Department of Justice

* Someone keeps sending pizzas to this German lawyer. He wishes they would stop. [BBC]

* While the Big 4 threaten to invade Biglaw, one possible solution to keep firms relevant is a corresponding invasion of the alternative legal provider space. Like Hogan Lovells partnering with the 1500 lawyer Elevate. [American Lawyer]

* Not content to profit off of unpaid labor for decades, the NCAA is challenging the attorney fees awarded in the O’Bannon case. [Courthouse News Service]

* Where people are most and least likely to follow the law. Apparently, the Vikings have this all worked out. [Forbes]

* The evolving world of lawyer fashion. [ABA Journal]

* Second Circuit upheld a NY law requiring tax-exempt entities to reveal their donors. Citizens United had argued that this would quell speech and that we should just trust entities enjoying tax-emempt status to not engage in fraud. Reality prevailed… so assume this gets overturned. [Law360]

* On her way out the door, Rachel Brand decided to let us all know that the Department of Justice is considering intervening in more class action settlements so the government can undermine private justice too. [National Law Journal]

* “I’d like to see in the Constitution a statement that men and women are people of equal citizenship stature. I’d like to see an equal rights amendment in our Constitution.” Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is all in favor of amending the Constitution to benefit women. Are you? [Washington Post]

* Kashyap Patel, the “primary author” of the House Intelligence Committee’s secret memo, is no stranger to controversy. You may remember when he dropped out of this bachelor auction due to an issue with his license to practice or from this “Order on Ineptitude” after he was berated by a federal judge. [New York Times]

* Duke Law has a brand new dean, and she’ll be starting her job come July 1. Congratulations to Kerry Abrams — “one of the brightest stars in legal education” — on becoming one of the handful of women to lead one of America’s top law schools. [Duke Today]

* The DOJ wants former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort’s suit against special counsel Robert Mueller and Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein to be tossed, arguing that its only purpose is to “interfere with [his] ongoing criminal prosecution.” Yep, that was the whole point. [CNN]

* Ouch! One Am Law 100 Firm is experiencing that awkward moment when management decides to completely scrub the name of the firm’s major merger partner from all of its branding, just one year after the combination was consummated. [American Lawyer]

* She’s going to be 85 in just a few months, and like a fine wine, she just keeps getting better with age. No one should count on Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg retiring any time soon. [Associated Press]

* Speaking of Justice Ginsburg, you’re going to have to change up your State of the Union drinking games this year, because she won’t be in attendance. She’ll be on a Northeast law school tour instead — and she’ll be wide awake. [The Hill]

* The president wants “[his] guys” at the “Trump Justice Department” — but not Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein, he wants Rosenstein out — to make public a classified memo on the Russia investigation, an act that the DOJ said would be “extraordinarily reckless.” [Washington Post]

* Don McGahn may have threatened to quit his job as White House counsel last summer, but because he decided to stick around, he’s been instrumental to the Trump administration in reshaping a much more conservative judiciary. [CNN]

* Just a few months ago, merger talks between Andrews Kurth and Hunton & Williams seemed pretty tepid, but now they’re heating up. We can tell because AK partners are being picked off by other firms like crazy. [American Lawyer]

* Justice is blind — and cheap: Stephen McAllister was recently sworn in as U.S. attorney for the District of Kansas, and he’s taking a humongous pay cut. The former Kansas Law dean earned more than $1 million by working three jobs, and his new gig pays more than $800K less. [National Law Journal]

* The effort to hijack “religious freedom” to legalize discrimination continues to be plagued by members of Satanic Temples invoking the same law to secure personal freedoms that governments routinely curtail. [Huffington Post]

* Cy Vance is barring donations to his campaign from lawyers with business before his office, resolving a conflict that was obvious to everyone but him. [ABC News]

* Mary Jo White admits Debevoise made a mistake in naming confidential witnesses in its report that functionally exonerated the University of Rochester in a massive sexual harassment investigation. Well, when they’re described as “confidential” witnesses this would seem to be a mistake. [American Lawyer]

* Prosecutors want to retry Senator Menendez and have a list of demands for the new trial like, “not letting defense attorneys talk.” [New Jersey Law Journal]

* HLS students open a startup bringing AI into document categorization following in the proud tradition of Harvard undergrads who dropped out to become tech moguls. [Legaltech News]

* Discrimination suit against Winston & Strawn hinges on what it means to be a “partner.” In other words, can firms placate attorneys with empty titles without accepting the consequences? [Litigation Daily]

* Pennsylvania’s gerrymandered map gets the benchslap. [NPR]

* Okay, let’s get this straight: Roy Moore’s Jewish lawyer isn’t Richard Jaffe, the one who voted for Doug Jones; no, Roy Moore’s Jewish lawyer is Martin Wishnatsky, the one who “has accepted Christ” as his savior. [Washington Post]

* In our last Supreme Court Clerk Hiring Watch, we focused a bit on the fact that rumored retiree Justice Anthony Kennedy hired a full set of clerks for OT 2018, but in case you missed it, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg already has a full set of clerks for OT 2019. The Notorious one isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. [Newsweek]

* Lawyers for the Department of Justice who are attempting to defend the Trump administration’s rescission of the DACA program have asked Judge William Alsup, who is handling the case, to ignore our “very stable genius” president’s recent tweets regarding the immigration policy. [The Recorder]

* Evan Greebel, pharma bro Martin Shkreli’s ex-lawyer, is facing hard prison time for conspiracy, but one of the juror’s who convicted him is having second thoughts. The former Biglaw partner better hope that Judge Kiyo Matsumoto decides to reopen his case. [Big Law Business]

* In what may have been some sort of a Christmas miracle, the legal sector witnessed a very slight uptick in jobs in December. Beggars can’t be choosers, so a gain of 600 jobs is better than nothing at all. Employment in the profession is still nowhere near where it once was before the recession. [American Lawyer]

* Lewis Donelson, cofounder of Baker Donelson, RIP. [Memphis Business Journal]

* Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon has apparently “lost his mind,” and now he’s found himself on the receiving end of a cease-and-desist letter from President Trump’s lawyers, with claims that he’d not only violated his employment agreement with the Trump Organization, but that he’d likely defamed Trump. [Washington Post]

* According to Governor Andrew Cuomo, New York will be filing suit against the government over the new tax plan, contending that its limitation on SALT deductions constitutes unconstitutional “double taxation.” Will other states with high local taxes get on board? [Big Law Business]

* In an effort to beat a deadline, Attorney General Jeff Sessions is using his executive authority to appoint almost 20 interim U.S. attorneys. The jurisdictions where these appointments were made include districts in California, Florida, Guam, Hawaii, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, the Virgin Islands, and Washington. [NBC News]

* There were 102 law firm mergers in 2017, topping a record that was previously set in 2015. Now, just a few days into 2018, law firm mergers are still going strong and show no sign of stopping, and it may be because younger managing partners have replaced their baby boomer predecessors. [American Lawyer]

* Earlier this week, Judge Adrienne Nelson was appointed to the Oregon Supreme Court by Governor Kate Brown. Nelson is the first African-American to ever serve on the state’s high court. Congratulations on making history, Your Honor! [Oregonian]

* Yet another DOJ veteran is leaving for greener pastures in academia. This time, it’s Doug Letter, director of the Civil Division appellate staff, who will bring 40 years of government service experience to Georgetown Law, where he’ll join the school’s Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection. [National Law Journal]

* Both Quinn Emanuel and Kirkland & Ellis are moving into Boston. Is this going to be a trend? Is there enough extra work laying around up there for this to be a trend? [American Lawyer]

* Look forward to hearing more about machine learning in 2018! It’s good to know it won’t all be vague conversations about blockchain next year. [Legaltech News]

* Jeff Sessions opens door to debtor’s prisons, because of course he does. [New York Times]

* And… here come the lawsuits over Apple’s newly uncovered practice of slowing down old phones. There’s a lot of ill will about these types of suits, but this is a pretty good example of how out of hand things can get without the threat of litigation. [Daily Business Review]

* Texas Lawyer put together a top 10 list of the troubled lawyers and judges of 2017. [Texas Lawyer]

* Steptoe’s John Nolan Jr., who negotiated the Bay of Pigs prisoner releases, has passed. [National Law Journal]