Emoluments Clause

* A law school dean accidentally emailed confidential bar exam results and then sent another email asking that the first message be deleted. Ask Michael Scott how successful that usually is… [Charlotte Observer]

* An autopsy suggests that the man allegedly struck by a car driven by the Attorney General of South Dakota died from the injuries he sustained from being hit by a vehicle. [NBC News]

* A female lawyer was roasted online yesterday for criticizing the outfit worn by Judge Amy Coney Barrett at her confirmation hearing. [Fox News]

* The Supreme Court yesterday declined to hear a case about whether President Trump violated the Emoluments Clause by maintaining ownership in businesses that receive payments from foreign governments. [CNN]

* A former lawyer is pursuing a new career as a bagel consultant. Guess that’s one way to make “dough”… [ABC News]

* A GOP lawyer brought files to an impeachment hearing yesterday in grocery bags. Pretty sure the bags weren’t from Whole Foods… [New York Post]

* A lawyer is saying that booze led him to swindle elderly clients out of millions. Sounds like this attorney is taking his defense from Jamie Foxx. [Albany Times Union]

* The Supreme Court has declined to review a Kentucky law that requires doctors to play the sound of a fetal heartbeat to individuals seeking abortions. [Slate]

* Attorney General Barr has rescheduled a Justice Department holiday party that was to occur at the Trump International Hotel. I guess my invitation got lost in the mail… [Washington Post]

* An appellate court seemed skeptical Monday about an Emoluments Clause lawsuit filed against President Trump. [NPR]

* A mistrial has been declared in a murder case after the defense lawyer was struck by a car. Hopefully, this does not give criminal defendants any ideas. [Boston Globe]

* Shortly after AG Bill Barr released his four-page summary of the Mueller report, special counsel Robert Mueller himself stepped forward to tell Barr that he objected to his conclusion that President Trump had been cleared of obstruction, “express[ing] a frustration over the lack of context.” [New York Times]

* Congressional Democrats can move ahead with their emoluments suit against Trump over his business thanks to a ruling by Judge Emmet G. Sullivan, where he found the narrow definition of emoluments championed by Trump to be “unpersuasive and inconsistent.” [Washington Post]

* Kannon Shanmugam may have been the first to leave Williams & Connolly to join the new Supreme Court practice at Paul Weiss, but he certainly isn’t the last. Five of his colleagues followed him, and the group continues to grow. [National Law Journal]

* Remember Am Law 200 firm Stinson Leonard Street? You should probably forget that name, because the firm is rebranding itself as Stinson. Going by one name is apparently the cool, new thing for Biglaw firms. [American Lawyer]

* Biglaw money fight: The ex-chair of the government contracts practice at Dentons, a legacy McKenna Long partner, claims the firm owes her more than $390,000, but Dentons claims she owes the firm almost $2 million. [Big Law Business]

* President Trump asked the FBI to investigate the claims of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and Deborah Ramirez, the first two women to accuse would-be SCOTUS justice Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault and misconduct, leaving out Julie Swetnick’s claims to the chagrin of her lawyer. [Wall Street Journal]

* So, just how limited in scope will the FBI’s new Kavanaugh inquiry be? Trump claims that the bureau has “free rein,” but no one who has contradicted the judge’s claims about his drinking and partying as a high school and college student are going to be interviewed. [New York Times]

* HLS is second best at feeling shame: Following student protests against Kavanaugh teaching at Harvard Law, the elite law school’s dean won’t come out and say whether the accused jurist will still have a job in legal academia come 2019. [HuffPost]

* ICYMI amid the Kavanaugh craziness, a judge ruled that the plaintiffs in Blumenthal v. Trump — the 201 Democratic members of Congress — have standing to sue the president for his alleged violations of the emoluments clause. [National Law Journal]

* That was quick! In the span of just a few days, Elon Musk settled the securities fraud lawsuit filed against him by the SEC, and the deal calls for him to pay a $20 million fine and step down as Tesla’s chairman for the next three years. [New York Times]

* Judge George B. Daniels (S.D.N.Y.) dismissed a suit alleging that President Trump violated the Constitution’s emoluments clause when his hotels and restaurants did business with foreign governments during his time in office. The reason for dismissal? A lack of standing. [Washington Post]

* Speaking of the president, past vetting (or lack thereof) concerns be damned, because he recently announced his latest round of judicial nominations. Thus far, Trump has had a record number of circuit judges confirmed in his first year. [CNN]

* Simpson Thacher and Kasowitz Benson are being sued for malpractice by the former CEO of Patriot National, who claims the firms are the reason why his company went under and is on the brink of filing for bankruptcy. [Daily Business Review]

* Co-conspirator or victim? That’s what jurors will have to decide when it comes to former Katten Muchin partner Evan Greebel, who once represented pharma bro Martin Shkreli. [New York Law Journal]

* UCLA Law School is creating the Chris Cornell Scholarship, named for the late Soundgarden/Audioslave singer, endowed with a $1 million gift from a coalition led by his widow, Vicky Cornell. This is a wonderful way to remember an amazing artist who was an amazing human being. [Los Angeles Times]

* It’s finally here, a listing of the Top 10 Most Ridiculous Lawsuits of 2017. Topping the list is the woman who sued because she claimed she was “deceived” by amount of sugar in jelly beans. [U.S. Chamber Institute for Legal Reform]

* President Donald Trump will reportedly visit the Supreme Court later this week for Justice Neil Gorsuch’s official investiture ceremony. Based on the president’s prior behavior, it may only be a matter of time before he refers to his appointee as an “absolute disaster” whose “mind is shot.” [USA Today]

* Former U.S. attorney Preet Bharara, who was fired by President Trump after he was asked to remain in his post, says phone calls he received from Trump made in an effort to “cultivate some kind of relationship” made him uncomfortable. In response, a spokesman for Marc Kasowitz called Bharara a “resistance Democrat,” and said “he deserved to be fired.” [Washington Post]

* In other news, Marc Kasowitz, who will likely be setting up an office on White House grounds where he can run President Trump’s defense, has reportedly told White House aides to hold off on hiring their own lawyers — a move that would only be in his client’s interest, and against their own. [New York Times]

* In defense to a lawsuit, the Justice Department has likened President Trump to George Washington (yup!), alleging that Trump isn’t violating the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution by accepting payments for goods and services like hotel bills and golf club fees from foreign governments. [Bloomberg]

* In the wake of former FBI director James Comey’s tell-all appearance before the Senate Intelligence Committee, Attorney General Jeff Sessions will now have to testify himself on the ongoing probe into Russian’s election interference. Hmm, what will the recused AG have to say for himself? [New York Times]

* “It was really disgusting and really scary.” Joseph Amico of Las Vegas was arrested after he allegedly called New York lawyer Douglas Wigdor a “n**ger lover” and threatened to blow up his firm. Wigdor is representing plaintiffs in a racial discrimination lawsuit against Fox News Channel. [New York Daily News]

* Miguel A. Méndez, Stanford Law’s first Latino professor, RIP. [Stanford News]

* An interesting look at the life and career of Gloria Allred — who has litigated groundbreaking civil rights cases as well as TMZ fodder. [Coverage Opinions]

* Lawyer Jose Baez intends to investigate the death of his client Aaron Hernandez, who was found dead in his prison cell after apparently hanging himself. [Deadspin]

* Footnote of the day (gavel bang: Raffi Melkonian aka @RMFifth Circuit). [Twitter]

* Professor Jonathan Adler still has doubts about the Emoluments Clause lawsuit against President Trump (although it’s much stronger now, thanks to some additional plaintiffs). [Volokh Conspiracy / Washington Post]

* Professor Glenn Reynolds has some doubts about diversity (although I suspect he strongly supports intellectual diversity). [Instapundit]

* Professor Ann Althouse has her doubts about… Democrats (even though she has voted for more Democrats than Republicans over the years). [Althouse]

* And Professor Eugene Volokh has his doubts about the constitutionality of this order. [Volokh Conspiracy / Washington Post]

* In honor of national haiku poetry day, here are some verses from Dean Dan Rodriguez of Northwestern Law. [PrawfsBlawg]

* Congrats to the ACLU of Massachusetts, the national ACLU, the state public defender’s office, and Fick & Marx LLP on a huge and historic win! [ACLU]

* Elizabeth Warren’s idealism bends to the new political reality. [The Hill]

* We get a one week reprieve from Jeff Sessions as the next Attorney General.[Politico]

* Welp, this horrific perversion of religion is particularly stomach turning. [Wonkette]

* Are the Dems willing to play ball? [Slate]

* The United Kingdom’s plan to weaponize taxes. [Tax Law Prof]

* So… what’s the injury in the Emoluments Clause case? [Dorf on Law]

* Reflections on Scalia’s time on the bench. [YouTube]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yu8K8DTujSA&feature=youtu.be&t=11m58s

* Several prominent lawyers and legal scholars are filing a lawsuit alleging that Donald Trump is violating the Emoluments Clause by letting his businesses accept money from foreign governments — but the litigation looks like a long shot to some. [New York Times via How Appealing]

* Former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson (previously profiled here) is returning to private practice — and, not surprisingly, to Paul, Weiss. [American Lawyer]

* Judge Andrew Hanen (S.D. Tex.), who brutally benchslapped the Obama Justice Department last year, has withdrawn the sanctions he imposed on the DOJ, finding that the misstatements in question were inadvertent. [ABA Journal]

* If you’ve been handicapping the Supreme Court race, adjust the odds in favor of Judge Neil Gorsuch (10th Cir.) — he’s conservative but less contentious than some other nominees, as noted by Jan Crawford. [CBS News]

* Confirmability might be increasing in importance as a factor for picking a SCOTUS nominee now that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer pledged to block any nominee who is not “bipartisan and mainstream.” [How Appealing]

* The Obama Administration didn’t fare so well before SCOTUS; will the Trump Administration do any better? [New York Times]

* The Second Circuit joins the Seventh Circuit in considering whether discrimination “because of sex” encompasses discrimination based on sexual orientation. [New York Law Journal]

* Looks like Baylor University got some Biglaw sticker shock. [Deadspin]

* The judge that blocked the Obama Administration’s new overtime rules left a lot of uncertainty in his wake. [Androvett Blog]

* Can courts hold Trump accountable under the Emoluments Clause? [Huffington Post]

* A look at the changing nature of Presidential power cases before the Supreme Court and what that may mean under a President Trump. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* Challenging abortion restrictions in Alaska, Missouri and North Carolina. [Slate]

* Will a cashless society mean fewer legal problems? [Law and More]