Free Republic

Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband of the Civil Rights Division issued the following statement in response to the federal court ruling today regarding religious liberty in New York City and New York State:"Today’s federal court decision is a win for religious freedom and the civil liberties of New Yorkers. Government cannot discriminate by protecting free speech and the right to assemble while threatening or limiting religious exercise – it must protect all rights guaranteed under the First Amendment. The court’s decision is consistent with positions and arguments made by the United States Department of Justice in similar filings and...

Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Eric Dreiband issued the following statement today regarding Juneteenth:“On June 19, 1865, the Emancipation Proclamation was first announced to enslaved African-Americans in Texas.  On that day, Union soldiers, led by Major General Gordon Granger, landed at Galveston, Texas, with news that the Civil War was over and that the enslaved were now free.  This was two and a half years after President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation became the official policy of the United States on January 1, 1863.“Today, “Juneteenth” has become a day to recognize the abolition of slavery and the continuing work to promote racial equality for all Americans.“When President Lincoln...

Department of Justice Office of Public Affairs FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Friday, January 31, 2020   Officer Was Previously Convicted of Related Obstruction Offenses Daniel Davis, 44, a former major at Louisiana State Penitentiary (LSP) in Angola, Louisiana, was found guilty by a jury yesterday in federal court for his participation in the beating of an inmate who was handcuffed, shackled, and not resisting and for failing to intervene to stop his subordinates from participating in the same beating. In a previous trial in January 2018, Davis was convicted of conspiring with other officers to cover up the beating by...

Yesterday, I reported on an outlandish effort to shake down a Christian pastor about his views on Islam by the Justice Department in an Obama-era holdover case. Today, a federal court entirely dismissed the Justice Department's case. United States District Court Judge Norman Moon ruled that the case was moot because the mosque settled with Culpeper County. The mosque obtained a settlement allowing it to pump and haul sewage from the land. The United States had sought to keep the case alive, and to conduct wide ranging and intrusive discovery against third parties such as Pastor Steve Harrelson of...

Civil rights and LGBT activists say they are concerned about President Donald Trump's nomination Thursday of Eric Dreiband to head the Justice Department's civil rights division because of his work defending major corporations and others against discrimination lawsuits. Dreiband, a labor attorney in Washington, D.C., who served as general counsel of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission under George W. Bush, has represented such companies as R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. in an age discrimination case, Bloomberg in a pregnancy discrimination lawsuit, CVS Pharmacy in an employee severance agreement lawsuit brought by the EEOC, and Abercrombie & Fitch in a Supreme Court...

The White House nominated Washington labor lawyer Eric Dreiband as an assistant attorney general to head the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division — a choice eliciting anger from liberal advocacy groups. Organizations like the ACLU and the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, which is headed by Mr. Dreiband’s predecessor, questioned the lawyer’s experience, saying he has spent much of his career fighting for companies accused of discrimination rather than on behalf of those discriminated against. Mr. Dreiband, a partner at Jones Day law firm, has specialized in representing businesses in litigation over employment discrimination, whistleblower claims, and wage...