The US Court of Appeals for the Tenth ruled Wednesday that Kansas’s voter registration rules, which required documentation of citizenship, were unconstitutional and violated federal law. The lawsuit had arisen as a challenge to former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach’s well-publicized push to tighten control over voter rolls. But the state’s arguments about the [...]
A group of hundreds of law professors from around the country, joined by some researchers and other academics, sent a letter to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Monday urging that detainees in all the US’s immigration facilities be released to help prevent the spread of COVID-19. The letter was addressed to Chad Wolf, the [...]
A group of Pennsylvania businesses petitioned the US Supreme Court Monday in their lawsuit seeking to overturn Governor Tom Wolf’s March 19 executive order closing “non-life-sustaining” business in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Last Friday the Pennsylvania Supreme Court denied their request to stay the order, finding that the group had “not established any basis [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed the dismissal of a lawsuit by numerous Japanese individuals and business who hoped to sue General Electric (GE) over its role in building and maintaining the reactors that exploded in the 2011 disaster at the Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan. The Japanese plaintiffs had [...]
The Texas Supreme Court on Thursday upheld Governor Greg Abbott’s order limiting jail release during the COVID-19 pandemic. The challenge before the court centered around Abbott’s order, issued in March, that cited the COVID-19 pandemic emergency and suspended state laws and rules of criminal procedure that would normally allow judges to release inmates on personal [...]
The US Supreme Court released its decision on Thursday in the case of Barton v. Barr, which was argued last fall and concerned a green-card-holder’s eligibility to have his deportation cancelled. The court held that Barton, a Jamaican national who was a lawful permanent resident in the US for more than 30 years, was ineligible to [...]
A federal district court judge on Monday issued a preliminary injunction ordering Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to improve its measures for protecting the health of detainees in the agency’s facilities and consider releasing those most at risk of contracting COVID-19. Numerous individual detainees and two advocacy organizations have sued ICE, arguing that its relative [...]
The US Supreme Court issued its decision in Atlantic Richfield Co. v. Christian Monday, settling technical questions in a dispute between Montana landowners and a mining company over liability for hazardous materials cleanup within—and beyond—the scope of the federal law governing “Superfund” sites. Under the law, called the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit on Wednesday affirmed the denial of a Republican challenge to Michigan’s new independent commission that will re-draw legislative district boundaries. In an effort to combat gerrymandering, voters created the commission via ballot initiative in November 2018 with an amendment to the state’s constitution. The commission will [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled Wednesday that the trial judge overseeing a massive set of cases involving the opioid crisis had violated the procedural rights of pharmacies who were defendants in the matter. In the case, Judge Dan Polster in the Northern District of Ohio had allowed Cuyahoga and Summit [...]
