A federal appeals court dismissed a Missouri death row inmate’s petition for post-conviction relief Sunday, despite questions about the evidence used to convict him, clearing the way for his execution to take place on Tuesday. This order will vacate a 30-day stay of execution that a federal judge granted to Walter Barton on Friday. Walter [...]
Puerto Rico’s newly-elected Governor, Wanda Vázquez Garced, announced in a press conference Saturday that Puerto Rico will hold a non-binding referendum on November 3, the same day as US presidential election, to decide whether Puerto Rico should become a US state or remain a territory. “It is never too late to be treated as equals,” [...]
French authorities arrested Félicien Kabuga, a leading figure in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, on Saturday in Paris. A release from the UN said Kabuga, 84, “was indicted by the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in 1997 on seven counts of genocide, complicity in genocide, direct and public incitement to commit genocide, attempt to [...]
With an expected increase in mail-in voting during the COVID-19 pandemic, voter rights advocates have filed lawsuits across the country challenging existing obstacles in states’ mail-in voting procedures. Challenges to mail-in voter restrictions have been filed in Tennessee, Texas, Minnesota, Georgia and North Carolina, among others. Some challenges primarily address the general restrictions states have [...]
The European Union Court of Justice on Thursday ruled that Hungary’s confinement of third-country asylum seekers subject to a “return decision” in transit zones at the Serbian-Hungarian border “must be classified as detention.” Additionally, it found that those detained for no reason must be released immediately, following a judicial review by a national court. The [...]
The U.S. Senate passed a bill on Thursday in support of the Uyghur Muslim minority in China. The bill would require the president to make a report to Congress regarding China’s crackdown on the Uyghurs and other minorities in the region. The report would identify persons responsible for the crackdown, whether they are officials with [...]
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the House of Representatives passed the largest relief package in U.S. history on Friday. The Health and Economic Recovery Omnibus Emergency Solutions (HEROES) Act authorizes more than $3 trillion in new spending, including aid to state, local, tribal and territorial governments, as well as additional $1200 payments directly to [...]
The Ukrainian parliament, Verkhovna Rada, passed a vital anticorruption banking law on Wednesday preventing former bank owners from reclaiming insolvent and nationalized banks. Bill No. 2571–d –– known as the “anti–Kolomoisky” law –– protects public funds and taxpayers from illegal lending practices. Enacting the law is a major step in securing a $5.5 billion dollar [...]
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Stroock & Stroock & Lavan LLP joined together to file a lawsuit on Thursday against US Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos over new regulations regarding the handling of sexual harassment and assault on college campuses. The Department’s new regulations offer further definitions for what conduct constitutes sexual harassment [...]
The UK government announced that all British and Irish citizens born in Northern Ireland would be treated as EU citizens for immigration purposes, making the official rule change in Parliament on Thursday. This rule change follows the case of an Irish woman, Emma DeSouza, who applied for a residence card for her US-born husband in [...]
