Free Republic

A federal court dismissed a case Tuesday against Republican Iowa Gov. Kimberly Reynolds’ prohibition of mask mandate in school districts across the state, official documents showed. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit found “persuasive” the argument that “the general risks associated with COVID-19, even though COVID-19 remains an ever-present concern in society, are not enough to show ‘imminent and substantial’ harm,” court papers showed in part. The court also decided that “because Plaintiffs have only alleged the potential risk of severe illness should they contract COVID-19 at school, the risk of harm is too speculative to satisfy...

Fifty-six years after it exempted antiwar teenagers from First Amendment protections while on campus, a federal appeals court in America's heartland affirmed students' speech rights in public schools on an equally contentious subject today. The St. Louis-based 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a preliminary injunction Monday against an Iowa school district policy that threatens suspension and expulsion for "intentional and/or persistent refusal … to respect" a peer's gender identity, finding it's likely too vague to survive legal scrutiny. "A school district cannot avoid the strictures of the First Amendment simply by defining certain speech as 'bullying' or 'harassment'"...

An Eighth Circuit Court panel of judges unanimously ruled Friday that an Iowa school district’s policy requiring students and staff to “respect” their classmates’ gender identity was “unconstitutionally vague,” according to the court documents. Parents Defending Education (PDE) filed a lawsuit against Linn Mar Community School District in August 2022 over a policy that would hide student’s “gender support plans” from their parents and required both staff and students to “respect” someone’s gender identity. The court determined that the district’s policy was “unconstitutionally vague” and decided to grant a preliminary injunction, temporarily halting the enforcement of the policy, according to...

A win for Geraldine Tyler, who is now 94 years old, would be a win for property rights.The Supreme Court on Wednesday heard arguments in a consequential case. The query before the justices: Was it unconstitutional when the government seized a woman's home over an unpaid tax bill, sold it for more than the amount of the debt, and then kept the profit? It may sound like a slam dunk case. Over the last several years, it has not been. But yesterday's arguments provided both a glimmer of optimism for the state of property rights in the U.S., as well...

A federal appeals court has blocked the Biden administration from forcing Catholic doctors and hospitals from performing transgender surgeries, including on children. The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, based in St. Louis, issued a unanimous ruling on Friday declaring that making Catholic surgeons...

Life comes at you fast. On Thursday, Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett decided not to get involved with Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness scheme, denying a Wisconsin group’s bid to block the order. That had liberals spiking the football, suggesting that it wouldn’t be possible for anyone to gain standing to challenge the president’s move.Things shifted quickly on Friday, though. The 8th Circuit has now put an administrative stay in place, stopping Biden from moving forward with any cancellation of student debt.U.S. appeals court temporarily blocks Biden's student loan forgiveness plan https://t.co/dCIDJyjOxn pic.twitter.com/EwBKT2kIqd— Reuters (@Reuters) October 21, 2022Six different...

The 8th Circuit US Appeals Court blocked Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness program on Friday afternoon. The court granted an emergency stay barring the discharge of any student debt until the court decides on a request for a longer-term injunction. Reuters reported: A U.S. appeals court on Friday temporarily blocked President Joe Biden’s plan to cancel billions of dollars in college student debt, one day after a judge dismissed a Republican-led lawsuit by six states challenging the loan-forgiveness program. The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals granted an emergency stay barring the discharge of any student debt under the program...

Two different federal courts, in two different Circuit Courts of appeal, have refused to grant preliminary injunctions against the implementation of the ATF “Final Rule.” The Final Rule completely changes the definition of a firearm in Federal law. On August 23, in the United States Court for the Eastern District of North Dakota, in the Eighth Circuit, Judge Peter D. Welte refused to grant a preliminary injunction against the massive changes to federal law proposed in the “Final Rule” put forward by the Biden Administration, through the ATF.On August 24, 2022, the District Court for the Galveston Division of the...

On Thursday, a federal appeals court ruled that Arkansas cannot enforce a ban on “transgender” children receiving “gender-affirming” care. “Gender-affirming” care encompasses hormone therapy, puberty blockers and sex reassignment surgery. The 8th U.S. The Circuit Court of Appeals sided with a judge’s ruling temporarily blocking the state from enforcing the law, which prohibits doctors in the state from providing this type of care to anyone under 18 years old or referring them to other providers to receive treatment. The ACLU challenged the 2021 law on behalf of four families of transgender children and two doctors who provide “gender affirming” treatments.

President Biden and his Department of Justice were unsuccessful in arguing to the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals to lift an injunction against his vaccine mandate for healthcare workers. Missouri’s Attorney General Eric Schmitt posted the one-page order to Twitter on Monday afternoon. "The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals denied the Department of Justice's motion for stay pending appeal in our lawsuit against the vaccine mandate on healthcare workers, meaning our injunction will stay in place." The legal battles within the United States over mandating a Coronavirus vaccine have been ongoing through the final weeks of 2021.

The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals is expected to hear arguments Wednesday over whether a Health and Human Services mandate can force religious-based hospitals to perform sex-reassignment procedures that could cause "harm" to patients, plaintiffs say. Earlier this year, President Joe Biden's administration restored federal protections for gay and transgender people, allowing them to sue for "sex discrimination" in healthcare. The Religious Sisters of Mercy, along with other faith-based hospitals and medical providers, argue its facilities "routinely provide top-notch care to transgender patients," contending the HHS mandate should not force it to provide potentially "harmful" procedures such as sex-reassignment surgery...

We have been following a slew of defamation lawsuits by political figures over the last few years. (See, e.g., here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here). For torts scholars, it has been a bonanza of interesting issues touching on every element of defamation law. There is now an important ruling out of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit that could have enormous implications not just for the media but anyone who retweets stories or claims. The appellate panel ruled unanimously for Rep. Devin Nunes against journalist Ryan Lizza...

Fireworks won’t fly at Mount Rushmore July 4 weekend despite a lawsuit against the Biden administration from Kristi Noem, the Republican governor of South Dakota.Judge Roberto A. Lange called the idea of an Independence Day celebration at the iconic national monument “appealing.”“However this Court is not called upon to determine whether such a fireworks display is a good idea,” he said in his 36-page ruling, posted on yourbasin.com.Lange said the country could “use a good celebration of its foundational principles of democracy, liberty, and equal protection of the law” after the COVID-19 pandemic, the Jan. 6 siege on the Capitol...

The college will keep fighting a Biden administration rule that 'requires private religious colleges to place biological males into female dormitories and assign them as females’ roommates.'May 24, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) – A federal district court has rejected the Missouri-based College of the Ozarks’ request to temporarily block the Biden administration from imposing a slate of new requirements on the Christian school to recognize and accommodate the “gender identity” of gender-dysphoric students. One of President Joe Biden’s earliest acts was signing an executive order declaring the “policy of my Administration to prevent and combat discrimination on the basis of gender identity...

One of Joe Biden’s first orders of business was to make sure demented, perverted men could be allowed to share shower spaces with women. Biden signed an executive order in January titled, “Executive Order on Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation.” "Children should be able to learn without worrying about whether they will be denied access to the restroom, the locker room, or school sports.” Biden’s order said. One Christian college in Missouri filed a lawsuit against Joe Biden claiming the overreach was victimizing women, girls and people of faith. The College of...

Judge: Biden's co-ed dorm mandate trumps religious freedom A district judge rejected a challenge to the Biden administration's order to force co-ed bathrooms and dorms on a Christian college over the school's religious objections. In February, the Department of Housing and Urban Development directed colleges to eliminate single-sex facilities. The directive came after President Joe Biden issued an executive order in January directing federal agencies "to combat discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity," which would mean targeting religious institutions that maintain single-sex accommodations. The College of the Ozarks, a small Missouri Christian college, challenged the Biden administration for...

8th Circuit Overrules Minnesota Supreme Court — State must reject all absentee ballots received after 8 pm on Election Day  BREAKING: The 8th Circuit appeals court is forcing Minnesota to reject all absentee ballots received after 8 pm on Election Day.— Kambree (@KamVTV) October 29, 2020   The US Circuit #CourtofAppeals for the #EighthCircuit has ruled that mailed-in ballots in #Minnesota must be received by elections officials no later than #ElectionDay. It's the latest last-minute judicial #ballot ruling impacting a #battleground state pic.twitter.com/AKmK6KJ99F— Tina Kim (@TinaKimCNN) October 30, 2020

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A federal appeals court has overturned a judge’s ruling and allowed the state of Arkansas to ban abortions under an order to stop medically unnecessary procedures during the COVID-19 pandemic. Arkansas is one of several states that included elective abortions in its restrictions on non-essential medical procedures during the pandemic. Earlier this spring, the state Department of Health ordered a halt to procedures “that can be safely postponed” except for instances to prevent the death, permanent physical damage or disease advancement of a patient. State leaders included the killing of unborn babies in abortions in their order. However, the Little...

<p>LITTLE ROCK (AP) — A federal judge on Tuesday blocked Arkansas’ order preventing the state’s only surgical abortion clinic from performing the procedure during the coronavirus pandemic.</p> <p>The decision came as health officials announced that at least 1,498 people in the state have been infected with the coronavirus, an increase over the 1,410 reported a day earlier. Two more people died because of the virus, bringing the state’s death toll to 32.</p>