Public Policy

  • June 01, 2026

    EU Merger Guidelines Overhaul Leaves Door 'Slightly Open'

    Antitrust lawyers are optimistic that European Union merger reforms will be more favorable toward transactions' potential efficiencies and benefits, but they are waiting to see if that new leniency is granted in practice.

  • June 01, 2026

    Abortion Protester Denied 2nd Shot At Jury Trial In 4th Circ.

    The Fourth Circuit has decided not to rehear an appeal over whether a South Carolina abortion protestor should be given a new trial after the court previously affirmed his conviction for blocking the doors of a clinic.

  • June 01, 2026

    Florida AG Sues OpenAI, Says ChatGPT Is Aiding Violence

    Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier announced Monday that his office is suing OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman, saying ChatGPT is spurring young people to commit crimes and acts of violence. 

  • June 01, 2026

    Md. Authorizes Tax Credits For Service Station Conversions

    Maryland authorized local governments to grant property tax credits for service stations that are converted to other uses under legislation signed by the governor.

  • June 01, 2026

    Justices Won't Eye Burden Of Notice For Immigration Hearings

    The U.S. Supreme Court said Monday that it won't review a Ninth Circuit decision requiring the federal government to take additional steps to notify noncitizens of immigration hearing dates when their original notices initiating removal proceedings return unread in the mail.

  • May 29, 2026

    5th Circ. Lets Texas Enforce App Age-Check Law

    The Fifth Circuit has temporarily allowed enforcement of a state law that restricts app downloads by age and requires app stores to display age ratings in Texas, lifting a court order blocking the law while an appellate panel considers the litigation on its merits.

  • May 29, 2026

    Atmos Energy Hit With 1st Suit Over Deadly Dallas Explosion

    A Texas man who escaped the May 28 natural gas explosion at a Dallas apartment complex sued Atmos Energy Corp. on Friday, claiming the company failed to properly monitor conditions in his complex despite knowing the risks, calling it a pattern of "gross negligence" that contributed to the deadly blast.

  • May 29, 2026

    Skechers Seeks To Boot Wash. Anti-Spam Suit To Arbitration

    Two Washington shoppers behind a proposed class action accusing Skechers USA Inc. of sending false and misleading marketing emails must take their claims to arbitration, the footwear brand told a Seattle federal court Friday.

  • May 29, 2026

    Vermont Data Privacy Bill Poised For Signing Despite Doubts

    Vermont is poised to become the latest state to enact comprehensive consumer data privacy legislation, after the legislature on Friday approved a framework that consumer advocates have criticized for being significantly weaker than a proposal for regulating companies' handling of personal information that the governor vetoed two years ago.

  • May 29, 2026

    CFTC Eyes US Perpetual Derivatives With Kalshi Approval

    The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission on Friday took a leap forward in bringing so-called crypto perpetual derivatives to U.S. traders with a first-of-its-kind approval of Kalshi's bitcoin perpetual futures contract and no-action relief that allows Coinbase to connect U.S. customers with global offerings.

  • May 29, 2026

    8th Circ. Won't Revive Guatemalan Mother's Removal Fight

    An Eighth Circuit panel declined to revive a Guatemalan mother of six's challenge of a removal order, holding that there was no basis to disturb a Board of Immigration Appeals decision that affirmed it and underlying family hardship determinations.

  • May 29, 2026

    Justices Told USPTO's 'Settled Expectations' Rule Flouts Law

    A host of industry groups, professors, attorneys and more urged the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday to take up Google's appeal arguing that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has exceeded its authority by using the age of patents as a reason to refuse to review them.

  • May 29, 2026

    X Corp. Calls Apple, OpenAI Deposition Bid 'Opportunism'

    X Corp. on Friday called an attempt by Apple Inc. and OpenAI to conduct more than 10 depositions "simply opportunism at its most brazen," saying that the court should deny the defendants' bid to get more discovery in X's sweeping antitrust suit.

  • May 29, 2026

    Suirui And Jupiter Systems Appeal Injunction, Receiver Order

    Suirui Group, Suirui International and Jupiter Systems have appealed a D.C. federal court order granting the government's motion for a preliminary injunction in an ongoing battle to force it to divest itself of Jupiter Systems.

  • May 29, 2026

    Judge Orders Trump's Name To Be Taken Off Kennedy Center

    A D.C. federal judge blocked the closure and purported renaming of the Kennedy Center on Friday, ordering President Donald Trump's name removed from the building's facade and ruling that the board of the iconic performing arts hub violated its statutory duty when it failed to fully assess the closure's impacts.

  • May 29, 2026

    Wrongful Death Claims Settled Before Baltimore Bridge Trial

    The families of the six construction workers who died in Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge disaster have reached confidential settlements with the owner and manager of the cargo carrier that slammed into the bridge and triggered its collapse, according to court filings Friday.

  • May 29, 2026

    EchoStar, FCC Reach Deal To Settle Auction Defaults

    EchoStar inked a deal Friday with the Federal Communications Commission to settle debt claims from spectrum auction defaults for up to $2.9 billion, depending on how much money the FCC brings in from a new round of license sales.

  • May 29, 2026

    Wis. Says CFTC Lacks Standing To Block Its Betting Regs

    Wisconsin told a federal judge on Friday that the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission failed to specify injuries in a lawsuit seeking to block the state from regulating prediction market platforms, while also arguing against platforms' bid to intervene in the case.

  • May 29, 2026

    Feds Dodge Some Claims In New Mexico Wildfire Liability Suit

    A New Mexico judge carved up a challenge to the U.S. Forest Service over the destruction of nearly 43,000 acres of national forest land, saying the agency didn't follow its own monitoring obligations that don't allow for discretion until an emergent risk is brought to its attention.

  • May 29, 2026

    Facing Scrutiny, 'Schedule A' Suits Grow Beyond Chicago

    Federal lawsuits that target dozens or even hundreds of online sellers at once kept climbing in 2025 and spread beyond their Chicago stronghold, even as new data shows more friction for brand owners' mass anti-counterfeiting strategy.

  • May 29, 2026

    Sacramento Makes Pitch For Full-Time MLB Expansion Team

    Sacramento business and political leaders have started a campaign to bring a Major League Baseball expansion team to the area, unveiling plans to build a stadium and mixed-use development next to the temporary minor league home of MLB's Athletics.

  • May 29, 2026

    Preservation Group Wants Feds To Stop DC Golf Course Plans

    A District of Columbia preservationist group and two recreational golfers told the D.C. federal court not to toss their golf course suit against the U.S. Department of the Interior and its U.S. National Park Service, arguing that the federal government needs to be stopped because it is currently going forward with its plans to turn a public park's historic recreational golf course into a professional golfing venue despite claiming otherwise.

  • May 29, 2026

    Texas Justices Deny Review Of Heartbeat Act Procedure

    Texas Supreme Court Justices on Friday denied a bid by the Texas Equal Access Fund to revive a challenge to the state's so-called Texas Heartbeat Act, granting a victory to a woman who previously sought to investigate the fund under the law.

  • May 29, 2026

    Conn. Regulator Ends 'Unilateral' Decisions Amid Utility Suits

    Connecticut's public utilities watchdog has made a series of promises to change the way that it operates in hopes of bringing an end to a lawsuit in which Eversource Energy and others accused the agency's now former chair of unlawfully wielding her authority.

  • May 29, 2026

    Dems Tell DC Circ. Trump Can't Build White House Ballroom

    More than 140 Democrats from the House and Senate have urged an appellate court to uphold a lower court's ruling that halted construction on President Donald Trump's ballroom at the White House.

Expert Analysis

  • 3 Federal Policy Trends Shaping Data Center Power

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    With the White House, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and Congress each pushing energy policies that will influence how data centers are sited, powered and interconnected for years to come, industry stakeholders should understand compliance obligations, consider possible downstream effects, and evaluate off-grid and self-supply energy options, say attorneys at ArentFox Schiff.

  • NY Tax Talk: Calculating Tiered Partnership Income

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    Attorneys at Eversheds Sutherland discuss how the potential impact recent New York City Tax Appeals Tribunal decision in Matter of Cantor Fitzgerald holding that the entity approach should be used by tiered partnerships to compute unincorporated business tax liability, why the issue of the proper approach remains unsettled and the broader implications for federal conformity and administrative agency deference.

  • FDA Guidance May Move Goalposts For Form 483 Responses

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    New draft guidance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration provides formal insight on how drug manufacturers are expected to respond to Form 483s, raising some concerns about the agency's timelines and expectations, say attorneys at Cooley.

  • Understanding The SEC's Consequential Crypto Guidance

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    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's recent interpretive release — its most comprehensive statement ever on the application of the federal securities laws to crypto-assets — reimagines the Howey test to resolve long-standing questions over what is a security, but leaves many issues unresolved, say attorneys at Cahill.

  • Ohio Case Reflects States' Aggressive Criminal Antitrust Turn

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    The Ohio Attorney General's Office’s recent bid-rigging indictment of an online auctioneer is the latest signal that states, through attorneys general pursuing more kickback cases and legislators expanding the reach of antitrust laws, are shedding their historical reluctance to wield their criminal antitrust enforcement powers, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.

  • Justices' Geofence Ruling May Test 4th Amendment's Future

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    When the U.S. Supreme Court decides in Chatrie v. U.S. whether law enforcement may use geofence warrants to compel Google to disclose location history data, the ruling is likely to become an important statement about the future of Fourth Amendment law in data-driven investigations, says Duncan Levin at Levin & Associates.

  • Series

    NY Banking Brief: All The Notable Legal Updates In Q1

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    In the first quarter of 2026, New York's banking developments were headlined by initiatives to expand oversight of financial institutions and strengthen consumer protection laws, including a new framework for buy now, pay later lenders, a sweeping debt collection rule and a revised corporate self-disclosure program for financial crimes, say attorneys at Proskauer.

  • Seeking A Policy Fix As Merger Reporting Fight Continues

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    A recently announced request by the Federal Trade Commission and U.S. Department of Justice for public comment on the Hart-Scott-Rodino premerger reporting requirements, as litigation challenging the commission's updated requirements continues, suggests the government's willingness to address how best to support modern merger enforcement without unduly burdening filing parties, say attorneys at Baker Botts.

  • What New Fla. Citizens Bill Means For Surplus Lines Insurers

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    A Florida bill recently passed by the Legislature as part of a continued effort to depopulate Citizens Property Insurance, the state's insurer of last resort, creates an additional pathway for commercial policies to be written by surplus lines insurers, but also presents concerns of unnecessary regulation, say attorneys at Troutman.

  • What Voluntary Calif. Carbon Reports Show About Compliance

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    While the enforcement of California's S.B. 261 is currently paused due to a Ninth Circuit injunction, more than 130 companies have nonetheless chosen to voluntarily publish climate-related financial risk disclosures, providing a useful snapshot of how the market is interpreting the law's requirements in practice, say attorneys at DLA Piper.

  • PTAB Memo Recenters Discretion On US Manufacturing

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    Read alongside recent Federal Circuit decisions, U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director John Squires' memo on patent denial considerations emphasizes domestic manufacturing in a way that the International Trade Commission does not require, says Brandon Theiss at Volpe Koenig.

  • Why MDLs Slow Down — And How To Speed Them Up

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    Multidistrict litigation has become central to mass tort practice, but as MDLs grow in size and complexity, so do delays and costs — so tools like the new federal rule governing MDLs, targeted use of special masters and strategically deployed Lone Pine orders are more essential than ever, say attorneys at Ice Miller.

  • What A Court Doc Audit Reveals About Erroneous Filings

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    My audit of 1,522 court documents from last month found that over 95% contained at least one verifiable error, with fewer than 1% showing clear indicators of artificial intelligence use — highlighting above all else that lawyers may want to focus most on strengthening their review processes, says Elliott Ash at ETH Zurich.

  • Regulators' Basel Pitch May Bring Banks Capital Relief

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    The prudential banking agencies' new proposals to implement the so-called Basel III endgame rules — which would modify the approach to risk-based capital, among other notable changes — represent a fundamental directional shift in bank capital requirements aimed at increasing lending capacity, says Chen Xu at Debevoise.

  • How SEC And CFTC Are Attempting To End Their 'Turf War'

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    Through coordinated examinations and a shared aim to end duplicative regulation, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission's recent memorandum of understanding could represent a significant shift in the regulatory landscape for market participants subject to the jurisdiction of both agencies, say attorneys at Jenner.

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