Yale Law Cool Kids’ Chat: JD and Usha Vance’s law school classmates have kept a private Signal chat running for years to gossip about the couple’s improbable turn from Yale liberals to MAGA royalty.
Mangione Tries For Double Jeopardy Where The Scores Can Really Change: Luigi Mangione hopes to turn federal guilty plea to stalking into double jeopardy protection against murder charges. It shouldn’t succeed, but nothing about 2026 makes sense.
Ice Miller’s Raises On Layaway: Ice Miller matched the market salary scale for its New York associates, then decided they can wait until January 2027 to actually see the money.
Endless Shrimp, Meet Endless Billables: Paul, Weiss, Quinn Emanuel, and Proskauer are reportedly holding early talks with private equity investors despite already sitting on some of the fattest profit margins in Biglaw.
Eat What You Kill, Round Three: Litigation boutique Reid Collins & Tsai is handing out its third bonus round of 2026, pushing associates’ total bonus compensation for the year as high as $170,000.
SPLC Left With Chicken-And-Egg Problem: A federal judge in Alabama rejected the Southern Poverty Law Center’s vindictive-prosecution claim against DOJ, ruling the group needed more evidence of prosecutorial animus. Oh, and the judge ruled out allowing the SPLC to see that evidence.
Navarro Wants The Guy Who Convicted Him Fired For Convicting Him: White House adviser Peter Navarro used a livestream on Steve Bannon’s show to demand that DC’s top federal prosecutor fire the career attorney who helped put Navarro in prison for contempt of Congress.
Nicole Kidman Discovers The NDA Drawer: Paramount+ has ordered Discretion, an eight-episode legal thriller starring Nicole Kidman and Elle Fanning about a summer associate who uncovers the NDAs her firm’s most powerful partner used to bury a dark truth.
Pirro Reaches For Nuclear Grand Jury Option: Facing Trump’s fury over a botched prosecution, DC US Attorney Jeanine Pirro has convened a special grand jury and put a crony who once ran a dance photography studio in charge of politically sensitive cases.
Blame The Bot Strategy Fails: An NLRB judge refused to credit an auto parts company’s claim that ChatGPT invented the line in its own termination paperwork admitting it illegally fired an employee for discussing pay.