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Aerospace & Defense
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October 09, 2024
Fed. Circ. May Need To Fix Contractor Registration Dilemma
Two opposing Court of Federal Claims decisions regarding when a strict registration requirement applies to federal contractors have opened up a clash that could require the Federal Circuit's intervention to be resolved.
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October 09, 2024
Marine In Afghan Baby Kidnapping Suit Won't Be Discharged
A U.S. Marine attorney accused of kidnapping an Afghan child has reportedly avoided getting booted from the military despite a Marine Corps panel on Tuesday finding he engaged in conduct unbecoming of an officer in his fight over the child.
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October 09, 2024
Blank Rome Attys Beat DQ Bid Over Witness Contact
A Philadelphia federal judge Wednesday refused to disqualify Blank Rome from representing three of its attorneys facing claims they brought a baseless lawsuit against another attorney in retaliation for switching from corporate defense to the plaintiffs bar.
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October 09, 2024
Repeat Whistleblowing Led To Firing, Ex-Sikorsky Worker Alleges
A Connecticut man who describes himself as a "well-known" whistleblower at Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. says he was illegally terminated for reporting alleged wage and hour and environmental violations to government authorities, claiming the helicopter manufacturer fired him using bogus allegations he broke into an office he was given clearance to access.
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October 09, 2024
5th Circ. Revives Air Force Bias Case, Citing Broader Standard
The Fifth Circuit revived a former civilian U.S. Air Force employee's lawsuit alleging she was given negative performance reviews after rejecting colleagues' sexual advances, saying a lower court needs to reevaluate her claims under a year-old circuit standard that allows for a wider range of bias allegations.
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October 09, 2024
DC Judge Sanctions DOD For Destroying Gitmo Tapes
A D.C. federal judge on Tuesday sanctioned the Pentagon for destroying dozens of video recordings of the torture of a Palestinian man imprisoned in Guantánamo Bay, barring the Pentagon from rebutting the man's testimony of what he endured.
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October 09, 2024
Boeing Rescinds Wage Offer As IAM Strike Enters 4th Week
Boeing has withdrawn its most recent wage offer to more than 33,000 employees who've been on strike for nearly a month, prolonging a labor standoff with the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers that has grounded some of Boeing's key production lines to a halt.
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October 09, 2024
RFK Jr. Jumps Into TikTok Ban Fight At DC Circ.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has joined the fray in litigation at the D.C. Circuit challenging a federal law that could put TikTok out of business in the United States, contending in a new lawsuit that the sale-or-ban statute defies the First Amendment.
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October 08, 2024
Military Health Plans Deny They Were Overpaid On DOD Deal
Five military healthcare plan providers have asked the Maine federal court to dismiss the U.S. Department of Justice's claims that they were overpaid for healthcare services, arguing they were paid exactly what they were owed under their fixed-price contracts.
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October 08, 2024
Jackson, Kagan Target Loper Bright In Ghost Gun Case
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was uncharacteristically quiet during initial arguments Tuesday over the federal government's authority to regulate ghost guns. While her colleagues debated whether kits of unassembled parts qualify as firearms, she waited patiently to post a different question: Can courts now toss agency interpretations they don't like?
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October 08, 2024
House Panel Probes FCC's Revoking Starlink's $885M Subsidy
The Republican-controlled House Oversight Committee is investigating the Federal Communications Commission's 2022 decision to pull an $885.5 million broadband subsidy for SpaceX's Starlink, calling the Elon Musk-owned satellite internet company an asset in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene and accusing the agency of "partisanship," in a new letter Monday.
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October 08, 2024
Judge Clarifies Contentious Registration Rule For Contractors
The U.S. Court of Federal Claims clarified that a contentious registration requirement for federal contractors only kicks in when they submit final proposals in response to government solicitations, blessing a previously disqualified business' $45 billion nuclear cleanup deal.
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October 08, 2024
Judge Tells VA To Quickly Develop Housing For LA Veterans
The U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs and experts picked by a class of homeless, disabled military veterans were ordered by a California federal judge to collaborate on plans for veteran housing on a Los Angeles campus.
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October 08, 2024
Exporting Chips To China Doesn't Merit 7 Years, 9th Circ. Told
Counsel for a former UCLA electrical engineering professor urged the Ninth Circuit on Tuesday to reduce his seven-year prison sentence for illegally exporting high-powered semiconductor chips to China, saying the conduct did not amount to an evasion of national security controls.
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October 08, 2024
Ex-Judge Can Testify In Suit Against Blank Rome Attys, 2 Cos.
An attorney suing three Blank Rome LLP lawyers, an aircraft motor manufacturer and its parent company was unable to persuade a Pennsylvania federal court to stop a former judge from testifying for the defense as an expert witness in a retaliation case stemming from her decision to switch from representing companies to doing plaintiffs work.
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October 08, 2024
Honeywell To Spin Off Materials Biz Amid $9B Buying Spree
Skadden-advised Honeywell said Tuesday it will spin off its advanced materials business into an independent publicly traded company, the latest maneuver in a $25 billion strategic restructuring that the company said has included about $9 billion deployed for acquisitions in 2024.
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October 07, 2024
3M Facing PFAS Headwinds In Vermont, NJ And Ohio Cases
3M Co., which is facing forever chemical lawsuits across the country, is dealing with pushback from Vermont, which is fighting 3M's effort to take its state court case into federal court, and from plaintiffs in Ohio and New Jersey, who have kept their litigation out of a sprawling multidistrict litigation.
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October 07, 2024
New Bill Would Enact 'Commonsense' Litigation Disclosures
A top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee announced Monday he introduced legislation to require the disclosure of parties receiving payments in civil lawsuits, a phenomenon known as "third-party litigation financing," in order to prevent abuses in the legal system.
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October 07, 2024
SpaceX, T-Mobile Can Offer Service In Helene-Ravaged Areas
SpaceX and T-Mobile gained special temporary authority from the Federal Communications Commission to launch their plan for cellular coverage from space in the areas affected by Hurricane Helene.
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October 07, 2024
Man Who Faced Espionage Case Gets Probation Over Taxes
A Chinese engineer initially accused of illegally exporting documents on military aircraft to China was given probation and fined for failing to report about $1.4 million in business income by a Texas federal court after the government dropped its export charges.
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October 07, 2024
Judge Backs $3.3M DOD Sole-Source Parts Deal For Boeing
A Court of Federal Claims judge has denied a protest over a $3.3 million Defense Logistics Agency sole-source contract with Boeing, covering helicopter spare parts the protester argued it could also provide, ruling the DLA reasonably determined Boeing was the only available source.
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October 07, 2024
Manafort Associate's Bribery Case Won't Get Top Court Look
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to take up the case of a former bank CEO who had argued the Second Circuit's decision to uphold his conviction for bribing former Donald Trump staffer Paul Manafort wrongly criminalized even the smallest of benefits a bank executive receives from a customer.
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October 07, 2024
FCC Looks To Update Satellite Spectrum Sharing Rules
The Federal Communications Commission is working on new spectrum sharing rules for non-geostationary orbit fixed-satellite systems, saying the proposal will clarify details from a 2023 order requiring systems to work with each other to prevent signal interference.
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October 07, 2024
Justices Won't Review Judge's Non-Recusal In Al-Qaida Case
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to probe whether a D.C. Circuit judge, previously a government attorney, should have recused himself from a former al-Qaida member's appeal of a life sentence for terrorism and war crimes.
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October 07, 2024
High Court Rejects Ex-Raytheon Worker's Retaliation Suit
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to revisit its prior ruling insulating security clearance decisions from court review, after a fired Raytheon worker urged the court to clarify whether that decision also applies to actions by federal contractors.
Expert Analysis
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Why DOJ's Whistleblower Program May Have Limited Impact
The U.S. Department of Justice’s new whistleblower pilot program aims to incentivize individuals to report corporate misconduct, but the program's effectiveness may be undercut by its differences from other federal agencies’ whistleblower programs and its interplay with other DOJ policies, say attorneys at Milbank.
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How Justices Upended The Administrative Procedure Act
In its recent Loper Bright, Corner Post and Jarkesy decisions, the U.S. Supreme Court fundamentally changed the Administrative Procedure Act in ways that undermine Congress and the executive branch, shift power to the judiciary, curtail public and business input, and create great uncertainty, say Alene Taber and Beth Hummer at Hanson Bridgett.
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FTC Drives Crackdown On Connected Cars' Data Privacy Risk
After the Federal Trade Commission's warning to automakers about data privacy, which continues to emerge as a national concern, automakers must carefully examine their data collection, use and retention practices, say Catherine Castaldo and Michael Rubayo at Reed Smith.
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Lessons From Recent SEC Cyber Enforcement Actions
The recent guidance by the SEC's Division of Corporation Finance is helpful to any company facing a cybersecurity threat, but just as instructive are the warnings raised by the SEC's recent enforcement actions against SolarWinds, R.R. Donnelley and Intercontinental Exchange, say attorneys at O'Melveny.
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How Cos. With Chinese Suppliers Should Prep For Biotech Bill
A proposed bill to prohibit government-affiliated life sciences companies from contracting with Chinese biotech companies of concern may necessitate switching to other sources for research and supplies, meaning they should begin evaluating supply chains now due to the long lead times of drug development, say John O'Loughlin and Christina Carone at Weil Gotshal.
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Mirror, Mirror On The Wall, Is My Counterclaim Bound To Fall?
A Pennsylvania federal court’s recent dismissal of the defendants’ counterclaims in Morgan v. Noss should remind attorneys to avoid the temptation to repackage a claim’s facts and law into a mirror-image counterclaim, as this approach will often result in a waste of time and resources, says Matthew Selmasska at Kaufman Dolowich.
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DOJ Paths To Limit FARA Fallout From Wynn's DC Circ. Win
After the D.C. Circuit’s recent Attorney General v. Wynn ruling, holding that the government cannot compel retroactive registration under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, the U.S. Department of Justice has a few options to limit the decision’s impact on enforcement, say attorneys at MoFo.
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Series
Playing Dungeons & Dragons Makes Me A Better Lawyer
Playing Dungeons & Dragons – a tabletop role-playing game – helped pave the way for my legal career by providing me with foundational skills such as persuasion and team building, says Derrick Carman at Robins Kaplan.
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Bid Protest Spotlight: Misplaced Info, Trade-Offs, Proteges
James Tucker at MoFo examines three recent decisions concerning the consequences of providing solicited information in the wrong section of a bid proposal, the limits of agency discretion in technical merit, best-value trade-off evaluations, and the weight of the experience and capabilities of small businesses in mentor-protégé joint venture qualification.
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Unpacking Executive Privilege, Contempt In Recent Cases
The U.S. House of Representatives’ recent move to hold Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress is the latest example in a growing trend of executive privilege disputes, and serves as a warning to private citizens and corporate leaders who are in communication with the president, says Kristina Moore at Womble Bond.
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3 Leadership Practices For A More Supportive Firm Culture
Traditional leadership styles frequently amplify the inherent pressures of legal work, but a few simple, time-neutral strategies can strengthen the skills and confidence of employees and foster a more collaborative culture, while supporting individual growth and contribution to organizational goals, says Benjamin Grimes at BKG Leadership.
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The OIG Report: DOJ's Own Whistleblower Program Has Holes
A recent Office of the Inspector General memo found that the U.S. Department of Justice’s whistleblower program failed to protect federal employees whose security clearances were allegedly suspended in retaliation — a serious cause for concern that could have a potential chilling effect on would-be whistleblowers, says Diana Shaw at Wiley.
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E-Discovery Quarterly: Rulings On Hyperlinked Documents
Recent rulings show that counsel should engage in early discussions with clients regarding the potential of hyperlinked documents in electronically stored information, which will allow for more deliberate negotiation of any agreements regarding the scope of discovery, say attorneys at Sidley.
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Loper Bright Limits Federal Agencies' Ability To Alter Course
The U.S. Supreme Court's recent decision to dismantle Chevron deference also effectively overrules its 2005 decision in National Cable & Telecommunications Association v. Brand X, greatly diminishing agencies' ability to change regulatory course from one administration to the next, says Steven Gordon at Holland & Knight.
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What Cos. Should Note In DOJ's New Whistleblower Pilot
After the U.S. Department of Justice unveiled a new whistleblower pilot program last week — continuing its efforts to incentivize individual reporting of misconduct — companies should review the eligibility criteria, update their compliance programs and consider the risks and benefits of making their own self-disclosures, say attorneys at Skadden.