Tag: Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti

Tennessee A.G. Jonathan Skrmetti Joins Federal Antitrust Lawsuit Alleging Algorithmic Fixing of Rental Prices

Tom Pappert
House for Rent

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti on Friday joined seven other states and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) in an antitrust lawsuit accusing the property management software company RealPage of using its service to algorithmically fix rental prices across the United States, allowing them to form a monopoly that allows rental owners to collaboratively set prices in a bid to avoid market pressures to lower rent.

The DOJ confirmed the legal action on Friday, alleging RealPage is engaged in an “unlawful scheme to decrease competition among landlords in apartment pricing and to monopolize the market for commercial revenue management software that landlords use to price apartments.”

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Attorney General Skrmetti Files Motion to Dismiss Lawsuit on Abortion Trafficking

Peter D'Abrosca

Tennessee’s Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti Wednesday filed a motion to dismiss a lawsuit by State Representative Aftyn Behn (D-Nashville), Nashville abortion activist and attorney Rachel Welty, and others to stop a bill banning the practice of abortion trafficking to take effect. 

HB 1895, introduced by State Representative Jason Zachary (R-Knoxville) and signed into law by Gov. Bill Lee (R) in May bans  minor seeking a abortions to be transported across state lines by people unrelated to them in order to obtain an abortion.

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Tennessee Ethics Complaint over Pro-Bobby Harshbarger PAC Texts Targeting State Sen. Jon Lundberg Referred to A.G. Jonathan Skrmetti

Tom Pappert
Harshbarger Lundberg

It was determined on Tuesday that Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti will receive a complaint against Tennessee State Senate candidate Bobby Harshbarger, the Republican primary challenger to Senator Jon Lundberg (R-Bristol).

The complaint, originally filed by Tennessee Senate Republican Caucus Chair Ken Yager (R-Kingston) on April 25, alleges inappropriate collusion between political campaigns and the East Tennessee Conservatives PAC to send mass texts messages which allege Lundberg failed to adequately represent his conservative constituents on key votes.

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Tennessee Joins Antitrust Lawsuit Against Apple for Smartphone Monopolization

Peter D'Abrosca
IPhone User

Tennessee has joined a multi-state antitrust lawsuit against Apple, which claims that the Silicon Valley company is monopolizing the smartphone market.

“Apple, the most valuable company in the world, stifled competition in the smartphone market at the expense of consumers,” said Tennessee Attorney General Skrmetti in a press release. “When companies win by innovating, consumers benefit. When companies win by kneecapping their competition, consumers suffer.”

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TN DAs General Conference Files Illegal Brief Supporting Shelby County DA Mulroy’s Effort to Free Convicted Murderer, AG Skrmetti Tells Court Brief Not Legal

Tom Pappert
Skrmetti Mulroy

The Tennessee District Attorneys General Conference (TNDAGC) filed an amicus brief last week, which was labeled illegal in a Tuesday response by the Tennessee Attorney General’s Office, supporting the efforts of Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy to free a death row inmate who was convicted of two murders over 40 years ago.

The conference filed the amicus brief in a lawsuit brought by death row inmate Larry McKay against Tennessee over a law passed by the General Assembly in 2023, which expands the number of capital cases that the state’s attorney general must directly oversee.

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Tennessee Attorney General Skrmetti Claims Meta Knowingly Made Instagram Addictive to Children in Unredacted Lawsuit

Tom Pappert
AG Skrmetti

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti (R) released on Wednesday the unredacted lawsuit he is leading against Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, which alleges Meta created Instagram using “deceptive and unfair business practices that are fomenting a mental health crisis in this state.”

Skrmetti stated in a press release that his office’s “complaint makes clear that Meta knew its platforms were hurting kids and made a very clear decision to choose money over the mental health of its young users.” The attorney general said that “Tennessee law protects kids from companies, big or small, that mislead and hurt them” and that the state “will continue to aggressively enforce that law.”

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Tennessee Official Says Anxiety, Depression on the Rise Among Children

Peter D'Abrosca

An official with the Tennessee Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services (TDMHSAS) said in a recent interview that mental illnesses among children are on the rise in the Volunteer State, as the state’s Attorney General works to tackle some of the potential root causes of those illnesses. 

“The data from all sources point to that we see increased sadness and hopelessness among high school students,” TDMHSAS Deputy Commissioner Matthew Yancey told WKRN. “We’ve seen increases in emergency room presentations related to psychiatric emergencies, increases in suicidal ideation.”

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Metro Nashville Airport Authority Board Votes to Ratify 19 Actions Taken During State-Appointed Board’s Tenure

Tom Pappert

The city-appointed Metro Nashville Airport Authority board voted unanimously on Wednesday to ratify 19 actions taken during the tenure of the previous board, which state officials appointed some of its members in accordance with a new Tennessee law.

After the Tennessee General Assembly passed a law in June, the Nashville mayor, Tennessee governor, and top two lawmakers in the Tennessee General Assembly would each select two members for the board. The board was selected and began operating, but a ruling by a panel of three judges at the Tennessee Chancery Court agreed with Metro Nashville’s argument that the law violates the Tennessee Constitution because it only applied to one Tennessee city.

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Tennessee Attorney General Skrmetti Reveals Google Will Pay $700 Million to Settle Monopoly Lawsuit

Tom Pappert
Skrmetti Google

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti revealed on Wednesday that a bipartisan coalition of attorneys general announced a $700 million agreement with Google to settle their lawsuit alleging the technology company engaged in anticompetitive practices to stifle competitors to its Google Play Store.

Skrmetti stated that “Google will no longer profit from the inflated app costs it forced through its abuse of market power,” and said the settlement “will reduce app prices and increase consumer choices on the Android platform. Our office is proud to protect consumers, secure $700 million in financial relief, and be a part of this bipartisan effort to ensure one of the most powerful companies in the world follows the law.”

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Tennessee AG Skrmetti Joins 27-State Coalition Against ATF’s New Gun Sale Registration Rule

Tom Pappert

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti (R) joined a 27-state coalition of state attorneys general on Monday to oppose the new rule by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) which will require gun owners to conduct background checks and register transactions with the agency any time they sell, gift, or trade a gun.

Skrmetti announced his office will join 26 other state attorneys general and the Arizona State Legislature in a letter “demanding” the ATF drop the rule, arguing it “violates the Second Amendment” and “risks making any individual who sells a firearm for profit liable to civil, administrative, and even criminal penalties for failing to register with a federal agency.”

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Tennessee Joining Lawsuit Against NCAA

Peter D'Abrosca

The state of Tennessee, via Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti, announced Thursday that it is joining six other states in an antitrust lawsuit against the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA).

The lawsuit, according to Skrmetti’s office, challenges the NCAA’s student-athlete transfer eligibility rule, which currently states that athletes who transfer from one Division I school to another must sit out of competition for one season before they can resume playing. 

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Tennessee Attorney General Skrmetti Files Appeal over Who Appoints Metro Nashville Airport Authority Board

Tom Pappert
Skrmetti Nashville Airport

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti filed a notice of appeal to the injunction issued by a three-judge panel in October which determined the Tennessee General Assembly violated the state Constitution with its new law changing how the Metro Nashville Airport Authority board is selected.

Under the new law, two board members would be selected by the Nashville mayor, Tennessee governor, and top two lawmakers in the Tennessee General Assembly, respectively. When the injunction was filed, the board went back to its previous selection process, by which members are picked by Nashville’s mayor and approved by the Metro Nashville Council.

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Tennessee Has 30 Days to Appeal After Court Restores Previous Metro Nashville Airport Authority Board

Tom Pappert

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti (R) has 30 days to appeal the Tuesday decision from a three-judge panel that ruled the legislature violated the state constitution with its new law governing the Metro Nashville Airport Authority.

Metro Nashville filed the lawsuit after the Tennessee Legislature passed a law changing how the board’s members are selected, with the new law allowing the mayor, governor, and House and Senate speakers to each select two appointees. Tuesday’s ruling invalidated this law, and restored the board’s previous members who were all appointed by Nashville’s mayor and approved by the Metro Nashville council, effective immediately.

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Tennessee AG Skrmetti Sues Biden Administration Over Withheld Federal Funds During Abortion Battle

Peter D'Abrosca

After the Biden Administration bypassed the state of Tennessee completely and decided to give the state’s Title X funding directly to Planned Parenthood in September, Tennessee’s attorney general is taking action. 

“We are suing to stop the federal government from playing politics with the health of Tennessee women,” Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti said in a statement posted to X, formerly Twitter. “Our lawsuit is necessary to ensure that Tennessee can continue its 50-year track record of successfully providing these public health services to its neediest populations.”

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Rep. Mark Green’s Hunting Education Bill Passes House with Bipartisan Support

Hannah Poling

Tennessee U.S. Congressman Mark Green (R-TN-07) announced on Tuesday that his Protecting Hunting Heritage and Education Act passed the House with bipartisan support to keep hunting and archery programs in U.S. schools.

This follows the Biden administration recently announced its plan to withhold funding from schools that provide these programs, claiming that under the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA) passed last year, school hunting and archery classes are precluded from receiving federal funding.

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Williamson County GOP Issues Medical Rights Resolution Against Any Potential COVID-19 Mandates

Hannah Poling

The Williamson County GOP has issued a medical rights resolution refusing to “blindly submit” to any effort by the federal government to reinstate COVID-19 mandates and urging state lawmakers to do more to protect Tennesseans’ medical freedoms.

“We, as the Republicans of Williamson County, as Americans, as God-fearing Conservatives, will refuse to blindly submit, and we thank our State Legislators for the protections they have already enacted and beg them to do far more to protect our Medical Freedom and to prevent such a horrific overreach from ever happening again; and we ask for Governor Lee to task our state’s Attorney General to investigate violations of the Tennessee Constitution and other Covid-19 crimes,” the resolution reads.

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Tennessee Attorney General Skrmetti Says 6th Circuit Ruling ‘A Big Win,’ Meaning State Law Protecting Minors from Transgender Mutilation and Hormone Treatment ‘Can Be Fully Enforced’

Michael Patrick Leahy

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti released a statement Saturday morning, hours after the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a ruling granting the state of Tennessee’s emergency motion for a stay of a June 28 preliminary injunction from a federal district judge that temporarily prohibited the full implementation of a law enacted in March 2023. The law, Prohibition on Medical Procedures Performed on Minors Related to Sexual Identity, was originally scheduled to go into effect on July 1. “The case is far from over, but this is a big win. The court of appeals lifted the injunction, meaning the law can be fully enforced, and recognized that Tennessee is likely to win the constitutional argument and the case,” Skrmetti said in a statement released by his office. The law now goes into full effect on July 8, one week after its originally scheduled July 1 effective date. “Tennessee enacted a law that prohibits healthcare providers from performing gender-affirming surgeries and administering hormones or puberty blockers to transgender minors. After determining that the law likely violated the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses, the district court facially enjoined the law’s enforcement as to hormones and puberty blockers and applied the injunction to…

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DOJ Sues Tennessee over Limits on Gender-Related Treatments for Minors

Just the News

The Department of Justice on Wednesday announced that it had filed a complaint against state law in Tennessee barring certain gender-related treatments for minors.

“The Justice Department today filed a complaint challenging Tennessee Senate Bill 1 (SB 1), a recently enacted law that denies necessary medical care to youth based solely on who they are,” reads a DOJ press release. “The complaint alleges that SB 1’s ban on providing certain medically necessary care to transgender minors violates the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause.”

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AG Skrmetti Declines to Appeal Injunction, Metro Nashville Council Reduction Expected to Go into Effect in 2027

The Center Square

Tennessee’s attorney general will not appeal a three-judge panel decision last week to block a bill intended to reduce Metro Nashville’s council from 40 to 20 members and will allow it to become law in 2027.

Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti announced on Monday that he would not appeal the injunction and attempt to have the law go into effect sooner. While the law applies to all metropolitan forms of government in the state, only Metro Nashville has a metropolitan council with more than 20 members.

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Attorney General Skrmetti on TikTok’s Refusal to Provide Documents: If a Company’s Behavior Is Sufficiently Egregious, State Law ‘Allows Me to Ask a Court to Ban That Company from Ever Doing Business in Tennessee Again’

Julie Carr

Tuesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report, host Leahy welcomed Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti to the newsmaker line to discuss the amicus brief filed against Chinese-owned TikTok and the possibility of litigation that could outlaw its platform in the state.

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Tennessee Attorney General Skrmetti Leads Coalition of GOP AGs in Letter Demanding DOJ Respect Rights of Critics of Children’s Trans Surgeries

Peter D'Abrosca

After the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association and the Children’s Hospital Association asked the Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate critics of transgender surgery for minors, Tennessee’s Attorney General is leading a coalition of his peers in responding. 

“We, the undersigned State Attorneys General, write to express our deep concern with the recent letter you received from the American Academy of Pediatrics, American Medical Association, and the Children’s Hospital Association asking you to investigate and prosecute people who question the medical establishment’s current treatment of children struggling with gender dysphoria,” says the letter penned by Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti, and co-signed by 12 other attorneys general. “You cannot and should not undertake such investigations or prosecutions.”

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AG Skrmetti Leads States in Opposing Proposed ObamaCare Language Change

Peter D'Abrosca

Tennessee’s Attorney General is leading the charge against a proposed change to Section 1557 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare). 

Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti will lead a coalition of 20 states in filing a public comment against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’s (DHS) plan to change the wording in Section 1557 from “sex” to “gender identity.” 

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