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In a landmark ruling, a federal district court has ordered the U.S. Department of Defense to end a longstanding Pentagon policy forbidding enlisted military service members from deploying in active duty outside the continental United States and being commissioned as officers if they have HIV. Supporters hailed it as overdue legal affirmation that people receiving effective antiretroviral treatment for HIV are essentially healthy and pose no risk to others. The judgment topples one of the nation’s last major pillars of HIV-related employment discrimination. Federal law has for decades barred employers from discriminating against people with HIV under the Americans with...

NEW ORLEANS -- President Joe Biden’s requirement that all federal employees be vaccinated against COVID-19 was upheld Thursday by a federal appeals court. In a 2-1 ruling, a panel of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a lower court and ordered dismissal of a lawsuit challenging the mandate. The ruling, a rare win for the administration at the New Orleans-based appellate court, said that the federal judge didn’t have jurisdiction in the case and those challenging the requirement could have pursued administrative remedies under Civil Service law. U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Brown, who was appointed to the District Court...

Former President Donald Trump wants to remove the federal judge assigned to his lawsuit against Hillary Clinton, the Democratic National Committee, and others tied to the so-called "Russiagate" controversy. Trump's legal team filed a motion to disqualify U.S. District Court Judge Donald Middlebrooks, who is based in West Palm Beach, Florida, citing how the judge was nominated by former President Bill Clinton in 1997, when his spouse was the first lady. The filing stresses that "there exists a reasonable basis that Judge Middlebrooks’ impartiality will be questioned" and notes the lawsuit is levied, in part, against Hillary Clinton, who ran...

U.S. District Judge Mark Walker ruled that portions of the law restricting the use of ballot drop-boxes, assistance for voters, and third-party voter registration drives violated the Voting Rights Act and constitutional protections because they were passed "with the intent to discriminate against Black voters."

Quite a blockbuster ruling from the federal district court. The court found that in enacting certain election laws limiting registration outreach and the use of drop boxes, Florida violated the Voting Rights Act. The court also found that Florida acted intentionally discriminating against the state’s black voters. And although the parties hardly briefed it, the Court imposed a very strong remedy of requiring that certain changes in voting rules in Florida be precleared before the court for a period of 10 years under section 3c of the Voting Rights Act.

Pro-life Sen. Josh Hawley expressed alarm Wednesday about U.S. Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson’s “soft” record on child sex offenders amid growing concerns about protecting children from abuse. Jackson, President Joe Biden’s nominee to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer, also has a pro-abortion record that includes working with abortion activists on a case about suppressing pro-life advocates’ free speech. Her record on unborn babies’ rights has pro-life advocates opposing her nomination. Now, Hawley’s findings are raising additional concerns about other vulnerable children. “Judge Jackson has a pattern of letting child porn offenders off the hook for their appalling crimes,...

WASHINGTON — A Florida man who bragged he "broke the internet" when he was photographed carrying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's podium during the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol was sentenced to 75 days in prison on Friday. Adam Johnson, a stay-at-home father of five boys, traveled to D.C. in support of former President Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, which Trump lost to President Joe Biden. U.S. District Court Judge Reggie B. Walton sentenced Johnson to prison on Friday, saying Johnson made "a mockery" of the events by grabbing Pelosi's lectern and...

Mariposa Castro, also known as Imelda Acosta, was sentenced Wednesday by U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton. She also received a $5,000 fine from the judge, who said the January 6 attack had "totally undermined" the peaceful transfer of presidential power, NBC News reported. Throughout the day, Castro posted videos on her Facebook account showing the riot from inside the building and outside on restricted grounds. One video shows her climbing through a broken window, using the platform located at the lower west terrace of the Capitol, according to court records. As she was entering the Capitol, she could be heard...

On Friday, Federal District Judge Amita Mehta ruled that a civil suit alleging a conspiracy to foment the Jan. 6 insurrection could proceed. In an extremely thorough and detailed 112-page ruling, Mehta concluded that the plaintiffs had made a “plausible” case that former President Trump himself was at the center of a conspiracy to stop the peaceful transfer of power. While plausibility is not the same as proven, Mehta’s ruling is the first time such a finding has been made in an official proceeding.

Former President Donald Trump lost a bid Friday to toss lawsuits holding him responsible for inciting the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol. Federal Judge Amit Mehta rejected Trump’s attempt to dismiss the civil cases with a claim that he has absolute immunity because he was in office at the time. “To deny a President immunity from civil damages is no small step,” Mehta wrote in a 112-page ruling. “The court well understands the gravity of its decision. But the alleged facts of this case are without precedent, and the court believes that its decision is consistent with...

NEW YORK (AP) — Former President Donald Trump must answer questions under oath in New York state’s civil investigation into his business practices, a judge ruled Thursday. Judge Arthur Engoron ordered Trump and his two eldest children, Ivanka and Donald Trump Jr., to comply with subpoenas issued in December by New York Attorney General Letitia James. Trump and his two children must sit for a deposition within 21 days, Engoron said. Engoron issued the ruling after a two-hour hearing with lawyers for the Trumps and James’ office. “In the final analysis, a State Attorney General commences investigating a business entity,...

Lumping Donald Trump with Osama Bin Laden? That's going too easy on the former president! At least, if you ask CNN's "national security analyst" Juliette Kayyem, a former Obama DHS assistant secretary. Appearing on Thursday morning's New Day, Kayyem said that when a year ago in an Atlantic article she depicted Trump as "the leader of a terror movement," she was, as she recently tweeted, actually being "too kind" to him!Get the rest of the story and view the video here.

A federal judge in Washington, DC, questioned former President Donald Trump's actions during his speech on January 6, 2021, as he considers for the first time whether Trump is immune from liability related to his supporters attacking the US Capitol. During a court hearing Monday, Judge Amit Mehta pointed out repeatedly that Trump on January 6 asked the crowd to march to the Capitol, but that he didn't speak up for two hours asking people to stop the violence. In the year since the US Capitol attack, judges remind us what it means to be American "The words are hard...

A woman who brought her 14-year-old son to the Capitol on Jan. 6 last year will serve three months in jail for illegally parading in the complex during the insurrection, CNN reported Friday.Why it matters: Virginia Spencer and her husband entered a hallway of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's offices while inside the Capitol, later joining a crowd that attempted to enter the House chamber as lawmakers were still trapped inside, per court documents. Worth noting: It's one of the longer sentences handed to Jan. 6 defendants who face charges for non-violent misdemeanors, CNN notes.Spencer will also be on probation for...

Chief Justice John Roberts asserted the independence of the federal courts from what he called "inappropriate political influence," in a year-end report released Friday that comes amid widespread political criticism of the Supreme Court, and calls to dramatically reform its structure.

Judge rules against Proud Boys using First Amendment defense in Jan. 6 case A federal judge emphatically rejected the claim by four members of the white nationalist Proud Boys that they were only exercising their First Amendment rights by attacking the Capitol on Jan. 6. U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly said on Tuesday that the extremists are facing felony charges because they allegedly led a violent effort to overturn the presidential election not for speaking out against supposed election fraud as they claimed. “Defendants are not, as they argue, charged with anything like burning flags, wearing black armbands, or participating...

TALLAHASSEE — A legal showdown over a controversial state elections law is set to take place next month, after a federal judge rejected efforts to short-circuit a trial in constitutional challenges by voting-rights groups. The League of Women Voters of Florida, the Florida Conference of the NAACP, Disability Rights Florida and a number of other groups filed a series of lawsuits challenging the measure (SB 90), passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature this spring as part of GOP leaders’ nationwide attempts to make it more difficult for people to vote by mail. Lawyers for the plaintiffs allege that the changes are...

A Florida man was sentenced to more than five years behind bars Friday for storming the US Capitol on Jan. 6 — the harshest penalty dished out yet over the insurrection. Robert Palmer, 54, was handed a 63-month sentence after he pleaded guilty in October to attacking police officers during the riot. “Your honor. I’m really really ashamed of what I did,” he told US District Judge Tanya Chutkan through sobs on Friday. Federal prosecutors said Palmer, of Largo Florida, was on the “front lines” of the mob attempting to disrupt the certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020...

A federal appeals court has reinstated the Biden administration’s vaccine and testing requirement for private businesses that covers about 80 million American workers. The ruling by the 6th U.S. Court of Appeals in Cincinnati lifted a November injunction that had blocked the rule from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which applies to businesses with at least 100 workers. In the decision Friday, the 6th Circuit noted that OSHA has historical precedent for using wide discretion to ensure worker safety and “demonstrated the pervasive danger that COVID-19 poses to workers—unvaccinated workers in particular—in their workplaces.”

After being struck down by lower courts, an appeals court has reinstated Joe Biden’s OSHA vaccine mandate for businesses with 100 or more employees. Around 80 million Americans will be directly affected by this ruling. After the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 that the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration had the authority to Impose the mandate due to take effect Jan. 4, all eyes turn now to the Supreme Court where the final decision will be made. According to Just The News: “Given OSHA’s clear and exercised authority to regulate viruses, OSHA necessarily has the authority...