Bar Exams

* Many law school deans are opposed to the ABA’s proposal to require 75 percent of graduates sitting for a bar exam to pass it within two years, but this is perhaps one of the more absurd arguments offered against the rule: “Nobody looks at what percentage of Ph.D.s end up as college professors, or […]

* Despite the fact that President-elect Trump has called for the cast of “Hamilton” to apologize to Vice President-elect Pence for delivering a message to him after the show, Pence handled it well, saying he “wasn’t offended,” and that he reminded his kids that the mixture of boos and cheers from the audience as he took his seat was “what freedom sounds like.” [PLAYBILL]

* President-elect Donald Trump may be able to get a pretty hefty tax write-off for settling the Trump University fraud case for $25 million, since according to tax lawyer Robert Wood, most business settlements are fully tax deductible. Perhaps the president-elect — or his legal team — really does know the tax code better than anyone else. [Forbes]

* Libertarian vice presidential candidate Bill Weld is settling back into private practice after the election. The former Massachusetts governor has returned to the Boston office of Mintz Levin as a partner in the firm’s government relations practice, says that being back is a “pure pleasure because you get to sit at a desk and think.” [Am Law Daily]

* In an effort to slash their legal bills, rival fantasy sports rivals DraftKings and FanDuel will be merging in the second half of 2017. As the two sites are market leaders and their union would likely create a monopoly, there will be some antitrust issues to review before the merger closes. We wonder which firms are working on the deal. [Reuters]

* Kaplan’s Concord Law School, an unaccredited, for-profit, online-only institution, is petitioning several states to allow its students to sit for the bar exam. California is the only state that allows Concord graduates to sit for its bar exam, and their passage rate for first-timers on the July 2015 administration of the exam was 25 percent. [ABA Journal]

* Is the GOP writing a check its ass can’t cash? (In regard to the Supreme Court.) [Talking Points Memo]

* What time will a new president be determined? Everything you think you know about election predictions is about to change. [Politico]

* The 75-mile problem with Donald Trump’s wall. [Huffington Post]

* A deep dive into the D.C. bar exam stats. [Bar Exam Stats]

* A look at the Supreme Court’s grant, vacate, remand (“GVR”) dispositions this Term. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* The best of Assistant Attorney General Leslie Caldwell’s recent Foreign Corrupt Practices Act speech. [FCPA Professor]

* Donald Trump’s history of destroying emails mid-litigation. [Newsweek] * A deep dive into the New York bar results. [Bar Exam Stats] * The new hotness in prenup agreements for millennials. [The Fashion Law] * Let’s hope the election doesn’t go into overtime. [USA Today] * David Perla is leaving Bloomberg. Scott Mozarsky named President […]

* Results are out for the July 2016 administration of the South Carolina bar exam, and it appears that the Charleston School of Law is having trouble when it comes to its grads’ ability to pass. Barely half of test-takers from the law school passed (50.9 percent), down from 57.4 percent last year, and 65.3 percent the year before that. Whoops! [FITS News]

* No matter what Senator Ted Cruz says, when it comes to the Supreme Court, eight isn’t enough. In fact, according to what Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said at a recent New York City Bar event, “Eight is not a good number.” Justice Sonia Sotomayor agreed, stating, “I think we hope there will be nine as quickly as possible.” [Washington Post]

* The Supreme Court bar rarely meets, but when it does, it’s to honor the passing of a deceased justice. On November 4, the Supreme Court bar will convene to honor the late Justice Antonin Scalia, and the ceremony will be live-streamed, and several judges, law firm partners, law professors, and former clerks will give remarks. [Supreme Court Brief]

* “[T]his appeal presents a situation in which all the justices’ impartiality might be questioned.” Controversial Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore wants his suspension to be lifted, but all of his former judicial colleagues have recused themselves, so several retired judges will be hearing his appeal. [Associated Press via ABA Journal]

* China’s Ministry of Justice has ordered that all lawyers “support the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party.” Lawyers are prohibited from making statements that “reject [China’s] fundamental political system,” “endanger national security,” or “attack or slander” the judicial system. They could face disbarment for disobeying. [WSJ Law Blog]

* “Every woman lied when they came forward to hurt my campaign.” Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump plans to sue all of the “liars” who have accused him of sexual assault within the last two weeks when the election is over. As an attorney representing one of Trump’s accusers noted, a lawsuit would provide a “field day” to depose him under oath. [CNN]

* The American Bar Association’s Council of the Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar has approved a tougher bar-passage rate standard that would require 75 percent of of a law school’s graduates who sit for the bar exam to pass it within two years. It’s up to the ABA House of Delegates to decide if the stricter standard will ever be implemented. We’ll have more on this later today. [ABA Journal]

* “I don’t know why he would wait around for 200 days and then pull out at the very moment that it seemed likely that he was going to get confirmed.” Will Judge Merrick Garland be confirmed to SCOTUS? With senators calling for lame-duck hearings if Hillary Clinton is elected and a bare-bones oral arguments calendar scheduled, it seems like even the justices are holding out hope for a full house in 2017. [Washington Post]

* In a deal likely to invoke government scrutiny, AT&T has agreed to purchase Time Warner for $84.5 billion. Teams from Sullivan & Cromwell (transaction work) and Arnold & Porter (regulatory work) will be representing AT&T, while Cravath will be representing Time Warner. Faiza Saeed, Cravath’s deputy presiding partner, will lead the team working on the deal from her firm. [DealBook / New York Times; Am Law Daily]

* According to testimony from Bridget Kelly, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s former deputy chief of staff, Christie allegedly knew about the Bridgegate lane closures a month before they occurred, not afterwards, as he’s repeatedly claimed. Kelly, who says she thought the lane closures were for a traffic study, not a politically motivated scheme, is currently being tried in federal court over her role in the 2013 scandal. [Reuters]

* Rhonda Crawford, the Illinois law clerk who allegedly posed as a judge and was running unopposed for her own judgeship, was indicted for her judicial impersonation. Crawford does not intend to drop out of the race for a seat on the bench, despite the state bar ethics commission seeking to suspend her license to practice. [Chicago Tribune]

* London firms CMS and Olswang are merging with international firm Nabarro for a three-way combination that’s set to close in May 2017 and operate under the name CMS Cameron McKenna Nabarro Olswang, but rumor has it an American firm wants to get in on the action. Will Hunton & Williams join in for four-way fun? [The Lawyer]

* “[M]aybe Republicans can stop with the 60-something repeal votes they’ve taken … and just work with the next president to smooth out the kinks.” President Obama hopes that maybe when his second term in the White House is over, his signature healthcare law can be fixed. He doesn’t even care if they change its name to “Reagancare.” [Reuters]

* “The panic is starting to set in. Those who have a lot of interests at stake need to do work now.” Lawyers across the pond are poised for a profitable 2017 thanks to people scrambling for legal advice following Brexit, but those billables won’t last forever; after all, lawyers aren’t “immune to a broader economic slowdown.” [Big Law Business]

* More law schools are partially or completely covering bar exam preparation costs for their students, but with pass rates plummeting across the nation, you must be curious if this trend has had any positive effect. It worked for Loyola New Orleans and Southern University, whose pass rates for first-timers increased quite a bit. [ABA Journal]