Public Policy

  • June 25, 2024

    NC Development Bill Violates UN Declaration, Tribe Says

    A North Carolina tribe is fighting state legislation that it says does not assure protections over one of the most significant archaeological Native American discoveries in recent years, arguing its language violates international law and centuries-old treaties.

  • June 25, 2024

    Russian Ferrosilicon Gets Preliminary Duties Topping 748%

    The U.S. Department of Commerce handed down preliminary duties of 283.27% and 748.58% in its anti-dumping and countervailing duty investigations, respectively, into Russian producers of ferrosilicon, a key input in steelmaking.

  • June 25, 2024

    Ariz. Lawmakers Say State Has No Interest In Monument Fight

    The Arizona State Legislature says Gov. Katie Hobbs and Attorney General Kris Mayes can't show that they have an interest in lawsuits against President Joe Biden's proclamation designating an Indigenous site in the Grand Canyon region a national monument and they shouldn't be allowed to intervene in the litigation.

  • June 25, 2024

    Medical Marijuana Bill Sent To NC House After Senate Sign-Off

    The North Carolina Senate has approved a bill that would legalize medical marijuana statewide as part of larger legislation boosting hemp regulations and outlawing the use of three other drugs in the Tar Heel state.

  • June 25, 2024

    Texas' Challenge To Biden Admin. Asylum Rule Survives

    A Texas federal judge ruled Tuesday that he got it right when he declined the federal government's attempt to end the state's suit challenging a Biden administration rule that broadens immigration officers' power over the asylum system, saying Texas did enough to withstand a motion to dismiss.

  • June 25, 2024

    Trump Atty Argues Feds Lied To Get Mar-A-Lago Warrant

    An attorney representing Donald Trump in his criminal case over retaining classified documents after leaving the White House urged a Florida federal judge Tuesday to toss evidence seized during the raid on Mar-a-Lago, arguing the government put false information on the warrant application to search the former president's estate.

  • June 25, 2024

    DC Council OKs Tax Hikes On High-End Property, Payroll

    Washington, D.C., would impose a special tax rate on high-end residential properties, boost the premium for the district's paid leave program and make other tax and spending changes under legislation passed Tuesday by the district council.

  • June 25, 2024

    Pot Cos. Push Back On Calif. City's Bid To Toss $5.4M Fee Suit

    Six cannabis companies are fighting the California city of Cudahy's bid to dismiss a suit alleging that the city reneged on a promise to waive $5.4 million in fees accrued during the COVID-19 shutdowns, saying the motion largely disputes allegations that the court has to accept as true under a motion to dismiss.

  • June 25, 2024

    Fintech Exec Gets 3 Yrs In Crypto Market Manipulation Plot

    The former head of financial engineering at fintech company Hydrogen Technology Corp. was sentenced Tuesday to nearly three years in prison for conspiring to manipulate the market for Hydrogen's digital assets.

  • June 25, 2024

    Drilling Permit Challenge Should Stay Dead, DOI Tells DC Circ.

    The U.S. Department of the Interior told the D.C. Circuit a federal judge correctly ruled environmental groups cannot challenge the federal approval of thousands of drilling permits in New Mexico and Wyoming because they failed to establish any particularized injury.

  • June 25, 2024

    Calif. Pot Co. Accused Of 'Lab Shopping' To Skirt Safety Rules

    A California marijuana cultivator has been accused of selling cannabis products with unacceptable levels of contaminants, getting around state requirements by seeking out laboratories that turned a "blind eye" to its crops' impurities, according to a proposed class action.

  • June 25, 2024

    Gov't Asks Ala. Fed. Court To Stay Gender Care Case

    The Biden administration has asked an Alabama federal court to stay a suit challenging a state law criminalizing gender-affirming care for transgender youth, which has drawn attention because of judge-shopping allegations leveled against plaintiff's counsel, as the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a separate but potentially precedential suit.

  • June 25, 2024

    Ex-Trump Atty Seeks Discovery Stay In Dominion Voting Suit

    A former One America News reporter and Trump attorney is urging a D.C. federal judge to grant her a discovery pause in civil defamation litigation brought by Dominion Voting Systems, arguing that responding to requests now could put her defense at risk in a criminal case in Arizona.

  • June 25, 2024

    House GOP Looks To Hold Biden Ghostwriter In Contempt

    The House Judiciary Committee will consider a resolution on Thursday on whether to hold President Biden's ghostwriter Mark Zwonitzer in contempt for refusing to turn over materials related to special counsel Robert Hur's investigation of the president's handling of classified documents.

  • June 25, 2024

    Atlanta City Council To Consider $2M Settlement In Taser Case

    Atlanta's City Council is set to consider a $2 million settlement next week in a case in which two college students allege they were pulled from their car and Tasers used on them by police in 2020 during protests related to the police killing of George Floyd.

  • June 25, 2024

    EU Opens Microsoft Case, Unappeased By Teams Unbundling

    European Union antitrust authorities opened a formal complaint against Microsoft on Tuesday over the company's bundling of its Teams communications program with its Office 365 suites, calling out as insufficient the disconnection of the services Microsoft initiated last year to appease enforcers.

  • June 25, 2024

    Kennedy's Bid For President Violates NJ Law, Suit Says

    An election lawyer Tuesday launched a bid in New Jersey state court to kick presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. off Garden State ballots in November's general election, arguing Kennedy's independent candidacy is barred by state law.

  • June 25, 2024

    Int'l Paper Gets US Clearance On $7.2B DS Smith Buy

    International Paper Co. and its U.K. competitor DS Smith PLC said Tuesday that the waiting period for U.S. antitrust authorities to try and block their planned roughly $7.2 billion merger has expired. 

  • June 25, 2024

    House Republicans Look To Cut Justice Department Funding

    House Republicans are looking to slash funding for the U.S. Department of Justice for fiscal 2025, a move that comes as Republicans have been attacking the department for what they deem unfair prosecutions of former President Donald Trump.

  • June 25, 2024

    NJ Says Union Skipped Over Black Workers For Job Referrals

    An ironworkers union passed over workers for job assignments solely because they were Black and looked the other way when workers complained they were subjected to racist, sexist and homophobic harassment, the state of New Jersey told a state court.

  • June 25, 2024

    Justice Berger Asks Full NC High Court To Decide Recusal Bid

    North Carolina Supreme Court Justice Phil Berger Jr. asked the full court on Monday to decide whether he should recuse himself from two constitutional challenges concerning the governor's appointment powers given his father's role in the litigation as a state lawmaker.

  • June 25, 2024

    NY Judge Partially Lifts Trump Gag Order Ahead Of Sentence

    The Manhattan judge overseeing former President Donald Trump's hush-money case on Tuesday vacated key parts of a gag order intended to shield jurors and witnesses from his verbal attacks, although an order protecting the jurors' identities remains in place.

  • June 25, 2024

    Oracle Can Seek PAGA Arbitration, Calif. Panel Says

    A California appellate panel said Oracle could compel two workers' 7-year-old individual Private Attorneys General Act wage claims into arbitration, holding that the arbitration agreements couldn't have been enforced until after the U.S. Supreme Court issued the Viking ruling in 2022.

  • June 24, 2024

    Chevron's $120M Trial Loss Reinstated By Calif. Appeals Court

    A California appellate court says Chevron cannot get another trial after a jury found it liable for the negligent operation of an oil field, overturning a lower court's ruling that the company was entitled to a new trial because a juror failed to disclose a decades-old criminal conviction.

  • June 24, 2024

    Menendez Was 'Weird' While Planning Egypt Trip, Jury Hears

    A New York federal jury weighing charges that U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez took bribes for official acts related to Egypt heard Monday from a congressional staffer that the senator acted "weird" while planning an official trip there and was "making up lies."

Expert Analysis

  • A Look At FERC's Plan To End Reactive Power Compensation

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    A recent notice of proposed rulemaking indicates that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is likely to eliminate compensation for reactive power within the standard power factor range — causing significant impacts for the electric power industry, which relies on income from providing this service, say Norman Bay and Matthew Goldberg at Willkie and Vivian Chum at Wright & Talisman.

  • How FTC's Noncompete Rule May Affect Exec Comp Packages

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    In the event the Federal Trade Commission's final noncompete rule goes into effect as currently contemplated, companies will need to take stock of how they structure post-employment executive compensation arrangements, such as severance agreements and clawbacks, says Meredith O'Leary at King & Spalding.

  • Action Steps To Address New Restrictions On Outbound Data

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    Companies should immediately assess all their data-based operations so they can consider strategies to effectively mitigate new compliance risks brought on by recently implemented transaction restrictions, including a Justice Department proposal and landmark data legislation, say attorneys at Wiley.

  • E-Discovery Quarterly: Recent Rulings On Text Message Data

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    Electronically stored information on cellphones, and in particular text messages, can present unique litigation challenges, and recent court decisions demonstrate that counsel must carefully balance what data should be preserved, collected, reviewed and produced, say attorneys at Sidley.

  • CFPB Reality Check: Video Game Cash Is Still Money

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    The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's recent report examining payments within online video games indicates that financial services offered within the game marketplace are quickly evolving to the point where they are indistinguishable from traditional financial services subject to regulation, say attorneys at Sheppard Mullin.

  • What CRA Deadline Means For Biden Admin. Rulemaking

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    With the 2024 election rapidly approaching, the Biden administration must race to finalize proposed agency actions within the next few weeks, or be exposed to the chance that the following Congress will overturn the rules under the Congressional Review Act, say attorneys at Covington.

  • 5 Takeaways From FDA's Biosimilars Promotion Guidance

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    New draft guidance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration expands upon other recent efforts to clarify expectations for biosimilar and interchangeable labeling, highlighting a number of potential missteps that could draw attention from regulators, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.

  • The Legal Issues Raised In Minn. Rate Exportation Opt-Out Bill

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    A recent Minnesota House bill would amend state law by opting out of the federal interest rate preemption and introduce several legal gray areas if passed, including issues regarding loan location, rates on credit card loans and values of state charters, says Karen Grandstrand at Fredrikson & Byron.

  • Rebuttal

    Time For Congress To Let Qualified Older Pilots Keep Flying

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    While a previous Law360 guest article affirmed the current law requiring airline pilots to retire at age 65, the facts suggest that the pilots, their unions, the airlines and the flying public will all benefit if Congress allows experienced, medically qualified aviators to stay in the cockpit, say Allen Baker and Bo Ellis at Let Experienced Pilots Fly.

  • Does Expert Testimony Aid Preliminary IPR Responses?

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    Dechert attorneys analyze six years of patent owners' preliminary responses to inter partes review petitions to determine whether the elimination of the presumption favoring the petitioner as to preinstitution testimonial evidence affected the usefulness of expert testimony in responses.

  • Fostering Employee Retention Amid Shaky DEI Landscape

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    Ongoing challenges to the legality of corporate diversity, equity and inclusion programs are complicating efforts to use DEI as an employee retention tool, but with the right strategic approach employers can continue to recruit and retain diverse talent — even after the FTC’s ban on noncompetes, says Ally Coll at the Purple Method.

  • Are Concessions In FDA's Lab-Developed Tests Rule Enough?

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    Although the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's new policy for laboratory-developed tests included major strategic concessions to help balance patient safety, access and diagnostic innovation, the new rule may well face significant legal challenges in court, say Dominick DiSabatino and Audrey Mercer at Sheppard Mullin.

  • 5 Climate Change Regulatory Issues Insurers Should Follow

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    The climate change landscape for insurers has changed dramatically recently — and not just because of the controversy over the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's climate-related risk disclosure rules, says Thomas Dawson at McDermott.

  • How New Rule Would Change CFIUS Enforcement Powers

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    Before the May 15 comment deadline, companies may want to weigh in on proposed regulatory changes to enforcement and mitigation tools at the disposal of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, including broadened subpoena powers, difficult new mitigation timelines and higher maximum penalties, say attorneys at Venable.

  • What's Extraordinary About Challenges To SEC Climate Rule

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    A set of ideologically diverse legal challenges to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's climate disclosure rule have been consolidated in the Eighth Circuit via a seldom-used lottery system, and the unpredictability of this process may drive agencies toward a more cautious future approach to rulemaking, say attorneys at Thompson Coburn.

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