Jay-Z

* A light start: The Supreme Court hears on the legality of SB8 today. [FiveThirtyEight]

* Former CEO of the ROC distinguishes between an ad and a commercial during an $18M civil lawsuit over perfume. [Law360]

* Qualified immunity ambiguity continues to make it difficult to determine when Blue Lives are Reasonable. [Law.com]

* New York passes a “Keep That S*&t Down!” law that aims to quiet the streets. [SILive]

* President Trump tweeted a letter that his lawyer John Dowd wrote to former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis about criticism Mattis lodged against President Trump. Guess Dowd can save money on a stamp… [Hill]

* The attorney accused of firebombing an NYPD police car during protests last week has been suspended from his Biglaw firm. [New York Post]

* A Texas attorney is accused of charging homeless people exorbitant fees to help process their stimulus payments. [KHOU.com]

* Attorneys are fearful over plans to reopen Brooklyn courthouses closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As someone who has attended CCP and JCP in Kings County many times, I can understand the concern. [New York Daily News]

* Jay-Z lent his private jet to Ahmaud Arbery’s legal team so they could make it to a court proceeding on time. [E! Online]

* Amazon is facing a lawsuit alleging that warehouse workers were not properly protected from COVID-19. Thought Amazon would just have robot workers by now… [Fox News]

* President Trump is assembling a legal “Dream Team” to defend him in his impeachment trial. [NPR] * A California lawyer has trademarked a moniker used by Meghan Markle and Prince Harry. Quite the entrepreneur. [Fox Business]

* Paul Weiss really showed its “commitment to putting the white in white shoe” with its new partnership class, and the New York Times is on it! See our coverage from December here. [New York Times]

* President Donald Trump recently met with a group of right-wing activists led by Ginni Thomas, wife of Justice Clarence Thomas, where they criticized transgender people and women serving in the military. Trump reportedly looked “taken aback“ during the meeting, which is a bit of a rarity. [New York Times]

* Some pretty major lateral moves for some pretty major players when it comes to appellate practice: Lisa Blatt is returning to Williams & Connelly where she’ll lead the firm’s Supreme Court practice, and Kannon Shanmugam is leaving Williams & Connolly to lead a new Supreme Court practice at Paul Weiss. Congrats! [NLJ; NLJ]

* “I’m here to speak for the people who don’t have a voice.” Rappers Jay-Z and Meek Mill have launched the Reform Alliance, an initiative for criminal justice reform, with the goal of dramatically changing laws and policies to reduce “unreasonable” probation, parole, and prison terms. [CBS News]

* What happened to the people who were told that they passed the D.C. bar exam, when in reality they actually failed? “Just shock. I didn’t think that could happen. I never heard of a bar committee changing the results.” Here’s a bit of a depressing update. [Washington Post]

* Jay-Z pointed out that it’s nearly impossible to find a diverse arbitrator and Blank Rome says the claim that white arbitrators may be biased against minorities, “dubious, indeed offensive” and “contravenes every published authority on the matter.” Every published authority? Bold. [American Lawyer]

* Law professor notes that legal technology is going to kill off junior lawyers, which is something I’ve been saying for years now. [Legal Cheek]

* Big 4’s coming yo! (Hong Kong edition) [International]

* The EPA is basically an empty shell these days. [Courthouse News Service]

* The government shutdown raises hacking risks… which doesn’t sound encouraging. [Law360]

* Supreme Court poised to make it easier to access booze. Kavanaugh’s appointment already paying dividends. [NY Times]

* Trump appoints more dicks to the courts. [American Lawyer]

* The D.C. Circuit awarded more than $501M in damages to the family of Otto Warmbier, the student who tortured so badly in North Korea that he was left deaf, blind, unable to speak, and died shortly after he returned home. [New York Times]

* Trump’s DOJ has filed many emergency SCOTUS requests to bypass lower courts, but here are the ones to watch: the asylum ban, the DACA wind-down, the transgender military ban, the citizenship census, and kids’ climate change. [PBS NewsHour]

* Ex-district judge and U.S. AG Michael Mukasey says Bill Barr is “probably the best-qualified nominee for U.S. attorney general since Robert Jackson in 1940.” Mukasey has also linked “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” to Islamic terrorism. [Wall Street Journal]

* Not even a weird video in character as Frank Underwood can help him now: Kevin Spacey has been accused of sexually assaulting a minor and is scheduled to be arraigned on a felony charge of indecent assault and battery. [Boston Globe]

* In case you missed it,after declaring war against the lack of diversity in the arbitration world, rapper Jay-Z managed to get the American Arbitration Association to commit to expanding its roster of black arbitrators. [Hollywood Reporter]

* With NY Attorney General Eric Schneiderman resigning, the negotiations to determine his successor are in full swing. Expect someone no one has ever heard of from some upstate DA’s office who will then hold the job for a decade. [New York Law Journal]

* Trouble in paradise? Donald Trump reportedly frustrated with Rudy Giuliani because Fox is starting to let him know that Rudy’s completely screwing him. But is he? It may be embarrassing, but if he sells the story that Cohen paid off women all the time, then it may not be a campaign law violation because it’s something he does in the ordinary course. Giuliani’s may be crazy like a fox. Or just crazy. [Time]

* GDPR = Y2K 2018? European regulators claim they aren’t ready for the planned switch over to GDPR. The law is definitely more stringent than what most of Europe was used to, but it’s not wildly out of sync with what some countries were already doing. Stop hyperventilating and get it together, people. [Reuters]

* The SEC wants a completely open-ended opportunity to meet with Jay-Z. He says this is unreasonable and offered them a full day of testimony. Why are we wasting a judge’s time with this? Give the SEC one whole day with the right to come back to make a request for more. It’s an SEC investigation, it’s not Bonnie & Clyde. [Law360]

* The administration may have pardoned Sheriff Joe for his crimes, but that doesn’t mean the county who elected him over and over can avoid paying for it. The Ninth Circuit determined that Maricopa County is on the hook for the illegal activity Sheriff Joe perpetrated behind his badge. [The Recorder]

* Forget Amazon, drones are now delivering contraband and other smuggled goods. Ah, the future. [Futurism]

* A financial technology firm claims Perkins Coie and Bracewell cost it millions of dollars by leading it into a contract with Morgan Stanley without protecting it from changes the bank made to the contract. Are you saying a major bank tried to screw someone over? [American Lawyer]

* This great profile of Chuck Cooper, by Tierney Sneed of TPM, includes more details on why he withdrew from the solicitor general sweepstakes. [Talking Points Memo]

* A team from Quinn Emanuel, led by high-profile hire Alex Spiro, is repping Jay-Z in a trademark fight. Can Biglaw + Beyonce be far behind? [Hollywood Reporter]

* Steven Brill, the godfather of modern legal journalism, launches his latest venture: NewsGuard, which “uses journalism to fight fake news.” [Dewey B Strategic]

* Speaking of “fake news,” leading media lawyer Charles Glasser puts President Trump’s “war on the press” in a broader, global context. [Daily Caller]

* Still on the subject of POTUS v. Press, is the media being played in the Stormy Daniels drama? Joel Cohen and Dale Degenshein think so. [Law & Crime]

* Strange bedfellows at One First Street: Adam Feldman looks at Supreme Court cases featuring unusual ideological alliances. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* Protip for litigators and litigants: don’t tick off Judge Frederic Block (or any other judge presiding over your case, for that matter). [artnet]

* If our five Biglaw business development tips weren’t enough for you, Jane Genova adds two more for your consideration. [Law And More]

* How can technology be harnessed to bridge the justice gap? Neota Logic has some ideas. [Artificial Lawyer]

* President Trump has added five names to his slate of judicial candidates to fill a nonexistent vacancy on the Supreme Court. Welcome aboard to Judges Brett M. Kavanaugh (D.C. Circuit), Amy Coney Barrett (Seventh Circuit), and Kevin C. Newsom (Eleventh Circuit), as well as Justices Britt C. Grant (Georgia Supreme Court) and Patrick R. Wyrick (Oklahoma Supreme Court). [New York Times]

* Did Trump obstruct justice in the Russia probe? We may soon find out. Special counsel Robert Mueller has requested all manner of documents from the Justice Department related to the firing of former FBI director James Comey. [ABC News]

* In other Trump-related legal news, rather than continuing to have his re-election campaign or the Republican Party foot the bill for his legal representation in the Russia probe, the president has officially started to pay his own legal tab. [Reuters]

* Ohio Supreme Court Justice Bill O’Neill, who was considering running for governor, bragged about the fact that he’d been “sexually intimate with approximately 50 very attractive females.” After much backlash, he told his detractors to “lighten up” and offered a nonpology. He won’t be running for governor anymore. [Washington Post]

* FCC Chairman Ajit Pai is about to pull the plug on net neutrality, and Americans are too distracted by Thanksgiving to care. Luckily for us, Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel wants open hearings to take place before a vote is held. [Slate]

* “Probation is a trap and we must fight for Meek and everyone else unjustly sent to prison.” In the wake of rapper Meek Mill being sentenced to up to four years in prison for violating his probation, Jay-Z is letting everyone know he’s got 99 problems and the way the criminal justice system treats minorities is one of them. [New York Times]

* Bey and Jay-Z want to trademark their kids’ names because nothing creates the nurturing environment of unconditional love children need like converting them into commodities. [The Recorder]

* For lexicography nerds, a deep dive into the original definition of “emoluments.” For the MAGA crowd, the English language itself is fake news. [National Law Journal]

* The 2017 A-List is out! That’s the American Lawyer’s comprehensive ranking of law firms. No, not the Am Law 200, the other one. No, not the NLJ 500, the other one. Actually, what the f**k is the A-List? [American Lawyer]

* Freshfields co-managing partner steps down. [Law.com]

* Martin Shkreli not having the best of days. [Law360]

* The Communications Director is calling on the FBI to investigate the Chief of Staff and put this news on Twitter. That’s… not standard procedure. [Huffington Post]

* A repeal and replace they can actually get done. Say goodbye to clean water regulations! [Courthouse News Service]

* Fahrvergnügen! The DOJ charged six VW executives in the emissions-cheating scandal, arresting one in Miami. [New York Times]

* Dewey think the Trustee should be able to destroy records? [Law360]

* The Jeff Sessions confirmation hearing opted for the “he can’t be racist, he has a black friend” strategy that absolutely, positively never fails. [Litigation Daily]

* Child prostitution isn’t legal in California and oh my God why do we have to clarify this? [ABC News]

* Company under CFPB investigation battling to remain anonymous. This probably would be a significant legal challenge if we assumed the CFPB would exist past next month. [National Law Journal]

* Chelsea Manning’s sentence may be commuted before Obama leaves office. [Lawfare]

* The fight over legal rights to Prince’s catalog continues. [Page Six]

* Brush that dirt off your shoulder: Jay-Z may have 99 problems, but this copyright lawsuit about his song “Big Pimpin'” is no longer one of them. The suit filed against the rap mogul in 2007 was dismissed on standing grounds, but the plaintiff says he plans to appeal. [Los Angeles Times]

* When it comes to the death penalty, Justice Antonin Scalia says that it “wouldn’t surprise [him]” if the Supreme Court were to strike it down as unconstitutional. It seems that a capital punishment case could become the next SCOTUS blockbuster. [CBS Minnesota]

* No one is a fan of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s in-house court system, and legislation to give financial defendants the right to opt out will be introduced in Congress later this week. Would you rather face trial before a federal judge or jury? [WSJ Law Blog]

* Earlier this week, a state-court judge brought a live grenade to the courthouse, but only because he wanted to have it properly disposed of by police. The jurist currently remains unidentified, which is a good thing, because this is pretty embarrassing. [CBS Los Angeles]

* Jurors in New York are paid $40 per day for their service, so you may be wondering how the confused members of the jury in the Dewey & LeBoeuf (mis)trial were able to survive on only $2,920 after five months spent in the courtroom. [Big Law Business / Bloomberg]

* This October, rappers Jay Z and Timbaland will have to testify in a lawsuit concerning copyright infringement and improper music sampling. We’ll see how “Big Pimpin'” they really are when we find out which lawyers and law firms are repping them. [Page Six / New York Post]

* This judge apparently doesn’t appreciate fighting words in pleadings. “Do you want to fight me? Is that what you want?” A West Virginia magistrate judge challenged a litigant — one who previously called the magistrate a “fat sweaty slob” in motion papers — to come to his house and “see what happens.” [Charleston Gazette-Mail]

* An ex-Texas judge was sentenced for his side job of smuggling guns into Mexico and selling them. He faced up to 70 years when he pleaded guilty to two felony counts in May, and was handed his 18-month sentence on Friday. Yeehaw! [Austin American-Statesman]

* The Idaho College of Law will begin to host first-year law school classes at its Boise campus starting in 2017. The Boise campus now serves 1Ls, 2LS, and 3Ls, but not to worry, this flyover law school’s main campus isn’t going anywhere. [Idaho Statesman]

* Julian Bond, civil rights icon, SPLC board member, former NAACP chair, RIP. [NYT]