Aerospace & Defense

Expert Analysis

• Federal AI Panel Report May Help Guide New Export Controls

  

  The National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence’s recommendations on the use of export controls to bolster the United States’ commercial and military position illustrates that blunt controls on artificial intelligence as a category of emerging technologies are not practical, says Hdeel Abdelhady at MassPoint.

• Nissan Ex-CEO Illustrates Do's And Don'ts Of Image Repair

  

  Lawyers can draw a number of useful lessons about reputation management from the efforts of former Nissan executive Carlos Ghosn — who recently escaped house arrest in Tokyo — to restore his sullied reputation, says Elizabeth Ortega at ECO Strategic Communications.

• Reining In Runaway Loss Calculations For Procurement Fraud

  

  In criminal prosecutions of procurement fraud cases involving set-aside contracts, prosecutors frequently argue that the victim’s loss is the total face value of the wrongfully awarded contracts, but this reasoning cannot survive basic scrutiny, say David Chaiken and Tiffany Bracewell at Troutman Sanders.

• How OFCCP's Systemic Discrimination Audit Proposal Is Flawed

  

  The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs' recently proposed new rule, laying out statistical thresholds for finding systemic discrimination, would implement a problematic method of statistical analysis and notice provisions that may provide government contractors inadequate time to respond, say Chris Wilkinson and Necia Hobbes at Orrick.

• DOJ's Trade Security Reporting Policy Boosts Transparency

  

  Recent guidance from the U.S. Department of Justice's National Security Division on the voluntary self-disclosure part of its sanctions and export controls enforcement program continues the DOJ’s movement toward increased transparency, but leaves unanswered questions about how the policy will be applied in practice, say attorneys at Paul Hastings.

• Iran Airspace Bans May Lead To EU Passenger Claims

  

  After the recent killing of Qasem Soleimani and the downing of Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752, the commercial aviation sector must consider how resulting restrictions on air travel may affect passenger compensation claims under European Union rules, says James Jordan of Holman Fenwick.

• Key Trends In Energy Antitrust Enforcement And Litigation

  

  Antitrust agencies and private litigants continued to focus on the energy industry in 2019, and new antitrust policy initiatives announced by the U.S. Department of Justice last year will offer energy companies opportunities to avoid prosecution in certain cases, say attorneys at Vinson & Elkins.

• Bid Protest Spotlight: 2019's Most Noteworthy Decisions

  

  In this month's bid protest roundup, Victoria Angle at MoFo highlights two December decisions from the U.S. Government Accountability Office, looks back at five of the most interesting bid protests of 2019 and provides a few takeaways from the GAO's fiscal year 2019 report.

• Managing Money Laundering Risk In The Art Trade

  

  The Office of Foreign Assets Control's recent declaration that a Lebanese art dealer's gallery was used to conceal Hezbollah financing is a reminder to the art community of the need for strict compliance with U.S. criminal anti-money laundering laws, say Nicole Horowitz and Brendan Hanifin of Ropes & Gray.

• How Associate Life Has Evolved Over The Past Decade

  

  During the last 10 years, the need to embrace change was fundamental for law firms, and that change affected associates in many ways — most, but not all, for the better, says Brad Kaufman, co-president of Greenberg Traurig.

• What's Changed And What's The Same In Final CFIUS Rules

  

  The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s final rules implementing the Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act complete the revamp of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, which will be more complex and better resourced to address evolving national security risks that arise in the context of foreign investments, say attorneys at Akin Gump.

• Gov't Contractor Suspension And Debarment: 2019 In Review

  

  Attorneys at Covington look back at last year's policy trends and developments, legislative and rulemaking activity, and notable federal district court rulings related to the exclusion of contractors from doing business with the federal government.

• OFAC's New Iran Sanctions May Not Signal Seismic Change

  

  While President Donald Trump’s recent executive order expands the ability of the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control to sanction non-U.S. entities doing business with Iran, it remains to be seen whether OFAC will pursue aggressive enforcement of its strengthened secondary sanctions authority, say attorneys at Ropes & Gray.

• Series

  Judging A Book: Dyk Reviews 'Democracy And Equality'

  

  In their new book "Democracy and Equality: The Enduring Constitutional Vision of the Warren Court," Geoffrey Stone and David Strauss provide valuable context for U.S. Supreme Court decisions under Chief Justice Earl Warren that have profoundly affected the country, but their overly protective attitude sometimes obscures reality, says Federal Circuit Judge Timothy Dyk.

• What Employers Still Don't Get About Benefits For Veterans

  

  Although the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act recently turned 25, employers remain relatively unfamiliar with its requirements, potentially exposing them to litigation and reputational harm, say Jason Ranjo at Morgan Lewis and Kurt Perhach at Novartis.