Judge Seems Unswayed By Fears SEC Seeks 'Enemies List'

By P.J. D'Annunzio

A Pennsylvania federal judge on Thursday appeared reluctant to block the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's subpoena seeking information about voting advice that proxy adviser Institutional Shareholder Services gives to institutional investors despite ISS' concerns about political retaliation.

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House Bill Would Increase Oversight Of Antitrust Settlements

By Matthew Perlman

Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., introduced proposed legislation Thursday that would increase court scrutiny of antitrust settlements reached by federal enforcers, with the lawmaker saying more oversight is needed after the White House's involvement in recent cases.

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Ex-ComEd CEO, Lobbyist Signal Plea Deal Over Retrial

By Celeste Bott

Attorneys for Commonwealth Edison's former CEO and a longtime lobbyist told an Illinois federal judge on Thursday that they are in talks with the government about plea deals rather than an anticipated retrial next year on charges that they conspired to win former Illinois Speaker Michael Madigan's legislative favor in exchange for do-nothing jobs for his allies.

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DOJ Boosts Alaska Election Suit As State Asks For Dismissal

By Hailey Konnath

The U.S. Department of Justice Thursday filed an amended, more detailed version of its lawsuit over the two Dan Sullivans running in Alaska's Senate race, prompting the state to urge the federal court to throw it out, arguing that the new complaint "has no more legal basis than the original one."

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Warren Calls For BofA Criminal Probe After $1.2B AML Fine

By Craig Clough

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, called for a federal criminal probe Thursday into Bank of America after the U.S. Treasury Department fined the institution $1.2 billion this month over alleged anti-money laundering failures.

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CFPB Faces 2nd Suit Over Bid To 'Erase' Fair Lending Rules

By Jon Hill

One of the nation's oldest civil rights groups Thursday sued to overturn the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's recent rollback of longstanding federal protections against lending discrimination, widening the ongoing legal battle against the controversial rule change.

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Fugitive Former Conn. Official Must Pay Capital One $25K

By Aaron Keller

A onetime Connecticut budget official who fled to Greece as sentencing neared in one federal public corruption case and a trial loomed in another must pay more than $25,000 to cover the balance of a Capital One personal loan, a state judge has ruled.

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Trump Admin Appeals Block Of DC Golf Course Work

By Jared Foretek

The Trump administration is appealing a D.C. federal judge's order that stopped further tree removals at East Potomac Golf Course and required advance notice before irreparable changes are made to the facility.

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'We're Going To Get Sued': LA Revives Ban On Oil, Gas Wells

By Craig Clough

The Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday passed an ordinance banning all new oil and gas drilling within city limits and phasing out existing wells within 20 years, with one councilmember commenting that the city expects to get sued by members of the industry over the vote. 

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Navy Beats Clean Water Act Suit Over Fuel Discharges

By Madeline Lyskawa

A Hawaii federal judge ruled in favor of the U.S. Navy over an environmental group's claims it violated the Clean Water Act by discharging fuel into Pearl Harbor, saying there's no reasonable likelihood that the Navy will continue to do so.

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Courts Can't Nix Calif. Waiver Moves, EPA Tells DC Circ.

By Keith Goldberg

The Trump administration has urged the D.C. Circuit to restore the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's move to make Clean Air Act waivers for California subject to potential rescission by lawmakers, saying a lower court wrongly intruded on Congressional authority in blocking the effort.

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Judge Rejects Extra Hurdle For Medicaid Frailty Exemption

By Chris Villani

A Trump administration bid to create additional barriers to Medicaid eligibility was rejected Thursday by a Massachusetts federal judge, who ruled that Congress did not delegate to the executive branch the task of deciding who is too medically frail to meet work requirements.

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Colo. Justices Won't Review Hospital's Injunction Compliance

By Rachel Konieczny

The Colorado Supreme Court declined Thursday to take up transgender youth patients' challenge to a Denver judge's ruling that discharged their contempt citation against Children's Hospital Colorado for not resuming providing medical gender-affirming care to transgender adolescents.

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US Tells Justices FedEx Can't Appeal Interested Party Order

By Elliot Weld

The U.S. government has urged the U.S. Supreme Court to ignore a petition from FedEx Corp. seeking review of whether Qualcomm Inc. complied with real-party-in-interest requirements when it challenged FedEx patents, saying the Federal Circuit got it right by declining to hear the case.

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Squires Grants 4 Patent Review Bids In Latest Bulk Order

By Adam Lidgett

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director John Squires has greenlighted four new petitions seeking review of patents in his latest round of decisions, while turning down one on discretionary grounds.

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NY Judge Temporarily Pauses NYC's Chinatown Jail Project

By Isaac Monterose

A New York state judge has placed a temporary pause on the construction of a jail in New York City's Chinatown neighborhood, siding with a group of New Yorkers who sued the city and a Tutor Perini Corp. joint venture over the noise allegedly caused by the project.

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9th Circ. Ruling Dooms Sports Betting Suit, Washington Says

By Tom Lotshaw

Prediction market operator Underdog's contention that its sports-based event contracts are not subject to Washington state gambling laws is doomed under a recent Ninth Circuit ruling holding otherwise, the Evergreen State told a Washington federal judge.

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Utah Hits Kalshi With Criminal Charges Over Sports Offerings

By Ganesh Setty

Utah has brought criminal charges in state court against Kalshi and its co-founders under its anti-gambling laws, amid an ongoing jurisdictional battle over whether federal law preempts state and tribal regulation of the prediction market platform's sports event contracts.

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1st Circ. Seeks Mass. Justices' Input On USAA Rate Row

By Gianna Ferrarin

The First Circuit asked Massachusetts' highest court to weigh in on a suit by service members alleging USAA improperly considered their military pay grade when issuing auto insurance policies, finding the dispute implicates questions of state law.

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Mich. Judge Mulls Detroit Sign Rules Ahead Of Election

By Melanie Dorsey

A Michigan federal judge questioned Detroit's permitting requirements for political signs Thursday as she considered whether to let a congressional write-in candidate display dozens of campaign signs outside businesses ahead of Tuesday's election.

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9th Circ. Drops Speech Holding In Seattle Gig Worker Ruling

By Benjamin Morse

The Ninth Circuit on Thursday withdrew its earlier finding that Seattle's protections for app-based delivery workers don't regulate speech, replacing it with a narrower ruling that assumes the law involves speech but still passes First Amendment scrutiny.

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EEOC Eliminates Long-Standing Criminal History Guidance

By Vin Gurrieri

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has revoked Obama-era guidance that outlined employers' legal obligations in their use of workers' arrest and conviction records to make employment decisions, the agency announced Thursday.

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Pa. Court OKs Unemployment Comp Despite Off-Duty Lie

By Matthew Santoni

A Pennsylvania nurse didn't commit "willful misconduct" by refusing to answer questions about a coworker visiting her while he was on duty and she was off duty, so the nurse remained eligible to collect unemployment benefits after she was fired, a state appellate court ruled Wednesday.

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DOL Finalizes Pharmacy Benefit Manager Fee Disclosure Rule

By Kellie Mejdrich

The U.S. Department of Labor's employee benefits arm unveiled a final rule Thursday that requires pharmacy benefit managers — which act as intermediaries between drugmakers, pharmacies and insurers — to make new disclosures on their fees and compensation to employer-sponsored group health plans.

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DOJ Says Immigration Judge Isn't Shielded From Removal

By Elaine Briseño

The U.S. Department of Justice told a Massachusetts federal judge that an ex-immigration judge who claims he was fired for his political ideology and advocacy work was an at-will employee who cannot show his firing was discriminatory.

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NLRB Urges 7th Circ. To Ponder Injunction Harm Burden

By Braden Campbell

The National Labor Relations Board urged the full Seventh Circuit to rethink a ruling that raised the bar for the agency to win injunctions, saying the panel's merits conclusions and its take on what constitutes irreparable harm to workers' labor rights conflict with U.S. Supreme Court precedent.

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Uber, Amazon, Instacart Fight NYC Courier Deactivation Law

By Linda Chiem

Uber, Amazon and Instacart have accused New York City of overstepping by enacting a law prohibiting them from "deactivating" delivery couriers without formal notice and investigation, claiming in a new federal lawsuit that the regulation unconstitutionally interferes with their contractual rights.

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NJ Panel Says State Shields Military Leave Past Federal Cap

By MJ Koo

A New Jersey state appeals court on Thursday upheld a decision giving an Atlantic City police officer his job back after the city fired him for staying on military leave for more than five years, saying a federal five-year limit is a minimum, not a maximum.

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Union Sues IRS Over Termination Of Workers' Contract

By Katherine Smith

The Internal Revenue Service violated federal law by terminating its collective bargaining agreement with a union representing the agency's employees in light of a 2025 executive order from President Donald Trump, the union has claimed in a lawsuit filed in Massachusetts federal court.

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Meta Faces Senate Inquiry Over AI Glasses Privacy Risks

By Lauren Berg

Two Democratic senators on Thursday launched an investigation into allegations that Meta Platforms' "smart" glasses capture sensitive images of users and bystanders without their consent and use the data to train the tech giant's artificial intelligence models.

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5th Circ. Will Review Texas Content-Filtering Law Ruling

By Aneeta Mathur-Ashton

The Fifth Circuit has granted Texas' request for an en banc rehearing of a July panel opinion that partly upheld a block on the state's new law requiring companies to filter content for underage users.

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NJ Justices Uphold Atty's Privacy Expectation In Email Advice

By George Woolston

The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled Thursday in a split decision that the name of the attorney who emailed legal advice to a municipal prosecutor in a traffic dispute should not be disclosed under the state's public records law, finding the sender's reasonable expectation of privacy outweighs any interest in disclosure.

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NY Bars AI Chatbots From Using Emotional Tactics With Kids

By Dorothy Atkins

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed a law Wednesday that creates a regulatory framework restricting artificial intelligence chatbots' emotional interactions with minors, spurring swift pushback from business groups, which criticized the legislation for allegedly being unconstitutionally vague and overly broad.

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Pa. Can Enforce E-Cigarette Law Amid Vape Cos. Appeal

By Jonathan Capriel

There will be no pause on a Pennsylvania law that makes it illegal to sell most vape products, a federal judge said, rejecting a vape industry bid seeking a brief reprieve while an appeal seeking to upend the statute heads to the Third Circuit.

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EMT Immunity Doesn't Cover Driving, Wash. Justices Say

By Ben Adlin

Emergency medical technicians' qualified immunity from negligence claims in Washington does not extend to driving ambulances, a divided state Supreme Court held Thursday, ruling that the transportation of patients falls outside EMTs' statutory immunity for rendering emergency services.

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Groups Drop Suit Over Trump's DEI Mandate For Contractors

By Grace Elletson

A coalition of organizations ended their challenge of an executive order from President Donald Trump that requires government contractors to disavow "racially discriminatory DEI activities," stating that while they lost their bid to freeze the order, they gained crucial clarity from the court about the directive's scope.

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GEO Says Colo. Health Inspection Law Suit Should Survive

By Nadia Dreid

The federal contractor that runs an immigration detention center near Denver is coming out swinging against Colorado's attempt to kill its suit challenging a state law requiring extra inspections, saying its claims cannot be considered premature just because the state has not enforced the law yet.

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Canada, UAE Sign Economic Partnership Agreement

By Jack McLoone

Canada and the United Arab Emirates have reached an agreement on a trade deal that is expected to double bilateral trade between the countries, up to CA$7 billion ($5 billion) annually, the Canadian government said, lauding the agreement as being reached in "record time."

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EU Head Affirms Ties With Canada As Member Talks Open

By Jack McLoone

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Thursday reaffirmed the European Union's commitment to strengthening its ties with Canada at the opening of a summit to consider whether to adopt Canada as the EU's first-ever associate member.

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China Slams US Ban On 3 Biotech Cos. Over Forced Labor

By Dylan Moroses

The Chinese government Thursday condemned the U.S.' recent addition of three new entities in the biotechnology sector to its blacklist of companies from which goods are banned from entering the U.S. due to their presumed use of forced labor.

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Brief

EU Pushes China For More Fair Trade Commitments

By Jack McLoone

The European Parliament's Committee on International Trade spent a three-day trip to China pushing for an expansion of a trade framework beyond a recently reached mutual understanding on hybrid vehicles, among other concerns, the committee said Thursday.

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Brief

US Signs Key Sector Memorandums With Hungary, Finland

By Dylan Moroses

Secretary of State Marco Rubio signed memorandums with Finnish and Hungarian officials Thursday indicating that the U.S. will work together with those trading partners on key minerals, technology and energy policy matters.

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FCC Agrees To Rules Targeting Some Foreign Test Labs

By Christopher Cole

The Federal Communications Commission voted Thursday to block recognition of equipment testing labs in countries that do not similarly recognize U.S.-based labs.

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Gov't Urges 11th Circ. To Lift Sanctions Over Trump-IRS Deal

By Asha Glover

A federal judge's order barring President Donald Trump, the IRS and the U.S. Treasury Department from citing the agreement made to settle his $10 billion suit against the tax agency is unsupportable and should be reversed, the government told the Eleventh Circuit.

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Tax Consultancy Asks 5th Circ. To Kill Microcaptive Rule

By Kevin Pinner

The IRS never published data showing that microcaptive transactions pose a potential for tax avoidance to justify a rule making companies and advisers report them as "transactions of interest," a tax consultancy seeking the rule's demise told the Fifth Circuit.

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Treasury Asked To Narrow Crackdown On Fund Strategies

By Kat Lucero

The U.S. Treasury Department should develop targeted rules distinguishing abusive transactions from long-standing investment management practices in new enforcement that scrutinizes novel strategies exploiting the tax benefits of certain investment vehicles and financial products, firms and organizations told the department.

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Split 4th Circ. Stays Man's Removal Over Competency Issue

By Ganesh Setty

The Fourth Circuit has extended a stay preventing the removal of a self-represented noncitizen detainee who said his "mental condition" prevented him from fully arguing his case to an immigration judge, finding that the full administrative record is needed.

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7th Circ. Probes Trump's Challenge Of Ill. Sanctuary Laws

By Celeste Bott

The Seventh Circuit pressed the Trump administration Thursday to address how refusal by Illinois and other sanctuary jurisdictions to help federal officers take custody of immigrants leaving state jails amounts to unlawful interference with federal immigration law, while also expressing skepticism that such cooperation amounts to unconstitutional commandeering of local law enforcement resources.

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Admin Ordered To Identify States Hit With Voter Roll Demands

By Jared Foretek

A D.C. federal judge ordered the Trump administration to quickly turn over a list of states from which it has demanded immigration-related voter roll changes to Democratic campaign officials and congressional leaders Thursday, saying the list could make or break the Democrats' bid for an injunction to halt the demands.

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Panel Says Municipalities Can't Be Sued Under Colo. FCA Law

By Zach Dupont

In a matter of first impression, the Colorado Court of Appeals Thursday found that a municipality can't be held liable under the Colorado False Claims Act because a municipality isn't a "person" under the statute.

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Archaeologists Win Bid To Halt Transfer Of Native Artifacts

By Joyce Hanson

A Wyoming federal judge has for now blocked the U.S. Department of the Interior from moving six archaeological collections of Indigenous artifacts in Wyoming and Colorado out of the government's control, saying irreparable harm will result if the agency action moves forward.

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Gov't Urges Court To Dismiss $50B Ligado Takings Case

By Madeline Lyskawa

The federal government has urged the U.S. Court of Federal Claims to dismiss Ligado's attempt to secure $50 billion over claims the Pentagon prevented the company from using valuable spectrum rights it bought for exclusive use to build a terrestrial wireless network.

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FCC Floats $4.4M Fine For Boomerang's Alleged Lifeline Fraud

By Aneeta Mathur-Ashton

The Federal Communications Commission proposed a $4.4 million fine against Boomerang Wireless for allegedly defrauding the Lifeline program, which gives discounts on phone and internet services to qualifying low-income Americans.

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FCC Seeks To Rev Up Satellite Device Coverage

By Christopher Cole

The Federal Communications Commission advanced new rules Thursday that could open 25 megahertz of midband spectrum for new uses, including not only terrestrial wireless but potentially also direct-to-device coverage from satellites.

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What Expanded CMS Authority Means For Health Compliance

A recent delegation gives the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services independent authority to impose permissive exclusions, creating a more active federal enforcement system with heightened risks for healthcare organizations, says Jose Vela at Clark Hill.

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NHTSA Vehicle Recorder Rule Highlights Crash Data Protocols

An amended rule from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will soon require vehicle event data recorders to capture more information about crashes — but to turn that data into evidence, attorneys, claims professionals and fleet managers must properly obtain and preserve it after an incident occurs, says Andrew Haling at Pathway Law.

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Compete Act Reinforces Calif.'s Antitrust Leadership Role

California's recent passage of the Compete Act, which expands the state's principal antitrust statute's focus on concerted multifirm conduct to business dealings between two or more firms, underscores California's leadership in state antitrust enforcement as attorneys general move to fill perceived gaps left by reduced federal oversight, say attorneys at Skadden.

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West Point Prof's Suit Tests Public Employee Speech Limits

A recent complaint in New York federal court alleging that West Point unlawfully terminated a professor who challenged a directive banning references to human causes of climate change could illuminate how academic freedom and public employee speech protections apply at a military academy, say attorneys at Foley & Lardner.

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Are You Happy With Your In-House Role? Take Our Survey

Is your company giving you everything you need to succeed? What are some misconceptions about working in-house? Help Law360 Pulse answer these questions and more in this year's In-House Satisfaction Survey.

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DOJ Backs Ex-Wisconsin Judge's ICE Obstruction Conviction

By Andrea Keckley

The U.S. Department of Justice told the Seventh Circuit that the high-profile conviction of a former Wisconsin state court judge for interfering with an ICE arrest was not compromised by her position on the bench or by jury instructions.

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Roundup

Hub Hires: WilmerHale, Womble Bond, Kirkland

By Chris Villani

Falling temperatures didn't bring a cooldown in the Boston legal lateral market as WilmerHale and Robinson & Cole LLP both welcomed former assistant attorneys general, Honigman LLP established its first office in the market, and Kirkland & Ellis LLP snagged a partner from Ropes & Gray LLP.

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Consovoy McCarthy PLLC and Smith Porsborg Schweigert Armstrong Moldenhauer & Smith lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions, after the Eighth Circuit struck down the Federal Reserve's regulatory cap on the swipe fees that larger banks may collect on debit card transactions.

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Cyberattack Class Action Against Fox Rothschild Dropped

By Madison Arnold

Three data breach victims have dismissed their proposed class action against Fox Rothschild LLP after ransomware group Silent Ransom Group targeted the firm.

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Ramona Nee, Tapped To Lead Weil, Now In Talks With Kirkland

By Daniel Moritz-Rabson

Ramona Nee, the co-leader of Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP's U.S. private equity practice who had been poised to become its leader, is engaged in talks to join Kirkland & Ellis LLP, a source with knowledge of the situation told Law360 Pulse on Friday.

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Roundup

GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Michele Gorman

Meta reached a settlement during jury selection in the second Los Angeles bellwether trial over claims its Instagram platform harms the mental health of children, leaving Snap as the lone defendant facing trial. In the meantime, current and former in-house lawyers for Google and Meta said that the ability of AI to write patent applications is rapidly improving, and that in blind tests, experienced attorneys often deem AI-drafted patents to be superior to those from humans. These are some of the stories in corporate legal news you may have missed in the past week.

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Jackson Walker Inks $500K Deal In EXCO's Ch. 11 Fee Fight

By Clara Geoghegan

Jackson Walker has agreed to pay EXCO Resources Inc. $500,000 to end litigation over fees paid to the firm while one of its partners was in an undisclosed relationship with the former bankruptcy judge who mediated in the reorganized oil and gas driller's Texas Chapter 11.

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Fed. Judge A No-Show Amid Inquiry Into Her Mental Health

By Craig Clough

U.S. District Judge Ada Brown of the Northern District of Texas failed to appear Friday before a judicial investigative committee examining allegations that she abandoned her post and concerns that a mental condition may be interfering with her ability to perform her duties.

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K&L Gates DQ'd In Trust's Mortgage Loan Agreement Dispute

By Isaac Monterose

A Washington federal judge disqualified K&L Gates LLP from a trust's dispute over a residential mortgage loan sale agreement, ruling that the law firm must leave the suit because it drafted the form agreement used in the transaction.

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Cruz Counsel Returns To FCC As Space Bureau Chief

By Nadia Dreid

The Federal Communications Commission has named a former employee with experience in both the public and private sectors to head the agency's Space Bureau, after a stint as chief telecommunications counsel to the Senate Commerce Committee.

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In Case You Missed It: Hottest Firms And Stories On Law360

For those who missed out, here's a look back at the law firms, stories and expert analyses that generated the most buzz on Law360 last week.

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Kalshi Taps Clement For High Court Sports Contracts Fight

By Elaine Briseño

Kalshi has hired appellate heavyweight Paul D. Clement of Clement & Murphy PLLC to represent the company in its potential U.S. Supreme Court battle over whether the prediction markets platform's sports wagering is subject to state or federal oversight.

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