Bar Exams

* How have personnel changes at the Supreme Court affected the dynamics at oral argument? Adam Feldman offers this analysis. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* Ed Whelan expresses relief over the White House’s new slate of Ninth Circuit nominations. [Bench Memos / National Review]

* Can President Trump declare a “national emergency” in order to build his beloved wall? The National Emergencies Act is not a blank check, according to Brianne Gorod. [Take Care]

* Should Congress pass a “deepfakes” law? Orin Kerr has some concerns. [Volokh Conspiracy / Reason]

* What’s going on with Rudy Giuliani? Joel Cohen has a theory. [The Hill]

* Jean O’Grady is pleased to see all the competition in the legal analytics space (with Precedent Analytics from Thomson Reuters as the newest entrant) — but she’d like to see more support for the competing claims of the different products. [Dewey B Strategic]

* News organizations need stricter and better guidelines when interviewing mentally ill defendants, according to former public defender Stephen Cooper. [The Tennessean]

* Have questions about the fast-approaching February bar exam? Ashley Heidemann has answers. [JD Advising]

* Paul Weiss really showed its “commitment to putting the white in white shoe” with its new partnership class, and the New York Times is on it! See our coverage from December here. [New York Times]

* President Donald Trump recently met with a group of right-wing activists led by Ginni Thomas, wife of Justice Clarence Thomas, where they criticized transgender people and women serving in the military. Trump reportedly looked “taken aback“ during the meeting, which is a bit of a rarity. [New York Times]

* Some pretty major lateral moves for some pretty major players when it comes to appellate practice: Lisa Blatt is returning to Williams & Connelly where she’ll lead the firm’s Supreme Court practice, and Kannon Shanmugam is leaving Williams & Connolly to lead a new Supreme Court practice at Paul Weiss. Congrats! [NLJ; NLJ]

* “I’m here to speak for the people who don’t have a voice.” Rappers Jay-Z and Meek Mill have launched the Reform Alliance, an initiative for criminal justice reform, with the goal of dramatically changing laws and policies to reduce “unreasonable” probation, parole, and prison terms. [CBS News]

* What happened to the people who were told that they passed the D.C. bar exam, when in reality they actually failed? “Just shock. I didn’t think that could happen. I never heard of a bar committee changing the results.” Here’s a bit of a depressing update. [Washington Post]

* President Trump is preparing to declare a national emergency at the country’s southern border. A draft order is in the works, and $7B+ will be used to build the president’s wall to fix the humanitarian crisis he helped to create. [CNN]

* Longtime Trump ally Roger Stone was arrested early this morning in connection with special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe. He’s been charged with seven counts: one count of obstruction of an official proceeding, five counts of false statements, and one count of witness tampering. [Washington Post]

* Were you planning on taking the D.C. bar exam in February? Not so fast. Thanks to the government shutdown, you might not be able to do so. We’ll keep you updated. If you’ve been waiting to get sworn in after passing the July 2018 bar, keep waiting — potentially for a while. [Law.com]

* Michael Cohen’s lawyer, Lanny Davis, has called for a criminal investigation into Rudy Giuliani for his alleged witness tampering because “calling out a man’s father-in-law and wife in order to intimidate the witness is not fair game.” [The Hill]

* Like it or not, women still carry the bulk of their childcare duties, and lawyer moms often find themselves “deploy[ing] tactical maneuvers” to get the job done. At least millennials are doing what they can to eliminate motherhood bias. [Law.com]

* Congratulations to Kimberly Mutcherson of Rutgers-Camden, who was recently named as the co-dean of Rutgers Law School. She will be the first African-American and first LGBTQ law dean at Rutgers University. Well done! [Daily Targum]

* Believe it or not, you can still do a lot of extracurricular activities during law school. Just ask Ted Bundy. He killed up to eight women while he was a student at Utah Law. We hope your preferred activities are more… normal. [Salt Lake Tribune]

* “Trump is screaming. He’s so mad at Rudy.” After yet another botched interview, President Trump is reportedly “furious” with Rudy Giuliani, and word on the street is that he’s being told to dump the former New York mayor before any additional damage can be done. Best of luck, because he very obviously needs it. [Vanity Fair]

* Justice will prevail… at least until the end of the month: The federal judiciary is still clinging to life amid the government shutdown, and the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts just announced its final funding extension to continue operations through January 31. [National Law Journal]

* The Supreme Court’s conservative wind just low-key alerted the nation that big changes could be on the way by deciding to hear a Second Amendment case for the first time since 2010. Will the high court swing further to the right now that its perennial swing justice has retired? [Washington Post]

* Stormy Daniels’s lawsuit against President Trump could be tossed out of court because there no longer seems to be a case. “They admitted what we said all along,” ATL’s 2018 Lawyer of the Year Michael Avenatti said. “So any attempt by anyone to claim that this is not a victory for Stormy Daniels is completely bogus and nonsense and dishonest.” [TIME]

* The ABA’s House of Delegates will reconsider a 75 percent bar pass rate within two years of graduation for law schools to maintain their accreditation. This time around, the proposal could actually pass. Stay tuned, because the effort to push through a stronger bar pass standard will be taken up this coming Monday. [Law.com]

* Congratulations to Chief Judge Stephen Dillard (@JudgeDillard) of the Georgia Court of Appeals, who was recently named as the state’s Twitter laureate. Just as you take judicial notice of my birthday each year, I take editorial notice of your constant kindness. Thank you for being you! [Daily Report]

* In this bombshell report, it was revealed that almost immediately after President Trump fired former FBI director James Comey, the agency launched a criminal and counterintelligence investigation into whether Trump was working on Russia’s behalf. No collusion? [New York Times]

* “They’re not God, after all. They could be wrong.” Meanwhile, Rudy Giuliani says the president’s legal team should be allowed to “correct” special counsel Robert Mueller’s report before anyone else gets to read it, including members of Congress. [The Hill]

* Uh-oh… The longer the government shutdown continues, the longer certain practice areas are going to be in limbo. In fact, law firms “might see a dip [in billable hours] in the first quarter, depending on how much longer this goes on.” [American Lawyer]

* “If a school can’t get enough of its students to have a high enough pass rate, then there’s a problem.” The ABA is again pushing for a 75 percent bar pass rate within two years of graduation for a school to retain its accreditation. [Wall Street Journal]

* Joshua Davis, the lawyer who sued Ticketmaster over tickets he purchased to see “Hamilton” on the wrong day due to a tech glitch, got a quick settlement out of the ticket broker — and now he won’t miss his shot to see the show. [Texas Lawyer]

* Patricia Wald, the first woman appointed to the D.C. Circuit, RIP. [Washington Post]