Pressure from a Columbus-based policy group has forced five university-based Ohio law schools to stop race-based scholarship or internship programs.
The Buckeye Institute announced law schools at Cleveland State, Ohio State, Akron, Cincinnati and Toledo stopped the programs after it announced an investigation.
Read the full story
Phill Kline, former Kansas Attorney General and current law professor at Liberty University School of Law, said the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DOJ) “radical” election interference operation is on full display following Wednesday’s ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that allows Virginia to remove individuals identified as noncitizens from its voter rolls.
Earlier this month, the DOJ sued Virginia over removing non-citizens from its rolls ahead of the November 5 general election.
Read the full story
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday docketed the appeal filed Sunday by Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares after a federal appeals court declined to overrule a lower court’s decision to force Virginia to add approximately 1,600 noncitizens back to its voter rolls.
According to the Supreme Court’s online portal, the case was docketed on Monday after Virginia submitted its appeal for the high court to reverse a lower court’s decision on Sunday.
Read the full story
The U.S. Supreme Court has scheduled to hear oral arguments in United States v. Skrmetti, a case challenging a Tennessee law that bans “gender-affirming care” on minors, for Wednesday, December 4.
Read the full story
Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti filed a response brief with the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday defending a Tennessee law that bans “gender-affirming care” on minors – including puberty blockers, hormone therapy, and sex-change surgeries.
Read the full story
The entire Tennessee congressional delegation sponsored a resolution this week celebrating the Scarboro 85 students from the Scarboro neighborhood in Oak Ridge. Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education, these students made history by entering all-white classrooms.
On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that separating children in public schools based on race was unconstitutional.
In a second opinion issued on May 31, 1955, the Supreme Court decreed that schools should be desegregated “with all deliberate speed.”
Read the full story
The Georgia Public Service Commission could decide a high-profile case this week that pits long-time property owners against a railroad looking to seize land for a new rail spur.
The Sandersville Railroad, a Class III short-line railroad, petitioned the PSC to condemn land for a 4.5-mile-long spur. Regardless of how the PSC rules, its decision will likely be appealed to Fulton County Superior Court and beyond, possibly even to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Read the full story
Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose wants the Legislature to allow him to require proof of citizenship on voter registration forms following a U.S. Supreme Court decision.
Both state and federal laws already make it illegal for noncitizens to vote to vote in federal and state elections.
Read the full story
At least nine states will have pro-abortion constitutional amendment proposals on ballots in November, during a presidential election with high voter turnout, with some states facing lawsuits from conservatives and pro-life groups.
Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade and sent the question of abortion legalization back to the states, some states are facing ballot measures over whether to ensure that abortion is codified in state constitutions.
Read the full story
Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti applauded the U.S. Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling on Friday to block the U.S. Department of Education’s (DOE) Title IX rule from taking effect.
The DOE’s final rule, blocked from being implemented by the nation’s highest court, would have rewritten Title IX to encompass gender identity and sexual orientation.
Read the full story
Wading into the confusing abyss of administrative law, on June 28 the U.S. Supreme Court, by a 6-3 vote, overruled the much-criticized 1984 decision in Chevron, restoring the bedrock principle — commanded by both Article III of the Constitution and Section 706 the 1946 Administrative Procedure Act — that it is the province of courts, not administrative agency bureaucrats, to interpret federal laws. This may sound like an easy ruling, but the issue had long bedeviled the Supreme Court. Even Justice Antonin Scalia, an administrative law expert, supported Chevron prior to his death in 2016. In Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, Chief Justice John Roberts sure-footedly dispatched Chevron.
If, as I wrote for The American Conservative in 2021, “Taming the administrative state is the issue of our time,” why did the Supreme Court unanimously (albeit with a bare six-member quorum) decide in Chevron to defer to administrative agencies interpretations of ambiguous statutes, and why did conservatives — at least initially — support the decision? In a word, politics. In 1984, the President in charge of the executive branch was Ronald Reagan, and the D.C. Circuit — where most administrative law cases are decided — was (and had been for decades) controlled by liberal activist judges. President Reagan’s deputy solicitor general, Paul Bator, argued the Chevron case, successfully urging the Court to overturn a D.C. Circuit decision (written by then-Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg) that had invalidated EPA regulations interpreting the Clean Air Act. Thus, in the beginning, “Chevron deference” meant deferring to Reagan’s agency heads and their de-regulatory agenda.
Read the full story
Mark Meadows, former chief of staff in the Trump White House, asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday to toss out the 2020 election interference case against him.
Read the full story
After losing an appeal in May, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA) has decided it will not take its case on the “open fields” doctrine to the Tennessee Supreme Court.
The case began when Terry Rainwaters and Hunter Hollingsworth found hidden cameras on their property, placed there by TWRA, according to the Institute of Justice, which took on the case.
Read the full story
Christy Kelly, reporter at The Arizona Sun Times, said the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling on Monday in Trump v. United States that former President Donald Trump is immune from federal prosecution for official acts he took while in office may have a major impact on the former president’s conviction in the Stormy Daniels hush money case.
Read the full story
Christy Kelly, reporter at The Arizona Sun Times, said the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling on Monday in Trump v. United States that former President Donald Trump is immune from federal prosecution for official acts he took while in office is certain to affect current and past litigation surrounding the former president.
However, the nation’s highest court also ruled that there is no immunity for unofficial acts.
Read the full story
President Joe Biden Monday night said the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling that the president has “absolute immunity” when acting in his core constitutional duties is “a dangerous precedent” that “undermines the rule of law of this nation.”
Earlier in the day, the Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision ruled that the “president’s exercise of his core constitutional powers, this immunity must be absolute. As for his remaining official actions, he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity.”
Read the full story
Members of the Tennessee congressional delegation reacted to the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling on Monday in Trump v. United States that former President Donald Trump is immune from federal prosecution for official acts he took while in office.
Read the full story
America First Legal (AFL) filed an amicus brief Wednesday on behalf of Georgia U.S. Representative Barry Loudermilk (R-GA-11), who chairs the House Administration Subcommittee on Oversight, in support of Stephen K. Bannon’s emergency stay application to the U.S. Supreme Court seeking his continued release pending further appeal of his convictions.
Bannon, former chief of staff to former President Donald Trump and host of the popular show War Room, was sentenced to four months imprisonment for a 2022 conviction on contempt of Congress charges for ignoring a subpoena from the January 6 Select Committee.
Read the full story
U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) joined many elected officials and conservative leaders who expressed disappointment with the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Murthy v. Missouri on Wednesday.
The Republican attorneys general of Missouri and Louisiana and five individual plaintiffs brought this court case.
Read the full story
The editor-in-chief and publisher of The Tennessee Star was ordered to appear in court last week and threatened with charges of contempt after his newspaper reported on an anonymously leaked collection of documents authored by Nashville mass shooter Audrey Elizabeth Hale. Michael Patrick Leahy was joined by his attorneys in court on Monday for a “show-cause hearing,” where the journalist was asked by Chancery Court Judge I’Ashea Myles to demonstrate why his outlet’s reporting does not subject him to contempt proceedings and sanctions.
On March 27, 2023, Hale (born Audrey Elizabeth Hale) entered the Covenant School armed with three semiautomatic guns and murdered six people, including three 9-year-old children. Hale, who was eventually shot and killed by police in the school, was a transgender man and former student at Covenant who harbored extremist sentiments on race, gender, and politics. The massacre remains the deadliest mass shooting in Tennessee history.
Read the full story
Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti joined Tuesday’s episode of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show for an exclusive interview where he discussed the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to hear arguments and rule on whether Tennessee’s law that bans “gender-affirming care” on minors violates the Constitution.
Read the full story
Michael Patrick Leahy, Editor-in-Chief and CEO of The Tennessee Star, reacted to Monday’s announcement by the U.S. Supreme Court that it would hear arguments and rule on whether a Tennessee law that bans “gender-affirming care” on minors violates the Constitution.
Read the full story
The U.S. Supreme Court announced it will hear arguments and rule on whether a Tennessee law that bans “gender-affirming care” on minors – including puberty blockers, hormone therapy, and sex-change surgeries – violates the Constitution.
Read the full story
Several election lawsuits filed recently with significant impact on the 2024 presidential election have been decided in favor of election integrity proponents, ensuring laws remain enforced ahead of the November election.
The lawsuits filed focused on candidate eligibility, different changes in law, and alleged violations of election laws. Most of them have resulted in wins for election integrity, while two are ongoing.
Read the full story
The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday upheld a law established by Congress requiring the deportation of foreign nationals who illegally enter the country.
The court ruled on three consolidated cases in Campos-Chaves v Garland that were on appeal in the Fifth and Ninth circuits, where the appellate courts issued conflicting rulings.
Read the full story
President Joe Biden’s new student loan forgiveness plan has legal experts divided, with some citing similar problems to his previous plan struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Biden administration’s Saving on a Valuable Education Plan is an income-based student loan repayment plan that provides full loan forgiveness in certain cases.
Read the full story
The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal from a former New Mexico county commissioner who was removed from office by a state court for his role in the January 6 protest. This left in place a lower court’s decision to remove and bar Otero County Commissioner Couy Griffin, founder of Cowboys for Trump, from office for “aid[ing] the insurrection even though he did not personally engage in violence.” Griffin was convicted of a misdemeanor for trespassing on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol. Griffin never entered the Capitol building.
His attorney Peter Ticktin stated in court filings submitting to the Supreme Court, “If the decision … is to stand, at least in New Mexico, it is now the crime of insurrection to gather people to pray together for the United States of America on the unmarked restricted grounds of the Capitol building.” He argued that Griffin was “fundamentally exercising his Constitutional rights to free speech and assembly.”
Read the full story
Republican U.S. senators introduced a bill that would ban student loan forgiveness for protestors convicted of a crime while protesting on U.S. college campuses.
The No Bailouts for Campus Criminals Act was filed by U.S. Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., with multiple cosponsors. The bill would prevent any college or university student who is convicted of any offense under federal or state law while protesting at a higher education institution from having their federal student loans forgiven, cancelled, waived or modified.
Read the full story
The Arizona Republican Party (AZGOP) submitted a joint Amicus Curiae brief on Thursday with the Georgia Republican Party and the Republican State Committee of Delaware supporting Kari Lake’s and Mark Finchem’s Petition for Certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court. The pair are appealing the lower courts’ decisions against their lawsuit challenging the use of electronic voting machine tabulators in elections. Under the new leadership of AZGOP Chair Gina Swoboda, who has a lengthy history in election integrity work including heading the Voter Reference Foundation, the AZGOP is heavily focused on election integrity.
Authored by attorney William J. Olson, the brief argues that the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals erred by dismissing the case claiming Lake and Finchem lacked standing. The court affirmed the trial court’s granting of the defendants’ motion to dismiss, asserting that the pair lacked standing because “speculative allegations that voting machines may be hackable are insufficient to establish an injury in fact under Article III.” The complaint emphasized that the lower courts “conflated standing with merits, twisting the standing rules to require much more — that the complaint prove facts sufficient to grant relief.”
Read the full story
Kari Lake and Mark Finchem filed a Supplemental Brief with the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday, adding support for their Petition for Writ of Certiorari and Motion to Expedite asking the court to hear an appeal of the dismissal of their lawsuit to stop the use of electronic voting machine tabulators in elections. The defendant Arizona officials failed to file a response to the pair’s petition, boosting the chances SCOTUS might accept the case and implying they did not object to the statements in the petition.
The new brief added more allegations of false representations by Maricopa County officials. It said the courts relied on their false representations when they dismissed and affirmed their case, sanctioning the pair’s lawyers. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that the plaintiffs’ injuries were “too speculative” for Article III, which requires showing of an injury. The brief said the court based this determination “in part on false representations that Maricopa County performed required preelection logic and accuracy (‘L&A’) testing and used certified and approved voting system software.” The court “expressly relied on false representations that Maricopa’s elections were protected from manipulation.”
Read the full story
A Georgia Public Service Commission hearing officer has ruled a railroad can take private land from several Sparta property owners, saying its proposed rail spur “serves a legitimate public purpose.”
The Sandersville Railroad, a Class III short line railroad that has served the area since 1893, petitioned the PSC on March 8, 2023, to condemn land for a proposed 4.5-mile-long spur. The railroad subsequently moved to condemn additional land.
Read the full story
Former President Donald Trump called for special counsel Jack Smith to be sanctioned or censured for “attacking” the judge in Trump’s classified documents case.
Trump’s comments on Thursday come after Smith and his team of prosecutors made it clear they think Judge Aileen Cannon’s latest ruling was based on “an unstated and fundamentally flawed legal premise.” Prosecutors objected to Cannon’s order to produce proposed jury instructions under two different legal scenarios. Smith said both legal scenarios were flawed.
Read the full story
When you watch a political ad, often you’ll see a disclaimer of who the ad was paid for by, usually a political action committee, but what about the donors to the committee? Or the donor’s donors?
That’s the bridge that a San Francisco campaign finance law seeks to cross — now being challenged at the U.S. Supreme Court in No on E v. Chiu — and to prohibit an incredibly common practice in campaign finance, which are donations from anonymous sources.
Read the full story
Donald Trump filed his brief Tuesday at the U.S. Supreme Court to defend his argument that presidents are immune from criminal prosecution. Noting the lack of historical precedent and dire ramifications for the future, Trump’s attorneys warned that “a denial of criminal immunity would incapacitate every future President with de facto blackmail and extortion while in office, and condemn him to years of post-office trauma at the hands of political opponents.”
Oral arguments on the groundbreaking question are set for April 25; a final opinion, which could be announced in late May or sometime in June before the current SCOTUS term ends, represents a do-or-die situation for Special Counsel Jack Smith’s four-count indictment against the former president for the events of January 6 and his alleged attempts to “overturn” the 2020 election. The case is now on hold awaiting a decision by SCOTUS.
Read the full story
School districts around the country are facing issues with how they handle their social media accounts, and the debate has reached the U.S. Supreme Court.
Denver Public Schools recently reviewed its social media policy that doesn’t allow employees to restrict comments on social media or limit who can see them.
Read the full story
Kari Lake and Mark Finchem filed a Petition for Certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday, appealing the dismissal of their lawsuit against Arizona officials to stop the use of electronic voting machine tabulators. The 210-page petition added new allegations stating that the defendants lied to the court and that new evidence had surfaced exposing the vulnerabilities of the machines to bad actors.
“New evidence from other litigation and public-record requests shows defendants made false statements to the district court regarding the safeguards allegedly followed to ensure the accuracy of the vote, on which the district court relied,” the petition asserted.
Read the full story
by Noah Slayter An organization that operates pro-life pregnancy centers in New Jersey asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a case involving what the centers’ petition calls an “improper” and “unlawful” subpoena by state Attorney General Matthew Platkin. Alliance Defending Freedom, a Christian legal firm known as ADF, filed a petition with the high court Feb. 26 on behalf of First Choice Women’s Resource Centers, asking it to force a lower court to hear the case. A federal district court judge dismissed the pregnancy resource organization’s case Feb. 15, citing “lack of jurisdiction.” In December, Platkin, a Democrat, subpoenaed First Choice Women’s Resource Centers, which operates five pregnancy centers by that name in the state, over what he called potential violations of the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act. “With zero justification, the attorney general is unlawfully targeting and harassing First Choice, simply because the resources it provides help women in need continue their pregnancies rather than abort their unborn children,” ADF legal counsel Tim Garrison said Friday in a written statement to The Daily Signal. The District Court incorrectly denied First Choice’s right “to address their claims in federal court,” Garrison said, “and should not affirm AG Platkin’s abuse of power after he initiated an illegitimate and harassing…
Read the full story
Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti joined in filing an amicus brief with 21 other state attorneys general in a case being considered by the U.S. Supreme Court that could decide the fate of a popular abortion pill.
“This case is about protecting the authority of the people of Tennessee to govern themselves,” Skrmetti stated, according to the attorney general’s website. “In our system, major policy decisions are made by the people through their elected representatives and decisions about abortion law are made by state governments. The U.S. Constitution prevents federal bureaucrats from undermining Tennessee’s Human Life Protection Act no matter how much they disagree with it.”
Read the full story
In their latest attack on the integrity of the U.S. Supreme Court, House Democrats are urging Justice Clarence Thomas to recuse himself from a case involving former President Donald Trump’s eligibility to appear on Colorado’s Republican primary ballot.
Their reasoning is simple, but dangerously misguided: Because Thomas’ wife, Ginni, has expressed opinions about Trump and the 2020 election, he should be barred from adjudicating any case involving Trump and elections.
Read the full story
The Oregon Supreme Court declined Friday to hear a bid to remove former President Donald Trump from the 2024 ballot, saying it wanted to wait for the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on the matter.
The bid was filed by Free Speech For People, a liberal advocacy group late last year.
Read the full story
U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts is urging the cautious use of artificial intelligence, and he predicts it will “significantly” impact the legal field.
Read the full story
The Colorado Republican Party is appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court in a case where the state Supreme Court ruled to remove Donald Trump from the 2024 Republican presidential primary ballot.
The appeal automatically places the former president on the March 5, 2024, primary ballot when certification takes place on Jan. 5, 2024, due to a stipulation in the Colorado Supreme Court ruling, according to a news release from Democratic Secretary of State Jena Griswold. However, if the U.S. Supreme Court declines to hear the case or if it affirms the Colorado Supreme Court, Trump would not appear on the ballot.
Read the full story
The Colorado Supreme Court, acting as supplicants for the enemies of Donald Trump seeking the most extreme remedy for driving the former president into the ditch, may have just unwittingly gifted the former president a Rocky Mountain high – in the polls.
This time, four left-wing Colorado justices attempting to kneecap Trump were not even going to wait on due process – the very foundation of law – to effectively declare Trump guilty of insurrection, a crime for which he has not, repeat not, even been charged. After believing their attempts to wipe Trump off the ballot would be a knockout punch, it is the left that is about to get walloped to the canvas with a right hook.
Read the full story
A Minnesota woman who was fired for refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccine and then denied unemployment benefits has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear her case, arguing that her First Amendment rights were violated.
“Religious belief is intimate and differs substantially among Americans. The promise of religious liberty in the First Amendment is that such differences may persist without punishment from the state. That promise is being broken in Minnesota,” James Dickey, senior counsel for the Upper Midwest Law Center, said in a petition filed with the court Monday.
Read the full story
U.S. Senator JD Vance (R-OH) introduced a bill to ensure colleges and universities comply with the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on affirmative action in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard.
In June, SCOTUS determined that affirmative action violates the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, overruling a 2003 opinion that race could be a determining factor in the college admissions process.
Read the full story
In the first half of 2023, roughly 32,000 babies were born in states that implemented abortion restrictions after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last June, a 2.3% increase, according to a new analysis.
In the first six months of 2023, “births rose by an average of 2.3 percent in states enforcing total abortion bans,” leading to an estimated 32,000 births that might have otherwise been aborted, according to a new analysis published by the IZA Institute of Labor Economics initiated by the Deutsche Post Foundation.
Read the full story
A group of 20 attorneys general want the U.S. Supreme Court to overrule a lower court’s restrictions on local governments enforcing homeless camping bans.
In their petition regarding Johnson v. City of Grants Pass, the attorneys general wrote that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals was wrong to prohibit state and local governments from enforcing laws that bar public spaces from being used as homeless encampments.
Read the full story
While Democrats routinely accuse election integrity advocates of disenfranchising voters, leftist lawfare practitioners in the battleground Badger State could disenfranchise more than a million voters, according to state Senator Duey Stroebel.
The Saukville Republican calls it a “preposterous attack on democracy.”
Read the full story
The groups that helped buy liberal Justice Janet Protasiewicz her seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court are on the attack as talk of impeaching the newly elected jurist heats up.
It’s the latest fight in a pitched battleground state battle over judicial bias, recusal and the “will of the people.”
Read the full story
U.S. Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN) signed a letter urging the Biden administration’s Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to pause the effective date of the Dodd-Frank Section 1071 small business data collection rule.
The rule would compel banks to gather private information on small business owners who apply for loans.
Read the full story