Morning Docket

Morning Docket: 08.19.26

* Disney goes to war with Trump administration over Kimmel retaliation effort. [NPR]

* Morgan & Morgan goes to court over Florida ban on celebrities in lawyer ads. [Florida Phoenix]

* Hugh Hefner repeatedly tried to get the FBI to act on Epstein over 20 years ago say survivors in lawsuit. [Law Commentary]

* Missouri weighs lowering pass score for bar exam after NextGen debacle. [ABA Journal]

* Harvey unveils its own LLM named Tenet. [Business Insider]

* In least shocking revelation of the day, whistleblowers suggest DOJ senior leadership reverse engineered political probes. [Courthouse News Service]

* Fourth Circuit blocks ICE from rounding people up at churches. [CBS News]

Morning Docket: 08.18.26

* Law firms secure big revenue gains in the first half of 2026... and yet those raises are still mostly on hold. [Law360]

* Penn State frat caught running massive cocaine ring. The school is proud of its white outs. [ABC News]

* Federal judges getting more requests to enforce rulings against the federal government as though they're some sort of "coequal branch" or something. [Bloomberg Law News]

* Biglaw building out national security capacity in world where tariffs and arbitrary supply chain risk designations keep coming. [ABA Journal]

* New documents reveal administration sought ways to punish Colorado if the state didn't release convicted election felon Tina Peters. [MSNow]

* Former prosecutor sues Justice Department over retaliatory firing because she previously prosecuted FACE Act crimes. [NPR]

* Fifth Circuit's Alien Enemies Act decision may well have put the final nail in the coffin of one of the administration's most aggressive legal maneuvers. [One First]

* Supreme Court asked to take up Texas Ten Commandments in schools mandate. [Washington Post]

Morning Docket: 08.17.26

* Trump's legal team at S&C just keeps shrinking. [Politico]

* Armed men claiming to be ICE agents try to bust into immigration law firm. [Sacramento Bee]

* Already facing ethical questions, the Chicago US Attorney's Office now revealed to have been running investigation into daughter of NY judge in Trump's trial. [NY Times]

* Administration allowing Trump family crypto venture to convert into a bank. [Law360]

* Kyrsten Sinema's sexcapades revealed in court documents. [Daily Beast]

* Law student punished for Charlie Kirk comments secures key victory. [Reuters]

* Goodwin Procter unveils AI tool to streamline venture capital financings. [Bloomberg Law News]

* Trump asks Supreme Court to authorize his power to tear down and rebuild national monuments without congressional approval. [US News]

* Tracing originalism's Bullshit-Industrial complex. [Slate]

* A law firm identified by the SPLC as a hate group took the organization to court. The Sixth Circuit tossed the case, noting that the firm posted a press release about it on their own website. [Courthouse News Service]

Morning Docket: 08.14.26

* Judge threatens DOJ with contempt in Epstein files coverup case. [All Rise News]

* Holland & Knight brings in former partner to defend against $1.2B malpractice case. [Bloomberg Law News]

* Litigant hides prompt injection in court filing asking the court's AI to rule favorably. Sure it's an attempt to deceive the court but... if they aren't turning over decision making to bots then it shouldn't matter, right? [404 Media]

* Luigi reportedly considering plea deal. [Reuters]

* Trump sued over $100K/month "early access" feature. [NPR]

* Antisemitism case against Harvard booted out of court. [Law360]

* Federal judge blocks attempt to use the Voting Rights Act to get rid of majority-Black judicial districts. [Mississippi Today]

* California joins effort to block administration policy of blocking student visas over speech. [California AG's Office]

Morning Docket: 08.13.26

* Jayden Daniels sends cease-and-desist claiming LSU violated his NIL rights by giving his number from three years ago to another player. [ESPN]

* Journalist Katie Phang's latest filing blasts DOJ's effort to delay Epstein file release. [Meidas News]

* Immigration enforcement use government databases to stalk women in "dog-bites-man" story. [DNYUZ]

* Trump asks Eleventh Circuit to pause the sanctions leveled against his team for the IRS case. [Law360]

* Structure of new birthright citizenship orders create new mechanism to criminalize women and girls. [Balls and Strikes]

* Treasury rolls back "burdensome" regulation that required corporations to send in a form listing who owned the company. [Forbes]

Morning Docket: 08.12.26

* Elite firms warn that AI spending could impact profits, though most continue to believe they'll be fine. Ahem... then where are the associate raises? [ABA Journal]

* ICE wants $20 million worth of electric shock gloves, in case you were wondering where we were on the "turning law enforcement into Spider-Man villains" spectrum. [Huffington Post]

* Paul Weiss and Gibson Dunn lead Yankees financing deal to inject $2.6B for the club to not spend during the looming lockout. [Bloomberg Law News]

* We covered this last week, but Trump is moving past rage at the Supreme Court and is now just pretending he won the handful of cases he lost. [Washington Post]

* Alabama primary marred by confusion after being hastily run of new maps after the Supreme Court functionally overturned the Voting Rights Act. If only there were some sort of doctrine to prevent confusing, last-minute alterations to election laws! [NPR]

* FCC vote to raise monopoly cap on media ownership faces legal challenges. [Axios]

* State's youth prison operator hid abuse. [ProPublica]

Morning Docket: 08.11.26

* Biglaw firms hit with data breaches. [Law360]

* Office of Legal Counsel takes position that executive privilege extends to unofficial, unconfirmed people the president talks to. [Alternet]

* Court appearance coming up for Luigi. [Reuters]

* FOIA requests become "Kafkaesque" mess with this administration. [ProPublica]

* New White House Counsel is exactly what you'd expect. [Bloomberg Law News]

* DOJ sues the whole Second Circuit over offering in-state resident tuition to non-citizens who reside in state. [VTDigger]

* The Fifth Circuit remains obsessed with punishing DeRay Mckesson for constitutionally protected speech. [Balls and Strikes]

* Class action alleging that early-decision amounts to illegal price-fixing moves forward. [Law360]

* Law school dean writes parody of children's classic. [ABA Journal]

Morning Docket: 08.10.26

* Todd Blanche confirmed as Attorney General in the middle of the night. [NPR]

* President's son-in-law intended to destroy villages to build luxury property on stolen Albanian land he bought from suspected gang lord. We are running out of unique English sentences so fast. [WSJ]

* Fake US Attorney Bill Essayli hires his former senior aide into the office despite facing jail time over battery and grand theft charges. Only the best people in this administration. [Bloomberg Law News]

* Trump judge decides she can't see anything vindictive about Justice Department's prosecution of Southern Poverty Law Center for paying informants to infiltrate hate groups. [CBS News]

* Investigation launching into Jeanine Pirro's ultimately fruitless Reflecting Pool prosecution. [The New Republic]

* Author of "How to Kill A Federal Judge" convicted for... threatening a federal judge. How ironic. [Reuters]

* Harvey raising another $500 million. [The Information]

* Trump tries to fire Lisa Cook again. [Law360]

* Judge Judy's son now has a court show. [ABA Journal]

Morning Docket: 08.07.26

* Murkowski will vote against Todd Blanche, putting the nomination in the hands of Bill Cassidy to see if he's learned anything since confirming RFK Jr. [CNN]

* Fresh off losing at the Supreme Court, Trump issues new executive orders to limit birthright citizenship. [NPR]

* Christian Scientist argues company 401(k) violates religious rights by investing in fossil fuels. [Bloomberg Law News]

* Rand Paul refers Anthony Fauci to Justice Department for a contempt of Congress charge based solely on committee vote. Which is illegal, but none of this circus has been particularly legal anyway. [Courthouse News Service]

* Lawmakers asked Skadden to explain its pro bono arrangement with the administration, and the response was... uncooperative. [Law360]

* DOJ earns yet another benchslap in effort to seize voter data. [Raw Story]

* Trump judge temporarily blocks BBC from discovery in Trump's defamation suit against the network. [Forbes]

Morning Docket: 08.06.26

* New Mexico sued the Justice Department, accusing Todd Blanche of facilitating a cover-up of Epstein crimes in the state. [Courthouse News Service]

* Trump attempts to block BBC access to his finances as he learns that "discovery" is a thing that happens. [New Republic]

* Third Circuit judge ran a PR firm on the side until it went out of business. [Politico]

* Dog toy manufacturer secures win in stupid trademark dispute brought by Jack Daniel's. [Reuters]

* Judge rules whole cell tower dumps unconstitutionally overbroad. [Court Watch]

* Eleventh Circuit en banc upholds obscenity ban barring minors from shows like Bugs Bunny or Monty Python. [ABA Journal]

* Louisiana continues to assert the guilt of fully exonerated people in effort to block statutory compensation for wrongful convictions. [ProPublica]

Morning Docket: 08.05.26

* Chicago U.S. Attorney's Office self-reports wrongdoing to DOJ watchdog... where almost certainly nothing will end up happening. [Chicago Tribune]

* ABA House of Delegates refuses to junk diversity standard for accreditation. [JD Journal]

* Anti-law enforcement license plates are free speech. [Courthouse News Service]

* Judges push DHS general counsel to remove social media posts comparing judges to murderers. [ABA Journal]

* Kansas rejects amendment to elect state supreme court justices. [Kansas Reflector]

* New Mexico develops a bar exam-free path to license. [Los Alamos Daily Post]

* A deep dive on Roy Cohn, the lawyer who ruined everything. [New Yorker]

Morning Docket: 08.04.26

* Supreme Court will not block massive judgment against Palestinian groups linked to past terror attacks. [PBS]

* Blanche set to get out of committee after duping holdouts with flimsy promise. [Reuters]

* DOJ making another pitch to force Susman Godfrey off executive order case. [Law360]

* Law designed to stop the KKK being used against the Trump administration. Honestly... that tracks. [NPR]

* Sidley picks up team from Hogan Lovells. [Bloomberg Law News]

* John Oliver dares Buc-ee's to sue him after exposing the companies aggressive litigation griefing of businesses with animal mascots. [ABA Journal]

* States sue over latest round of tariffs. [CNBC]

Morning Docket: 08.03.26

* Todd Blanche issues a memo claiming to rescind the Trump ally slush fund. It's not in the form holdout Senators asked for, but it might prove enough to get him out of committee. [ABC News]

* A deep dive into how Paul Weiss became the industry standard for cowardice. [NY Times]

* In Trump lawsuit against banks for dropping him as client, Capital One responds that it wasn't political... it was all the money laundering issues. [NPR]

* How Gibson Dunn's big score changes everything. [WSJ]

* Trump rages at Jeanine Pirro for dismissing case trying to foist blame for administration's reflection pool damage on Olympian bystander. [CNBC]

* It's like the Forbes 40 under 40, except it's lawyers. And they won't all be in prison soon. [Law360]

* Tom Goldstein appeals his conviction. [Reuters]

Morning Docket: 07.31.26

* Even if the Senate rejects Todd Blanche, he's going to stay in the job indefinitely, no matter how questionably constitutional that may be. [Politico]

* Judge seems to think Pentagon's designation of Anthropic as a security risk is bogus. [Law360]

* Lawyer seeks restraining order against client's Congress member ex-husband. [CNN]

* Data brokers refusing requests to delete personal information. [Bloomberg Law News]

* State sues Kalshi on the grounds that it runs an illegal gambling site. [Reuters]

* Alien Terrorist Removal Court holds first-ever hearing. It only took 30 years. [Court Watch]

* Court hikes up AI misuse sanctions as nothing seems to be working. [ABA Journal]

Morning Docket: 07.30.26

* Judiciary Committee pushes Blanche confirmation vote. [Politico]

* Dr. Fauci invokes Fifth Amendment at Senate perjury trap effort. [Reuters]

* More on the fallout from the disastrous bar exam rollout that lead to lengthy delays and one state cancellation. For contrast, the folks over at Law.com headlined it as a "Smooth Launch." [Bloomberg Law News]

* The Fifth Circuit tried to invent its own shadow docket power... it's not working. [Balls and Strikes]

* Criminal defense attorneys urged to adopt AI to keep up with prosecutors. [Courthouse News Service]

* Grand jury rejects hit-and-run charges against former U.S. Attorney. [ABA Journal]

* Legora acquires Wexler. [Law360]