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Public Policy
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June 05, 2025
DOL Head Vows To Fight Wage Theft With Fewer Investigators
The U.S. labor secretary told a U.S. House committee Thursday that the Department of Labor will continue to combat wage theft even with fewer resources after President Donald Trump's administration proposed cutting the number of wage and hour investigators.
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June 05, 2025
DOL Benefits Arm Needs Turnaround, Nominee Tells Senators
President Donald Trump's pick to lead the U.S. Department of Labor's employee benefits division told a Senate panel Thursday to prepare for an overhaul of the subagency if he's confirmed, vowing to change the direction of enforcement, regulation and more.
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June 05, 2025
USDA Sued Over $13M Food Aid Cut In Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture for pulling $13 million in funds meant for a local food purchase assistance program, telling a federal judge that the decision will have a "devastating effect" on the state's farmers and food banks contrary to the department's mission.
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June 05, 2025
Connecticut Lawmakers OK Bill Targeting Illicit THC
Legislators in Connecticut have approved a bill cracking down on illicit marijuana and hemp product sales outside the state's regulated marketplace.
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June 05, 2025
Judge Wants Details On Harm From Trump Wind Farm Pause
A Massachusetts federal judge Thursday asked a coalition of states and a clean-energy advocacy group for more specifics about the harm they allegedly will be caused by the Trump administration's decision to pause wind farm permitting, and said he wanted to move forward with a trial "promptly."
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June 05, 2025
Calif. Assembly OKs Exemption For Returned Tribal Land
California land that is transferred to a federally recognized Native American tribe would be exempt from state real estate transfer tax under a bill passed in the state Assembly.Â
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June 05, 2025
Justices Nix Mexico's Cartel Violence Suit In Win For Gun Cos.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday threw out a suit by the government of Mexico against Smith & Wesson and other major gun companies, finding in a unanimous opinion that the alleged ties between the firearms makers and cartel violence south of the border are too speculative to stand up in court.
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June 05, 2025
Justices Fault Wis. For Denying Tax Break To Charities
Wisconsin discriminated against a group of Catholic charities when it denied them an unemployment tax exemption, the U.S. Supreme Court said Thursday, rejecting the state's argument that the charities were not operated primarily for religious purposes.
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June 05, 2025
Justices Nix Higher Hurdle For Heterosexual Bias Claims
A unanimous U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday vacated the Sixth Circuit's ruling that plaintiffs claiming anti-heterosexual workplace discrimination need to provide extra "background circumstances" evidence, opining that it improperly imposed special standards on majority-group plaintiffs.
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June 04, 2025
Trump Issues Travel Ban On 12 Countries, Limits 7 Others
President Donald Trump on Wednesday issued a proclamation banning travelers from a dozen countries, including several he targeted during his first administration, and placed travel limitations on travelers from seven other countries, citing national security concerns.
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June 04, 2025
Trump Takes New Tack To Ban Harvard's Foreign Students
President Donald Trump announced Wednesday that he will restrict Harvard University's international students from entering the country based on supposed national security concerns, less than a week after a Massachusetts federal judge indicated she will block the administration from banning the university's foreign students.
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June 04, 2025
Texas Unauthorized Student Tuition Law Axed Hours After Suit
A Texas federal judge on Wednesday scrapped a decades-old Texas law that allowed college students without legal residency to pay in-state tuition, hours after the Trump administration filed suit to challenge the law as unconstitutional and after the state agreed the law conflicted with federal immigration law.
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June 04, 2025
Dems Say Robocalls Can't Be Stopped With Less Money, Staff
Combating the scourge of robocalls is normally a more bipartisan issue, but at a House subcommittee hearing Wednesday, Democrats used the opportunity to take aim at the Trump administration for cutting funding and jobs from agencies tasked with fixing the problem.
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June 04, 2025
Ex-CFTC Chair Warns Crypto Bill's Loopholes Still Too Wide
Former leaders of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission on Wednesday told U.S. House lawmakers mulling a bill to regulate cryptocurrency markets that the legislation needs to close potential regulatory loopholes and that Congress must expand the agency's resources if they expect it to police the bulk of the digital asset space.
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June 04, 2025
1st Circ. Upholds Block On Trump's Education Dept. Job Cuts
The First Circuit on Wednesday rejected a bid by President Donald Trump to greenlight massive job cuts at the U.S. Department of Education, finding that the administration had not provided enough evidence to overturn a block put in place by a Massachusetts federal judge.
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June 04, 2025
Yogis' Legal Warrior Pose Gets Beach Ban Lifted At 9th Circ.
The Ninth Circuit on Wednesday ordered a lower court to grant a preliminary injunction to yoga instructors who challenged San Diego's prohibition on free yoga classes at shoreline parks, finding the activity to be speech protected by the First Amendment since it imparts a skill derived from special knowledge.
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June 04, 2025
GAO Tells Congress DOD Must Take Fraud Risk Seriously
The Government Accountability Office's director of forensic audits and investigative services testified Wednesday that words and actions by U.S. Department of Defense leadership have called into question the DOD's commitment to combating fraud.
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June 04, 2025
DC Judge Won't Halt Education Data Collection Rollback
A D.C. federal judge refused to halt the Department of Education's cancellation of $900 million in data maintenance and collection contracts, saying it's not the court's place to "breathe life back into" large swaths of canceled programs and monitor day-to-day statutory compliance.
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June 04, 2025
Feds Say 'No Viable Path' Forward For Calif. High-Speed Rail
The U.S. Department of Transportation said Wednesday that the California high-speed rail's overblown budget and ongoing mismanagement indicate that there's "no viable path" to completing the project on schedule, so the federal government is preparing to pull nearly $4 billion in funding.
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June 04, 2025
What To Know About Trump's Shake-Up At Copyright Office
The firing of Shira Perlmutter by President Donald Trump as the head of the U.S. Copyright Office has introduced uncertainty into the agency's operations, including whether a previously unannounced report on artificial intelligence will ever be released, and set up a fight regarding the president's power to remove and replace whoever he wants without congressional input.
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June 04, 2025
Scalia Invoked Against Trump's Citizenship Stance At 9th Circ.
A panel of Ninth Circuit judges scrutinized the Trump administration's take on the citizenship clause as the government argued Wednesday to preserve the president's push to curb birthright citizenship, with one judge suggesting the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia would've rejected the attempt to read "beyond the mere words" of the 14th Amendment.
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June 04, 2025
Bowman Confirmed As Trump's Top Banking Regulator At Fed
Senators on Wednesday confirmed Federal Reserve Gov. Michelle Bowman to become the central bank's next vice chair for supervision, elevating the former Kansas community banker to a powerful perch overseeing many of the biggest Wall Street financial institutions.
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June 04, 2025
NC Governor Launches Council To Advise On Cannabis Policy
North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein on Wednesday announced the creation of a state advisory council on cannabis to develop a comprehensive policy with respect to the regulation of hemp and marijuana.
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June 04, 2025
Judge Ponders If Netflix's Tax Theory Is 'Too Philosophical'
A Colorado appellate judge on Wednesday wondered if Netflix's argument for why its subscriptions are not subject to state sales tax is "too philosophical" and doesn't reflect its actual transactions with customers, at a hearing in the state's appeal.
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June 04, 2025
3 Ways DOL Benefits Chief Nominee May Affect ERISA Cases
A key committee will decide Thursday whether to send President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the U.S. Department of Labor’s employee benefits arm ahead for a full Senate vote, setting the stage for what attorneys expect will be an employer-friendly shift in policies. Here are three ways Daniel Aronowitz could change benefits litigation if confirmed.
Expert Analysis
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Perspectives
Reading Tea Leaves In High Court's Criminal Law Decisions
The criminal justice decisions the U.S. Supreme Court will announce in the coming weeks will reveal whether last term’s fractured decision-making has continued, an important data point as the justices’ alignment seems to correlate with who benefits from a case’s outcome, says Sharon Fairley at the University of Chicago Law School.
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$38M Law Firm Settlement Highlights 'Unworthy Client' Perils
A recent settlement of claims against law firm Eckert Seamans for allegedly abetting a Ponzi scheme underscores the continuing threat of clients who seek to exploit their lawyers in perpetrating fraud, and the critical importance of preemptive measures to avoid these clients, say attorneys at Lockton Companies.
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Hints Of Where Enforcement May Grow Under New ÃÛÌÒÊÓÆµ
Though the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has significantly scaled back enforcement under the new administration, states remain able to pursue Consumer Financial Protection Act violators and the ÃÛÌÒÊÓÆµ seems set to enhance its focus on predatory loans to military members and fraudulent debt collection and credit reporting practices, say attorneys at MoFo.
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Only Certainty About FAR Reform Order Is Its Uncertainty
The president’s recent order overhauling the Federal Acquisition Regulation, which both contractors and agencies rely on to ensure predictability and consistency in federal procurement, lacks key details about its implementation, which will likely eliminate many safeguards that ensure contractors are treated fairly and that procurements are awarded in a reasonable manner, say attorneys at Miles & Stockbridge.
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Maintaining Legal Compliance For GenAI In Life Sciences
As companies continue to implement generative artificial intelligence to enhance all phases of drug discovery, they must remain mindful of legal, regulatory and practical considerations as best practices in this space emerge and evolve, say attorneys at Sullivan & Cromwell.
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Assessing Jurisdictional Issues In 2nd Circ. Bank Audi Case
The Second Circuit's reasoning last month in Raad v. Bank Audi that the exercise of personal jurisdiction must be based on conduct taking place within the jurisdiction reminds foreign financial institutions to continually monitor how plaintiffs are advocating for an expansive view of personal jurisdiction in the U.S., say attorneys at Freshfields.
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Series
Teaching Business Law Makes Me A Better Lawyer
Teaching business law to college students has rekindled my sense of purpose as a lawyer — I am more mindful of the importance of the rule of law and the benefits of our common law system, which helps me maintain a clearer perspective on work, says David Feldman at Feldman Legal Advisors.
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Enviro Justice Efforts After Trump's Disparate Impact Order
The Trump administration's recent executive order directing the U.S. Department of Justice to unwind disparate impact regulations may end some Biden-era environmental justice initiatives — but it will not end all efforts, whether by state or federal regulators or private litigants, to address issues in environmentally overburdened communities, say attorneys at ArentFox Schiff.
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What Disparate Impact Order Means For Insurers' AI Use
A recent executive order seeking to bar disparate impact theory conveys a meaningful policy shift, but does not alter the legal status of federal antidiscrimination law or enforceability of state laws, such as those holding insurers accountable for using artificial intelligence in a nondiscriminatory matter, say attorneys at Eversheds Sutherland.
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Choosing A Road To Autonomous Vehicle Compliance
As autonomous vehicle manufacturers navigate the complex U.S. regulatory landscape, they may opt for different approaches to following federal, state and local rules and laws, as they balance the tradeoffs between innovation, compliance and speed of deployment, say attorneys at Sidley.
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Navigating The Expanding Frontier Of Premerger Notice Laws
Washington's newly enacted law requiring premerger notification to state enforcers builds upon a growing trend of state scrutiny into transactions in the healthcare sector and beyond, and may inspire other states to enact similar legislation, say attorneys at Simpson Thacher.
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Evolving Federal Rules Pose Further Obstacles To NY LLC Act
Following the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network's recent changes to beneficial ownership information reporting under the federal Corporate Transparency Act — dramatically reducing the number of companies required to make disclosures — the utility of New York's LLC Transparency Act becomes less apparent, say attorneys at Pillsbury.
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The Risks Of Trump's Plan To Fast-Track Deregulation
A recent memorandum issued by President Donald Trump directing the repeal of so-called unlawful regulations, and instructing that agencies invoke the good cause exception under the Administrative Procedure Act, signals a potentially far-reaching deregulatory strategy under the guise of legal compliance, say attorneys at GableGotwals.
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Deregulation Memo Presents Risks, Opportunities For Cos.
A recent Trump administration memo providing direction to agencies tasked with rescinding regulations under an earlier executive order — without undergoing the typical notice-and-review process — will likely create much uncertainty for businesses, though they may be able to engage with agencies to shape the regulatory agenda, say attorneys at Blank Rome.
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Action Steps To Prepare For Ramped-Up Export Enforcement
In light of recent Bureau of Industry and Security actions and comments, companies, particularly those with any connection to China, should consider four concrete steps to shore up their compliance programs given the administration's increasingly aggressive approach to export enforcement, say attorneys at Gibson Dunn.