“Gig” workers around the world experience long hours, unpredictable and declining pay, and serious safety risks as platform companies sidestep labor protections, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Wednesday in a report. HRW urges governments to adopt binding standards in an International Labour Organization (ILO) treaty on platform work, negotiations for which are scheduled for June [...]

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Swedish authorities arrested the Chinese captain of a suspected Russia-linked oil tanker on Monday on suspicion of using forged documents and violating maritime law in the Baltic Sea, according to local media. On Sunday, the Swedish Coast Guard stopped the Jin Hui, a 182-meter tanker, in Swedish territorial waters south of Trelleborg over suspicions it was [...]

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A federal judge on Tuesday dismissed a proposed class action accusing the Law School Admission Council (LSAC) of conspiring with law schools to fix application fees and monopolize the admissions process, but gave the plaintiff until May 12 to file an amended complaint. US District Judge John Murphy of the US District Court for the [...]

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The US Supreme Court on Monday reversed a district court ruling that had blocked Texas’s 2025 congressional map as a likely racial gerrymander, allowing the Republican-drawn districts to stand for the 2026 midterm elections. The unsigned one-paragraph order cited the Court’s own 2025 decision in Abbott v. League of United Latin American Citizens as controlling, [...]

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Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Wednesday called on Hungary to repeal its 2021 anti-LGBTQ “child protection” law, one day after the European Union’s top court ruled the measure illegal. “This is a landmark ruling making clear that Hungary’s anti-LGBT law has no place in the European Union and should be repealed,” said Lydia Gall, HRW’s [...]

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A California ride-share driver advocacy group filed a complaint Monday in state court against Uber Technologies, Inc., alleging the company violated Proposition 22 and should be barred from classifying its drivers as independent contractors. Rideshare Drivers United (RDU), a California nonprofit representing more than 20,000 app-based drivers in the state, claimed Uber breached the Protect App-Based [...]

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FBI director Kash Patel filed a complaint Monday in US District Court for the District of Columbia against The Atlantic magazine and reporter Sarah Fitzpatrick, seeking $250 million in damages over a story alleging he had “alarmed colleagues with episodes of excessive drinking and unexplained absences.” The suit targets an April 17 article headlined “Kash [...]

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Maine’s legislature on Tuesday passed a temporary moratorium on the construction of large data centers through November 1, 2027, making Maine the first state in the US to impede facility expansion as lawmakers study their strain on the state’s power grid. The bill prohibits state agencies and municipalities from approving data centers that consume 20 [...]

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A US federal jury Wednesday found Live Nation Entertainment and its subsidiary Ticketmaster violated multiple federal antitrust laws, determining the companies held an illegal monopoly over the live entertainment industry and overcharged consumers $1.72 per ticket. The verdict, reached in United States v. Live Nation Entertainment before the US District Court for the Southern District [...]

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© European Union, 1998 – 2026, Attribution, via Wikimedia Commons

Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Monday urged Hungary’s incoming government to take immediate steps to restore fundamental rights and dismantle laws and institutions used to suppress dissent, following opposition leader Péter Magyar’s landslide victory in Sunday’s elections that is set to end 16 years of rule under Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.  The organization called for [...]

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