Free Republic

A federal appeals court on Monday vacated a water permit needed by developers to restart construction on the Mountain Valley pipeline in West Virginia, marking the latest setback for the $6.2 billion project. The Richmond, Virginia-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found several defects in the review the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection conducted before issuing the permit.

A federal judge has sided with four publishers who sued an online archive over its unauthorized scanning of millions of copyrighted works and offering them for free to the public... (snip) In June 2020, Hachette Book Group, HarperCollins Publishers, John Wiley & Sons, and Penguin Random House sued in response to the Archive's National Emergency Library, a broad expansion of its ebook lending service begun in the early weeks of the pandemic, when many physical libraries and bookstores had shut down.

NEW ORLEANS — President Joe Biden’s order that federal employees get vaccinated against COVID-19 was blocked Thursday by a federal appeals court. The 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans rejected arguments that Biden, as the nation’s chief executive, has the same authority as the CEO of a private corporation to require that employees be vaccinated. The ruling from the full appeals court, 16 full-time judges at the time the case was argued, reversed an earlier ruling by a three-judge 5th Circuit panel that had upheld the vaccination requirement. Judge Andrew Oldham, nominated to the court by then-President...

In Ciraci v. J.M. Smucker Company, (6th Cir., March 14, 2023), the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals held that employees of a company that sells food products to the federal government may not assert a 1st Amendment free-exercise claim against the company for denying them a religious exemption from a COVID vaccine mandate imposed by the company after the federal government required government contractors to do so. The court said in part: Constitutional guarantees conventionally apply only to entities that exercise sovereign power, such as federal, state, or local governments.... Smucker’s may be a big company. But it is...

A trio of federal appellate judges upheld a prior legal ruling on Thursday that bars the state of Florida from enforcing the ‘Stop WOKE Act’ while it faces ongoing legal battles related to its constitutionality. The measure, supported by Gov. Ron DeSantis, imposes restrictions on the instruction of race-related concepts in Florida’s public universities. The decision affirmed a ruling ordered by Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker last year, where he granted a preliminary injunction against the legislation, finding that it violated First Amendment rights. “Neither the state of Florida’s authority to regulate public school curriculum nor its interest in...

An excerpt from a notorious “Access Hollywood” tape in which former President Donald Trump seems to brag about sexually assaulting women will be allowed into evidence at his upcoming trial in the alleged rape of writer E. Jean Carroll. US District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan said Trump’s statements on the 2005 recording — in which he described moving on a woman “like a b–ch” — could lead a jury to infer that Trump has assaulted or attempted to assault women in the past. “In this case, a jury reasonably could find, even from the Access Hollywood tape alone, that...

Washington D.C., Feb 9, 2023 / 13:35 pm Despite the U.S. Supreme Court ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade, a federal judge is claiming that the 13th Amendment, which was ratified to abolish slavery, might establish a constitutional right to have an abortion. Under Roe v. Wade, the court previously held that the 14th Amendment protects a right to privacy and a right to privacy protects a woman’s right to decide whether to have an abortion. In the Dobbs decision last June, the court revoked that precedent, stating that “the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion” and that...

Douglass Mackey is alleged to be one of the many anonymous Twitter users who made the 2016 election so different, so memorable, and so important. Like other anonymous internet memesmiths (anons), Mackey had no external reason that anyone should care what he said. He held no office. He had no byline at an elite publication. He had no vast pool of wealth that conferred legitimacy, deserved or undeserved, on what he had to say. Mackey’s notability, like that of Bronze Age Pervert or Libs of TikTok, came exclusively from what he had to say, and that people found it funny...

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A federal judge in Wisconsin on Wednesday ruled that a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the father of a man shot and killed by Kyle Rittenhouse during a protest in 2020 can proceed against Rittenhouse, police officers and others. The father of Anthony Huber, one of two men shot and killed by Rittenhouse, filed the lawsuit in 2021, accusing officers of allowing for a dangerous situation that violated his son's constitutional rights and resulted in his death. Anthony Huber's father, John Huber, also alleged that Rittenhouse, who was 17 at the time of the shootings, conspired...

In Ference v. Roman Catholic Diocese of Greensburg, (WD PA, Jan. 18, 2022), a Pennsylvania federal magistrate judge recommended denying a motion to dismiss filed by the Catholic Diocese in a Title VII sex-discrimination lawsuit by a Lutheran 6th-grade teacher in a Catholic school who was fired shortly after being hired when the school discovered that he was in a same-sex marriage. The Diocese had raised defenses based on Title VII's exemption for religious discrimination, the church autonomy doctrine, the ministerial exception and RFRA.

Former State Attorney Andrew Warren will not get his old job in Hillsborough County, as the federal 11th Circuit Court has ruled that it does not oversee or have jurisdiction, over Warren's claim. "Today the court upheld the governor’s decision to suspend Andrew Warren from office for neglect of duty and incompetence," stated Gov. Ron DeSantis Communications Director Taryn Fenske

A federal judge on Friday rejected Trump’s motion to dismiss the civil sexual assault suit filed by E. Jean Carroll. In 2019, E. Jean Carroll alleged Donald Trump raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the 1990’s. E. Jean Carroll is a mentally unwell woman who previously told CNN she fantasizes about rape. Trump has denied the allegations and called E. Jean Carroll a “whack job” who’s “not my type.” Carroll filed the lawsuit in November after New York passed the Adult Survivors Act which allows adults to sue over sexual assaults that occurred decades ago. US District...

A federal court ruled the University of Maryland St. Joseph Medical Center broke the law by refusing to remove the uterus of a trans-identified patient due to the religious beliefs of the Institution, which is committed to Catholic principles while also being part of the public medical system. U.S. District Court Judge Deborah K. Chasanow ruled Friday that the hospital violated the Affordable Care Act and discriminated against plaintiff Jesse Hammons, a biological female diagnosed with gender dysphoria, by refusing to conduct a planned hysterectomy (removal of the womb) because it doesn't conduct those procedures to address gender dysphoria. The...

A judge on Wednesday ordered a Detroit museum to hold onto an 1888 painting by Vincent van Gogh in response to a lawsuit by its owner, who claims it has been missing for nearly six years. The painting, titled “The Novel Reader” or “The Reading Lady,” is part of a rare van Gogh exhibit, which ends Jan. 22 at the Detroit Institute of Arts. Brokerarte Capital Partners LLC and its sole proprietor, Gustavo Soter of Brazil, acquired the painting in 2017 for $3.7 million, but a “third party” took possession of the art, according to the lawsuit. “Plaintiff has not...

‘Just desperate.’ Judge orders man accused in Pierce substation attacks held without bail BY JARED BROWN Police in Washington arrested two men in connection to a series of Christmas Day attacks on power stations in the Tacoma area. A U.S. District Court judge in Tacoma ordered one of the defendants charged with attacking four Pierce County substations on Christmas Day to be held in federal custody pending a grand jury indictment, despite a public defender’s insistence that the man facing a terrorism charge was motivated by poverty and should be in drug treatment. Federal pretrial services officials also recommended that...

In a court filing, former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried asked to redact the names of the co-signers to his $250 million bail. The filing said the U.S. government has not taken a position on the request and that it's being done to protect the privacy and safety of the sureties. The filing said the two remaining sureties have yet to sign their individual bonds, the amounts of which have not yet been determined, but plan to do so by the Thursday deadline. "In recent weeks, Mr. Bankman-Fried's parents have become the target of intense media scrutiny, harassment, and threats. Among...

BREAKING: A federal judge has just blocked the use of Title 42 at the border as a result of ACLU litigation. Title 42 allows the U.S. to immediately expel migrants on the basis of public health. It has been used millions of times under both Trump & Biden. T42 is gone, for now.

Former President Donald Trump signed legal documents describing evidence of election fraud that he knew were false, a federal judge indicated on Wednesday. U.S. District Court Judge David Carter wrote in an 18-page opinion that emails from attorney John Eastman, an architect of Trump’s last-ditch effort to subvert the 2020 election, needed to be turned over to the Jan. 6 select committee. Those emails, Carter wrote, “show that President Trump knew that the specific numbers of voter fraud were wrong but continued to tout those numbers, both in court and to the public.” The emails are among the files that...

A Florida prosecutor suspended by Ron DeSantis for defying a new 15-week abortion law says a federal judge’s decision to send his reinstatement appeal to trial means a reckoning is coming for the state’s Republican governor. Andrew Warren, a Democrat, was removed as Hillsborough county state attorney on 4 August after saying he would not enforce the abortion ban or prosecute providers of gender transition treatment for young people. DeSantis cited Warren’s alleged “woke agenda” in reasons for his decision. At a hearing in Tallahassee on Monday, Judge Robert Hinkle denied motions from DeSantis to dismiss Warren’s lawsuit, and another...

Arizona officials can’t enforce a new election measure in the upcoming midterm elections, according to a federal judge. Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs and other officials shall not “take any action to implement or enforce H.B. 2243 in a manner that would remove any voter’s eligibility to vote in the 2022 general election or disqualify any otherwise-valid ballot on the basis of H.B. 2243,” U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton, a Clinton appointee, said in the Sept. 8 order.