Recent Headlines from Above the Law

  • Morning Docket: 08.04.23
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 08.04.23

    * Elena Kagan has entered the chat: Justice Kagan sounds off in response to Samuel Alito’s self-serving thoughts on the ability to check the Supreme Court’s power. [Politico]

    * Thanks to the ban on cameras in federal court, all we get is a sketch of Donald Trump’s not-guilty plea. [Huffington Post]

    * The legal battle to end Wisconsin’s egregious gerrymander heats up. [Vox]

    * The defamation case between Fox News and Smartmatic is getting spicy. [Law.com]

    * A look at Donald Trump’s latest defense attorney. [Law360]

  • Morning Docket: 05.26.22
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 05.26.22

    * Back the children: The number of children that have been shot to death at school is higher than the amount of officers that have been killed in the line of duty. [AS]

    * Oklahoma just banned abortion at fertilization. We’re like two steps off criminalizing miscarriages at this point, aren’t we? [CNN]

    * NY judge maintains law that allows gun manufacturers to be sued if and when they endanger public safety. [CNN]

    * Advertisers REALLY don’t like Texas’s social media law. [Adweek]

    * If Roe is overturned, the right to choose will be set back 173 years in Wisconsin. [Madison]

  • Morning Docket: 01.14.22
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 01.14.22

    * SCOTUS blocked Biden’s vaccine and testing requirement for large businesses. May liberty and funeral home owners rejoice. [CNN]

    * A Wisconsin judge recently ruled that absentee ballot drop boxes are not allowed under the state’s law. As you make it to the polls, remember — six feet! [NPR]

    * …So a few doctors, a paralegal, and some cops get paid $100m to walk into a bar. Oh my bad, I meant a jail cell. I get them mixed up sometimes. [NY Post]

    * Officers tried to jail a professor for showing other people what police misconduct looked like. Maybe they just wanted to be part of the video? [Reuters]

    * NJ governor Phil Murphy just signed a bill protecting abortion access. Woop Woop! [6ABC]

  • Morning Docket: 01.06.22
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 01.06.22

    * A New York firm by any name would be just as legal. Unless it’s confusing. [Bloomberg Law]

    * World’s most famous naked baby has one (1) more chance to sue Nirvana over their Nevermind cover. [ABA Journal]

    * Over 100 years after the matter, Homer Plessy is pardoned for his crime of not respecting “separate but equal.” Quite the legal Odyssey. [AP News]

    * “Only you can maintain democracy,” say law deans reflecting on today, a year ago. [Reuters]

    * Wisconsin law outlaws rubber necking and double texting around accidents. [News8000]

  • Morning Docket: 05.11.20
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 05.11.20

    * Evidence points to Justice Stephen Breyer being the perpetrator of the “flush heard ’round the world” during telephonic Supreme Court arguments last week. [Slate]

    * A Georgia lawyer has been identified as the leaker of a video showing the Ahmaud Arbery shooting. [New York Times]

    * Quinn Emanuel is representing Tesla in its lawsuit against a CA county over closures related to COVID-19. Hope the firm gets a few Model Xs thrown in for the representation. [The Recorder]

    * A Wisconsin lawyer, who is accused of offering to bribe officials for a client, has avoided prison. Talk about a full-service lawyer… [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]

    * Republican lawmakers are ready to fill any Supreme Court vacancy that may occur this year. [Politico]

    * A lawsuit about Ben and Jerry’s claim of using milk from “happy cows” has been dismissed. Guess the cows really were happy? [Fox News]

  • Morning Docket: 01.24.20
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 01.24.20

    * The Ohio Bar has denied an applicant for bar admission in part because of her student loan debt. [Forbes]

    * A man who recovered money in a racial discrimination case was allegedly discriminated against when trying to deposit his settlement check. Sounds like he may have another lawsuit. [Buzzfeed News]

    * Some commentators are noting how Lev Parnas’ strategy is similar to the one employed by Trump’s ex-lawyer Michael Cohen. [NPR]

    * An ex-CIA lawyer has stated that the Soleimani hit was a homicide under US law. [Daily Beast]

    * The man charged in murdering prominent lawyer Randy Gori has pleaded not guilty. [St. Louis Post-Dispatch]

    * A Wisconsin man who was wrongfully convicted has been sworn in as an attorney of the Wisconsin Bar. [Wisconsin Public Radio]

  • Morning Docket: 04.10.19
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 04.10.19

    * Tired of remaining silent, Jones Day is now defending itself against a $200 million gender bias class-action lawsuit, saying that the firm is “proud of its success in promoting a diverse group of outstanding lawyers.” [Law.com]

    * Meanwhile, MoFo is seeking sanctions against the attorneys at Sanford Heisler Sharp who filed the “mommy track” lawsuit against the firm, as well as against one of the anonymous plaintiffs, alleging that the claims made were “knowingly baseless.” [American Lawyer]

    * As it turns out, during his testimony yesterday before the House Financial Services Committee, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin acknowledged that his legal department had already been in touch with the White House Counsel’s Office over the release of President Trump’s tax returns — an exchange that’s “deeply troubling and certainly violates the spirit of the law” meant to prevent such communications. [Washington Post]

    * In case you missed it, Michael Cohen is no longer as useful to the House Intelligence Committee as he once thought. Chairman Adam Schiff seems to have no interest in helping Cohen to delay his upcoming prison sentence. [CNN]

    * Senator Lindsey Graham has once again again introduced the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, a bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks. He’s proposed this bill since 2013 and it gets slapped down each time, but this time… things could change. [CBS News]

    * Two Wisconsin lawyers claim that being required to pay bar dues to practice in the state is unconstitutional because it requires them to participate in the state bar’s advocacy. You can look forward to more lawsuits like this thanks to the Janus ruling. [Big Law Business]

  • Morning Docket: 02.19.19
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 02.19.19

    * 16 states, including New York and California, filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump yesterday — yes, on President’s Day — challenging his declaration of a national emergency. [NBC News]

    * Meredith Watson, one of the women to accuse Virginia Lieutenant Governor and MoFo partner Justin Fairfax of sexual assault, writes in an op-ed that she’s willing to publicly testify about the allegations. [Washington Post]

    * North Carolina elections shenanigans: state investigators the allege Republican candidate engaged in a “coordinated, unlawful and substantially resourced” absentee ballot strategy. [New York Times]

    * Gibson Dunn is suing the Justice Department over their about face on online gambling. [Law.com]

    * Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers really wants to bring medical marijuana to the badger state. [Huffington Post]

  • Morning Docket: 11.15.17
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 11.15.17

    * Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell thinks that the people of Alabama should choose Attorney General Jeff Sessions as a write-in candidate to replace alleged pederast Roy Moore on the ballot for his former seat, but the AG has no desire to return to the Senate. [NPR]

    * The Ninth Circuit has temporarily allowed part of Travel Ban 3.0 to proceed. While that means issuances of visas to citizens of Chad, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen will be restricted, there’s a catch. Applicants with concrete ties to the country will be exempt. [POLITICO]

    * Wisconsin is so desperate to get lawyers to help indigent criminal defendants in rural areas that lawmakers have introduced new legislation that calls for the state to fund law school loan payments of up to $20,000 a year in exchange for the representation of these clients in need. [Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel]

    * Newsflash: In-house legal departments are planning to spend more on outside counsel in 2018. This is the first time this will have happened in more than a decade. Hopefully Biglaw’s fee hikes don’t come back to bite them. [Corporate Counsel]

    * After a two-month national postal survey, Australians have voted “overwhelmingly” in favor of same-sex marriage. Now it’s up to the country’s government to work out the details of the bill that will bring marriage equality down under. Congrats! [CNN]

  • Non-Sequiturs: 07.07.17
    Non-Sequiturs

    Non-Sequiturs: 07.07.17

    * Indiana Jones v. Hobby Lobby. JUSTICE ALITO delivered the opinion of the court. [Held] As applied to closely held corporations, regulations prohibiting the purchase of stolen antiquities violate the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which clearly states the Christian companies like Hobby Lobby can indirectly fund ISIS should the black market or stolen artifacts have relevance to their deeply held beliefs. Petitioners’ claim that it belongs in a museum is denied. [NBC News]

    * The Supreme Court lifted the injunction against Wisconsin’s “cocaine mom” law, which allows the state to send expectant mothers to jail because it claims jurisdiction over the unborn fetus. It just goes to show that it’s better to be unborn in Wisconsin than actually having to live there. [ABA Journal]

    * States are suing because Betsy DeVos is delaying Obama regulations designed to protect students from for profit colleges. Given that the head of one of these “universities” is now the President of the United States, I do wonder what good a few regulations are going to do. The fox is already in the hen house, do I really care if he opens the gate for the rest of his friends? At this point, I blame the dumb ass chickens for being such easy prey anyway. [U.S. News]

    * Man arrested for assaulting his roommate during an argument about Star Wars vs. Star Trek. We don’t know what side he was on, but I’d like to point out that the alleged assailant is black. Dear everybody who called me “oreo” in middle school: this brother here was willing to go to jail over Trek v. Wars. He grabbed the blade end of a knife with his bare hands. Please, go tell him he’s not black enough because he has a deeply held opinion about science fiction. Report back how that goes for you. [The Root]

    * Penn State football is being counter-sued by a coach who claims that there were “intolerable” working conditions. I know nothing about the veracity of the coach’s claims, but I’m pretty sure they could have forced him to diagram plays in his own blood and that wouldn’t make the top ten “intolerable things that have happened in the Penn State locker room.” [Deadspin]

    * Obviously, the big Alt-Right story this week was the CNN blackmail letter. The Alt-Right pot caught the kettle being black as night with CNN’s veiled doxxing threat. The thing that’s weird about the Alt-Right’s obsession with CNN is: they seem to be the only ones watching the network. Like, this story details CNN’s recent ratings struggles, but who is really surprised by that? CNN is not a #resistance network, and it’s not a white supremacist network. Running a network for “moderates who like to be screamed at by partisans from both sides,” seems like a good idea to who? CNN is not balanced: it just gives equal airtime to both extremes, creating a dystopian false equivalency that venerates Don Lemon’s ability to make every thoughtful person on the planet hate his guts. If CNN is the great scalp the Alt-Right wants to take, they can have it. Wake me up when they come for the NewsHour. [Breitbart]

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