Good morning. Just days after the 5th Circuit upheld a Texas law limiting the ability of companies like Twitter and Facebook to moderate their users, Florida has sent the debate over free speech and censorship to the Supreme Court. Plus, what the New York lawsuit means for former President Donald Trump, the DOJ’s Mar-a-Lago win at the 11th Circuit, and what a key abortion rights attorney has to say about precedent. Dust off your decorative gourds — it’s the first day of fall!
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The state of Florida has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to address big tech companies’ ability to regulate their own users, just days after the 5th Circuit allowed a Texas law that bars the companies from removing users based on their “viewpoints.”
Florida has a similar law restricting tech companies’ ability to remove candidates for political office from their platforms, but the 11th Circuit struck it down in May. While the 5th Circuit said that the First Amendment doesn’t protect tech companies’ ability to limit what people say, the 11th Circuit held that Florida’s law violates the social media companies’ right to free speech.
Industry group NetChoice, which includes Facebook parent Meta and Twitter, has fought the laws, arguing the companies need the right to regulate user content when they believe it may lead to violence, citing concerns that unregulated platforms will enable extremists. The split between the 5th and 11th Circuits sets the case up for a ruling at the Supreme Court, Florida’s attorneys, Charles Cooper of Washington, D.C.’s Cooper & Kirk and its state solicitor, Henry Whitaker, argued in the petition.
Read more about the case. |
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| 2022 State of Corporate Law Departments Report
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Based on data driven and reliable insights: -2,000+ telephone interviews with in-house counsel -1,000+ survey responses -Detailed spend data from the Legal Department Operations (LDO) Index |
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2022 State of Corporate Law Departments Report
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Based on data driven and reliable insights: - 2,000+ telephone interviews with in-house counsel
- 1,000+ survey responses
- Detailed spend data from the Legal Department Operations (LDO) Index
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People suing Chevron claiming they developed Parkinson's disease after being exposed to the commercial weedkiller paraquat have asked a federal judge to sanction the company's lawyers at Jones Day for allegedly coaching an expert witness during a deposition.The plaintiffs and their attorneys from Meyers & Flowers; Walkup, Melodia, Kelly & Schoenberger and Levin Papantonio said that Jones Day partner Sharyl Reisman instructed the witness not to answer questions and conferred with him during breaks. (Reuters)
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Levine Plotkin & Menin, a New York entertainment law firm whose clients include the producers of the Broadway musical "Hamilton," opened a new office in Los Angeles. David Schachter will leave Beverly Hills firm McKuin Frankel Whitehead to open the outpost in L.A.'s Century City. (Reuters)
Global immigration law firm Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy said that longtime chairman Austin Fragomen — in that role since 1972 — will hand over his leadership to two new co-chairs. (Reuters)
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A senior lobbyist with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and a quartet of former federal judges and U.S. Patent and Trademark Office leaders launched a new organization to influence U.S. intellectual property policy. (Reuters)
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That’s the amount of money University of Houston Law Center spent for its five-story, cantilevered building. It is named for the late Houston trial lawyer and alum John O’Quinn, whose foundation has donated more than $16 million to the school. The University of Cincinnati College of Law is also celebrating the opening of its long-planned new campus after a $45.6 million renovation. Another law school is on track to finish construction on a new $33 million campus.
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"Dobbs is now the law of the land, and I will follow it, as I will follow all Supreme Court precedents."
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A 7th Circuit panel takes up a bid by Chicago drivers to revive an antitrust lawsuit challenging how the city runs its parking meter program. The plaintiffs' lawyers from Despres, Schwartz & Geoghegan and Chanen & Olstein contend the city’s deal renting the meters to an investment group for 75 years in exchange for $1.1 billion up front violates antitrust law because it requires the city to pay the company if it takes any action that could compete with the parking, like adding bike lanes. A district court judge rejected the challenge, saying the investment group could rely on governmental immunity from antitrust laws. Winston & Strawn’s Linda Coberly will defend the city’s parking meter program.
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D.C. Circuit Judges Nina Pillard, Harry Edwards and Judith Rogers will take up antitrust claims against Visa and Mastercard, as the companies challenge a Washington, D.C., federal judge’s class certification order in a dispute over network fees. The plaintiffs include the National ATM Council, an association of independent ATM operators that is represented by Jonathan Rubin of MoginRubin. Quinn Emanuel is also among the firms representing plaintiffs. Paul Weiss partner Justin Anderson is on the team for Mastercard, and Matthew Eisenstein of Arnold & Porter will defend Visa.
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Judge Michael Hatty in Howell, Michigan, will consider whether to combine the trials of two former pharmacists at New England Compounding Center charged with second-degree murder over the death of 11 patients who were injected with mold-tainted drugs it produced that sparked a deadly U.S. fungal meningitis outbreak in 2012. Barry Cadden and Glenn Chin were convicted of racketeering and fraud charges but cleared of murder in separate federal trials in Boston. They are now facing state court charges in Michigan.
Court calendars are subject to last-minute docket changes. |
Welcome back to the Penalty Box, where The Daily Docket highlights new and notable attorney and judicial discipline orders, hearings, claims and more. We’re looking out for cases and issues of importance, so please do share any observations with us. -
A Washington, D.C., professional responsibility board today takes up a former U.S. prosecutor’s challenge to recommended 90-day law license suspension for alleged ethics violations in the criminal case involving the 2001 murder of Chandra Levy. Amanda Haines, who has since retired as an assistant U.S. attorney, has denied withholding evidence from the man once accused in the murder of Levy, a federal Bureau of Prisons intern whose body was discovered in a D.C. park. A defendant was convicted in the Levy case but prosecutors later dropped the allegations over claims the government had not provided certain evidence to the man’s defense team.
Attorney Steven Donziger, who won a $9.5 billion judgment against Chevron over the polluting of the Ecuadorian rainforest but was later convicted of criminal contempt, has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review his conviction. Donziger, whose legal team includes Stephen Vladeck of the University of Texas School of Law, argued in the petition that the court-appointed lawyers who prosecuted him were acting without supervision from the Department of Justice or other executive branch officers, which violates principles of separation of powers.
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A Washington, D.C., appellate court suspended the law license of Larry Klayman, an attorney known for conservative causes and clients, for 18 months over his handling of a sexual harassment lawsuit initially filed more than a decade ago. Klayman, founder of the conservative Judicial Watch and Freedom Watch groups, called the court's ruling a "political hit" and accused the D.C. bar of targeting attorneys who support former President Donald Trump. He has denied any professional misconduct, and he told the court he would further seek reconsideration of its order.
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New York Attorney General Letitia James is suing Donald Trump and his adult children for alleged numerous acts of fraud and misrepresentation, including misstating the values of real estate properties to obtain favorable loans and tax benefits. Trump called the lawsuit part of a “witch hunt.” The case in New York state court adds to the numerous investigations and lawsuits that Trump faces. (Reuters)
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An 8th Circuit panel appeared skeptical of a five-month-old trademark ruling for H&R Block that temporarily barred Block, formerly Square, from using the Block name with its Cash App Taxes tax-preparation service. One judge said there may not be enough evidence to justify the order against Block. (Reuters)
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Donald Trump ally and My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell is under federal investigation for identity theft and for conspiring to damage a protected computer connected to a suspected voting equipment security breach in Colorado, according to a copy of the warrant that led to the seizure of Lindell’s phone. Lindell has filed a lawsuit seeking the return of his cell phone and an order barring the FBI from reviewing its contents. (Reuters)
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The Biden administration told the U.S. Supreme Court that it should turn down a request by Amgen to review a decision that invalidated patents on its blockbuster cholesterol drug Repatha. The Federal Circuit was right to find that the relevant parts of the patents did not describe Amgen's inventions adequately when it ruled for Sanofi and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar said. (Reuters)
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