translate that trajectory into actionable governance, contractual and advisory frameworks, says Jason Mueller at Vorys.

  • Patent Eligibility Reforms Keep Chasing The Wrong Fixes

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    Repeated efforts to create a consistent, predictable patent eligibility standard under Section 101 have centered on replacing judge-made exceptions with new statutory language, but the better fix is to align examination standards with how courts actually apply eligibility doctrine, says former Patent Trial and Appeal Board judge Amee Shah.

  • Opinion

    Qualified Immunity Bill's Reach Goes Beyond Federal Officers

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    The federal Qualified Immunity Abolition Act, introduced earlier this year and described by the bill sponsors as a federal-officer measure, would in actuality reach the entire universe of Section 1983 defendants, a distinction that matters as much to defense counsel as to plaintiffs, says attorney V. James DeSimone.

  • State Of Insurance: Q2 Notes From Pennsylvania

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    Todd Leon at Marshall Dennehey highlights notable second-quarter insurance developments in Pennsylvania, including federal court opinions providing guidance on first-party and third-party insurance coverage principles, and a pending bill seeking to regulate health insurers' use of artificial intelligence.

  • Assessing DOJ Antitrust's New, Faster Merger Review Option

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    The U.S. Justice Department Antitrust Division's recently announced targeted second request option and new model timing signal a commercially friendly stance and a departure from the prior administration's position, say attorneys at Paul Weiss.

  • NRC Proposal May Reshape Radiation Protection Framework

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    The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s proposal to drop the long-standing requirement to keep radiation exposure "as low as reasonably achievable," alongside the U.S. Department of Energy's removal of ALARA from its own rules, suggests a broader federal reassessment of radiation protection policy, say attorneys at Womble Bond.

  • High Court, SEC Proposals Set Stage For Further Fund Reform

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    The U.S. Supreme Court's recent decision in FS Credit Opportunities v. Saba Capital Master Fund and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's proposed rulemaking packages aimed at public market reforms provide a constructive backdrop for considering additional innovations to the listed fund structure, say attorneys at Debevoise.

  • AG Watch: Minn. Defends Prediction Markets Ban

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    Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has aggressively defended the state's landmark statute banning prediction markets, but the court's July 27 temporary injunction in U.S. v. Minnesota blocking the law from taking effect could set the template for state authority across the country, say attorneys at Crowell & Moring.

  • Series

    Judges On AI: Examining Administrative, Organizational Uses

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    U.S. District Judge Alan Albright of the Western District of Texas examines how artificial intelligence could transform a court's ability to deal with administrative work and organize materials when preparing for hearings or drafting opinions, thereby affording judges more time to resolve contested issues.

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