US Legal News
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Players associations of the National Hockey League (NHL), Major League Baseball (MLB) and National Football League (NFL) filed suit against the city of Pittsburgh Tuesday, claiming that a tax imposed on athletes in the city is in violation of both the Pennsylvania and US Constitutions. The suit also lists three athletes as plaintiffs, including former [...]

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The US Senate on Tuesday unanimously passed the Preventing Animal Cruelty and Torture (PACT) Act, which makes certain types of animal cruelty a federal felony. The bill expands upon a 2010 law criminalizing the creation or distribution of videos showing animals being crushed, burned or tortured. The underlying acts of cruelty had not yet been [...]

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US Representatives Anna Eshoo (D-CA) and Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) introduced the Online Privacy Act of 2019 (OPA) Tuesday, which would limit the ability of companies to buy and sell consumers’ online data, create new user privacy rights, and establish a new independent agency, the Digital Protection Agency (DPA). The OPA includes a serious of provisions, [...]

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A judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on Wednesday struck down a proposed rule that would have allowed health care providers to turn away patients seeking abortions and other treatments based on the providers’ religious views. The rule was set to take effect later this month but was [...]

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Photo credit: Stephanie Sundier

The House impeachment committees released their transcripts of the several depositions this week, including William Taylor, the senior US diplomat in Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, the former US ambassador to Ukraine, and Michael McKinsley, the former senior adviser to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. A primary insight uncovered in Taylor’s testimony is the extent to which [...]

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Voters in Washington narrowly rejected a referendum on Tuesday that would have instituted a statewide affirmative action program for employment. Referendum 88 would have enacted I-1000, deemed the “Washington state diversity, equity, and inclusion act.” The act was the state legislature’s second attempt in the last two decades to enactment an equal opportunity employment program [...]

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Pennsylvania voters on Tuesday widely approved a crime victims’ rights constitutional amendment known as Marsy’s Law, with an unofficial vote count of 73.87 percent to 26.13 percent (1,660,806 to 587,403 votes). The count is unofficial, as last week, a Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court Judge enjoined the tallying of votes on the amendment for due process and [...]

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The US Supreme Court heard oral argument in two cases Tuesday. CITGO Asphalt Refining Co. v. Frescati Shipping Co. asks about standards in federal maritime law regarding safe-berth clauses in voyage charter contracts. The respondent argued that safe-berth clauses in these contracts should be construed “as a warranty that the charterer would choose a port [...]

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Kansas voters approved an amendment Tuesday to the state Constitution ending an unusual state policy of redrawing legislative district boundaries based on federal census data adjusted by state numbers. The Kansas redistricting policy began in the 1990s and adjusted federal census data not to include college students and military personnel, given the non-permanent status of [...]

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