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Appellate

  • September 17, 2025

    Retired Judges Speak Out On 'Threats' To Constitution

    More than 40 retired federal judges appointed by presidents of both parties released an open letter Wednesday, the anniversary of the signing of the Constitution, saying they sought to underscore the importance of the rule of law at a time when the nation's ideals "are under historic strain."

  • September 16, 2025

    Dr.'s COVID Falsehoods Are Free Speech, Wash. Panel Says

    A Washington state appeals court unanimously ruled Tuesday that the Washington Medical Commission overstepped its authority by punishing a doctor for COVID-19 falsehoods he published to his blog, but affirmed the commission's decision to discipline him for prescribing ivermectin to COVID-19 patients.

  • September 16, 2025

    6th Circ. Backs Liability Theory In Kia, Hyundai Car Theft Suits

    A split Sixth Circuit panel Tuesday held that a lower court erred in rejecting that Kia and Hyundai could be liable for victims' injuries from crashes involving vehicles stolen amid a TikTok-inspired wave of thefts, finding "theft-related accidents" could be considered "hazards that make a car's design defective.

  • September 16, 2025

    $300M Hyatt Rewards Tax Ruling Criticized By 7th Circ. Judge

    A Seventh Circuit judge took issue Tuesday with a U.S. Tax Court's finding that Hyatt should report $300 million in rewards program fund revenue, saying the decision seemed to focus on a factor that was shot down by decades-old legal precedent.

  • September 16, 2025

    'It's Confidential': Judiciary Chair Mum On Court System Strife

    The federal judiciary's leaders heard sharp criticism at a private meeting Tuesday regarding the U.S. Supreme Court's increasing willingness to block lower court decisions, according to remarks released publicly, and one of those leaders subsequently deflected requests for details during an official briefing.

  • September 16, 2025

    Miami Shipping Co. Asks Justices To Eye Cuba Seizure Suits

    A Miami-based global shipper has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review an Eleventh Circuit decision reviving litigation in which the former owner of land near a Cuban port accused the company of "trafficking" in seized property, saying it wants clarity on the parameters of Helms-Burton Act suits.

  • September 16, 2025

    Military Contractor Tells Justices To Nix Army Vet's Injury Suit

    Fluor Corp. has urged the U.S. Supreme Court to toss a suit seeking to hold the defense contractor liable for a military veteran's injuries sustained in a 2016 suicide bombing in Afghanistan, saying federal law preempts the state-based injury claims.

  • September 16, 2025

    DOJ Fights Court Order To Reinstate NCUA Board Members

    The Trump administration has told the D.C. Circuit that the president had the right to remove two National Credit Union Administration board members at will, and that a lower court was wrong to reinstate them and read extra job protections into the law.

  • September 16, 2025

    NC Justices Hear Clash Over Property Compensation Suits

    Landowners' cases challenging their payouts for seized property threaten to upend North Carolina's jurisprudence, bury it in litigation and overly inflate damages owed if lower courts' rulings are left undisturbed, the state's Supreme Court was told Tuesday.

  • September 16, 2025

    High Court Urged To Leave $120M Iraq Immunity Ruling Intact

    The Trump administration urged the U.S. Supreme Court to turn away a Pennsylvania defense contractor's petition seeking clarity on the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act's commercial activity exception, arguing that a D.C. Circuit decision finding a lack of jurisdiction in the case is correct.

  • September 16, 2025

    2nd Circ. Revives Suit Over Buddhist Group's Water Pollution

    The Second Circuit on Tuesday revived an environmental group's Clean Water Act enforcement suit accusing a New York Buddhist center of contaminating nearby waterways with wastewater containing fecal coliform bacteria.

  • September 16, 2025

    9th Circ. Affirms Payment Plan For Poor Drug Dealer

    A Ninth Circuit panel has found that an Idaho federal court was within the law to require both an immediate payment and a payment plan over time for a fine and an assessment totaling $1,100 against an indigent drug dealer.

  • September 16, 2025

    Patent Owner Wants Fed. Circ. Revival Of Salesforce Suit

    A consulting company is asking the Federal Circuit to undo a Nevada federal judge's dismissal of its suit accusing Salesforce of infringing patents for database software reprogramming, calling the decision "improper and unjustified."

  • September 16, 2025

    Merck Says Vaccine Case 'Poor Vehicle' For Antitrust Review

    Merck & Co. told the U.S. Supreme Court to reject a bid from physicians looking to revive antitrust claims over submissions the pharmaceutical giant made to federal regulators concerning its mumps vaccine, arguing that the case is "an exceptionally poor vehicle" for review.

  • September 16, 2025

    NC Tells 4th Circ. New E-Cig Regs Fit With Federal Law

    The state of North Carolina is asking the Fourth Circuit to shut down a bid by vaping interests to block a new law giving state tax officials the ability to fine companies for selling vapes not authorized by federal regulators, saying the authority to do so is preserved by the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act.

  • September 16, 2025

    Roundup User Fights Uphill To Revive Cancer Suit At 9th Circ.

    A Ninth Circuit judge expressed doubts Tuesday that a lower court erred in tossing a personal-injury plaintiff's claims that Monsanto's Roundup likely caused his non-Hodgkin lymphoma, saying during a hearing the trial judge had a "great deal of discretion" to decide whether a general-causation expert's opinion was based on "junk science."

  • September 16, 2025

    Fed. Circ. Won't Look At USAA's Nixed $223M Patent Verdicts

    The full Federal Circuit declined Tuesday to scrutinize panel decisions that wiped out a pair of patent infringement verdicts against PNC Bank that totaled nearly $223 million, rejecting United Services Automobile Association's arguments that the appeals court wrongly invalidated its mobile check deposit patents.

  • September 16, 2025

    7th Circ. Judge Questions NCAA's Duty In Harassment Suit

    A Seventh Circuit judge seemed skeptical Tuesday that a district court incorrectly tossed University of San Francisco baseball players' sexual harassment suit at the pleading stage, saying the students seem to be seeking a "fishing expedition" for evidence to support their claims.

  • September 16, 2025

    Goldman, Morgan Stanley Beat Archegos Suit At 2nd Circ.

    The Second Circuit on Tuesday upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit accusing Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley of profiting off insider knowledge that the investment firm Archegos Capital Management was about to collapse, ruling that the companies had no duty to withhold from trading on the information.

  • September 16, 2025

    Bitcoin Fog Operator Fights Conviction Over Venue, Evidence

    The alleged operator of the Bitcoin Fog crypto mixer is urging the D.C. Circuit to overturn his conviction, claiming federal prosecutors failed to tie him to a crime in the district and relied on circumstantial forensic evidence to link him to money launderers' use of the anonymizing service.

  • September 16, 2025

    Ga. Justices Weigh Appropriate Sanction For Immigration Atty

    The Georgia Supreme Court on Tuesday considered whether an immigration attorney charged with abandoning multiple clients over a period of years should be suspended for up to a year or disbarred.

  • September 16, 2025

    Ex-Officials Say Harvard Visa Ban Will Hurt US Security

    Twenty-one former senior national security officials urged the First Circuit on Monday to uphold an injunction letting Harvard enroll international students on F-1 visas, saying the administration's attempt to bar the university from doing so is retaliatory and will drive foreign talent away.

  • September 16, 2025

    Bakery Drivers Are Exempt From Arbitration, 2nd Circ. Told

    Two Connecticut delivery drivers asked the Second Circuit on Tuesday to reverse an order sending their employment misclassification lawsuit to arbitration, arguing the Federal Arbitration Act doesn't apply to workers engaged in interstate commerce and cuts through contracts that purportedly cast them as independent contractors.

  • September 16, 2025

    Biz Groups Ask 9th Circ. To Block Calif. Climate Rules

    A coalition of business groups asked the Ninth Circuit to halt two new California climate regulations requiring large companies to publicly disclose their greenhouse gas emissions and climate-related financial risks, while they appeal a lower court's refusal to preliminarily block the rules that they say violate their First Amendment rights.

  • September 16, 2025

    4th Circ. Revives RICO Claims On Amazon Project Kickbacks

    The Fourth Circuit in a published decision Tuesday revived racketeering and other claims from Amazon.com Inc. after two former employees, a real estate developer and an attorney operated a kickback scheme as the company spent hundreds of millions of dollars on a set of data center projects in northern Virginia.

Expert Analysis

  • Google Damages Ruling Offers Lessons For Testifying Experts

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    The Federal Circuit's recent decision in EcoFactor v. Google represents a shift in how courts evaluate expert testimony in patent cases, offering a practical guide for how litigators and testifying experts can refine their work, says Adam Rhoten at Secretariat.

  • Series

    Law School's Missed Lessons: Communicating With Clients

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    Law school curricula often overlook client communication procedures, and those who actively teach this crucial facet of the practice can create exceptional client satisfaction and success, says Patrick Hanson at Wiggam Law.

  • One Year On, Davidson Holds Lessons On 'Health Halo' Claims

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    A year after the Ninth Circuit's Davidson v. Sprout Foods decision — which raised the bar for so-called health halo claims — food and beverage companies can draw insights from its finding, subsequently expanded on by other courts, that plaintiffs must be specific when alleging fraud in healthfulness marketing, say attorneys at Sidley.

  • Justices' NRC Ruling Raises New Regulatory Questions

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    In Nuclear Regulatory Commission v. Texas, the U.S. Supreme Court avoided ruling on the NRC's authority to license private, temporary nuclear waste storage facilities — and this failure to reach the merits question creates new regulatory uncertainty where none had existed for decades, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • Rocket Mortgage Appeal May Push Justices To Curb Classes

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    Should the U.S. Supreme Court agree to hear Alig v. Rocket Mortgage, the resulting decision could limit class sizes based on commonality under Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Evidence as opposed to standing under Article III of the U.S. Constitution, say attorneys at Carr Maloney.

  • 3 Judicial Approaches To Applying Loper Bright, 1 Year Later

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    In the year since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Chevron deference in its Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo decision, a few patterns have emerged in lower courts’ application of the precedent to determine whether agency actions are lawful, say attorneys at Husch Blackwell.

  • Trending At The PTAB: Shifts In Parallel Proceedings Strategy

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    Dynamics are changing between the Patent Trial and Appeal Board and federal courts, with two recent discretionary denials and one Federal Circuit decision offering takeaways for both patent owners and challengers navigating parallel proceedings, say attorneys at Finnegan.

  • What Businesses Need To Know To Avoid VPPA Class Actions

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    Divergent rulings by the Second, Sixth and Seventh Circuits about the scope of the Video Privacy Protection Act have highlighted the difficulty of applying a statute conceived to regulate the now-obsolete brick-and-mortar video store sector in today's internet economy, say attorneys at DTO Law.

  • Series

    Adapting To Private Practice: From US Rep. To Boutique Firm

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    My transition from serving as a member of Congress to becoming a partner at a boutique firm has been remarkably smooth, in part because I never stopped exercising my legal muscles, maintained relationships with my former colleagues and set the right tone at the outset, says Mondaire Jones at Friedman Kaplan.

  • Opinion

    IRS Should Work With Industry On Microcaptive Regs

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    The IRS should engage with microcaptive insurance owners to develop better regulations on these arrangements or risk the emergence of common law guidance as taxpayers with legitimate programs seek relief in the federal courts, says Dustin Carlson at SRA 831(b) Admin.

  • FLSA Interpretation Patterns Emerge 1 Year After Loper Bright

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    One year after the U.S. Supreme Court's monumental decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, four distinct avenues of judicial decision-making have taken shape among lower courts that are responding to their newfound freedom in interpreting the Fair Labor Standards Act through U.S. Department of Labor regulations, say attorneys at Kutak Rock.

  • A Pattern Emerges In Justices' Evaluation Of Veteran Statute

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    The recent Soto v. U.S. decision that the statute of limitations for certain military-related claims does not apply to combat-related special compensation exemplifies the U.S. Supreme Court's view, emerging in two other recent opinions, that it is a reviewing court's obligation to determine the best interpretation of the language used by Congress, says attorney Kenneth Carpenter.

  • Fed. Circ. In May: Evaluating Opportunistic Trademark Filings

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    The Federal Circuit's decision last month in the "US Space Force" trademark case gives the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board additional clarity when working through opportunistic trademark filings, particularly when the mark's value is primarily due to the potential value of a false connection, say attorneys at Knobbe Martens.

  • Opinion

    Senate's 41% Litigation Finance Tax Would Hurt Legal System

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    The Senate’s latest version of the Big Beautiful Bill Act would impose a 41% tax on the litigation finance industry, but the tax is totally disconnected from the concerns it purports to address, and it would set the country back to a time when small plaintiffs had little recourse against big defendants, says Anthony Sebok at Cardozo School of Law.

  • Drawbacks For Taxpayers From Justices' Levy Dispute Ruling

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    The Supreme Court's June decision in Commissioner v. Zuch, holding the Tax Court lacks jurisdiction to resolve disputes where the IRS has stopped pursuing a levy, may require taxpayers to explore new tactics for mitigating the increased difficulty of appealing their liability via collection due process hearings, says Matthew Roberts at Meadows Collier.

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