GAO Sustains Protest Of $1.9M Army Corps Contract

By Ganesh Setty

The U.S. Government Accountability Office has decided the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers erred in awarding a nearly $1.9 million contract to build an offloading platform, finding the awardee failed to address an amendment to one component's specifications.

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Trump Family Invests In $1.5B Go-Public Merger For Drone Co.

By Nate Beck

President Donald Trump's son, Eric Trump, is among a group of investors backing a $1.5 billion merger between Florida real estate company JFB Construction Holdings and Israeli drone-maker Xtend that would take the latter company public.

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Honeywell Settles $1.2M Suit Filed By Union Pension Fund

By Emily Brill

A Washington federal court closed an Employee Retirement Income Security Act case that pit Honeywell International Inc. against a union pension fund Tuesday, shortly after the conglomerate and fund told the court that they've settled the $1.2 million lawsuit for an undisclosed amount.

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Meeks Presses Rubio For Info On Venezuela Oil Money

By Madeline Lyskawa

Rep. Gregory W. Meeks, D-N.Y., demanded that Secretary of State Marco Rubio turn over documents and answer questions concerning the Trump administration's decision to place approximately $200 million in Venezuela oil revenues in an account in Qatar.

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DOD Seeks Input For Phase 2 Of FAR Overhaul

By Madeline Lyskawa

The U.S. Department of Defense is seeking input from the defense industrial base and acquisition stakeholders concerning how the next phase of the Trump administration's effort to streamline the Federal Acquisition Regulation can be used to boost the country's wartime readiness. 

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Judge Trims Moderna's Defenses In COVID Patent Suit

By Elliot Weld

A federal judge sitting in Delaware on Tuesday ruled that Moderna could not use obviousness to defend itself from patent claims brought by a rival vaccine developer since it already used that as a defense in related Patent Trial and Review Board proceedings, saying that Moderna had offered expert opinions to support a defense that the patents don't sufficiently teach about the claimed invention.

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Ex-McCarter & English Atty Adds Port Authority To Bias Case

By Jake Maher

A former McCarter & English LLP attorney suing the firm for alleged anti-veteran discrimination added the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and the agency's head to the litigation this week, claiming they retaliated against him by canceling a charity event he runs.

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CFIUS Initiative May Smooth Way For Some Foreign Investors

A new program that will allow certain foreign investors to be prevetted and admitted to fast-track approval by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States will likely have tangible benefits for investors participating in competitive M&A, say attorneys at Simpson Thacher.

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What 'Precedential' Decisions Reveal About USPTO's Direction

Significant procedural changes at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office last year have reshaped patent litigation and business strategies and created uncertainty around the USPTO's governing rules, but an accounting of the decisions the office designated as precedential and informative sheds light on the agency's new approach, say attorneys at Sterne Kessler.

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Law Professors Sue EEOC For Firm DEI Letter Records

By Craig Clough

Two professors at law schools in Michigan and Florida have sued the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in D.C. federal court, seeking documents related to 20 letters the agency sent to law firms over their purported diversity, equity and inclusion practices.

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Goldstein Tax Trial Heads To Closing Args As Defense Rests

By Jared Foretek

Jurors in SCOTUSblog founder Thomas Goldstein's tax fraud trial will hear closing arguments Wednesday, after the final two witnesses in the monthlong proceeding took the stand, and new emails regarding Goldstein's efforts to conceal poker debts came to light Tuesday.

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Flat Fee Or Contingency? Firm, Ex-Client Fight Over IP Spoils

By Ben Adlin

A 3D printing technology company has urged a Washington federal court to toss a breach of contract lawsuit brought by its former law firm, Lee & Hayes PC, arguing it agreed to a flat fee ahead of a patent settlement, while Lee & Hayes says it only waived a contingency fee because of its onetime client's "underhanded misrepresentations."

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J&J Fights Beasley Allen's Bid To Pause Talc DQ Ruling

By Emily Sawicki

A New Jersey state court lacks standing to block an appellate panel's removal of Beasley Allen from representing hundreds of women with ovarian cancer pursuing claims against Johnson & Johnson over talcum powder, the pharmaceutical company has argued in an opposition brief.

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Valve Jury Says Rothschild, Atty Broke Anti-Patent Troll Law

By Rachel Riley

Inventor Leigh Rothschild, his companies and his former attorney broke Washington state's anti-patent trolling law by making a bad faith assertion of patent infringement against video game developer Valve Corp., and Rothschild and his companies breached an intellectual property licensing deal in the process, a Seattle federal jury found on Tuesday. 

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Supreme Court Adopts Rule To Suss Out Stock Conflicts

By Katie Buehler

The U.S. Supreme Court announced Tuesday that litigants will soon be required to include companies' stock ticker symbols in court documents as part of new rules aimed at helping the justices identify potential conflicts of interest.

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Sens. Concerned About Live Nation Case After DOJ 'Ousting'

By Matthew Perlman

A group of Senate Democrats is raising concerns about potential political influence at the U.S. Department of Justice, following the abrupt departure of the agency's top antitrust enforcer weeks before Live Nation is set to face trial in the government's monopolization case.

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Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court

By Jeff Montgomery

Cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence disputes continued their slow weave into Delaware Court of Chancery and state Supreme Court dockets last week, with jurists and litigants grappling over how — or if — the courts' old-school equity jurisdiction and fiduciary duty hooks apply to new kinds of deals.

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