The US House of Representatives approved HR 3755, the Women’s Health Protection Act (WHPA), Friday, marking the first time the House has passed legislation specifically designed to protect the right to abortion access across the nation. The WHPA makes explicit that access to abortion services is essential to health care and the ability of people [...]
A British Columbia Supreme Court (BCSC) justice has granted a stay of civil proceedings on a case regarding the constitutionality of privately held church records. The Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Canada, a charitable religious corporation representing Jehovah’s Witnesses across Canada, alleges the application of BC’s privacy legislation, PIPA, violates their constitutional right [...]
Ian Profiri is JURIST’s Staff Correspondent for Canada. He files this dispatch from Calgary. Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou and the US Justice Department officials have reached a deal to resolve the criminal charges laid against her over three years ago that have raised tensions between the US, China, and Canada. As part of the deal, [...]
Ukraine’s parliament passed a bill defining anti-Semitism on Wednesday, establishing a punishment for transgressions. The Draft Law on Prevention and Counteraction to Anti-Semitism in Ukraine, Law No. 5109 (the Bill), was adopted by the Verkhovna Rada after it passed the second reading by 276 votes in the affirmative, reaching the 226 votes required. The bill [...]
A three-judge panel of the Wake County Superior Court in North Carolina permanently enjoined the state’s controversial voter ID law, holding that it discriminates against Black voters. The court referred to a decision by the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in 2016, which found that House Bill 589 (HB589) to be “motivated…by [...]
Ian Profiri is JURIST’s Staff Correspondent for Canada. He files this dispatch from Calgary. Late Wednesday evening, the Alberta government surprised Albertans by declaring a State of Public Health Emergency in a purported effort to protect what has become a fragile healthcare system in the wake of the fourth wave of Covid-19. At approximately 10pm [...]
The Tallahassee Division of the US District Court for the Northern District of Florida on Thursday granted a preliminary injunction blocking Florida’s controversial “anti-riot” bill, delivering a blow to one of Governor Ron DeSantis’s central election promises and a victory to civil rights groups. HB1, “Combating Public Disorder,” was signed into law by DeSantis in [...]
California lawmakers passed a bill on Wednesday that will stop plastic waste exported out of the country from being marked as “recycled.” Assembly Bill 881 changes the designation of exported plastic waste to “disposal” as opposed to “recycled” for the purposes of the states recycling program, with few exceptions. In order for plastic waste to qualify as [...]
A group of Indigenous Australian leaders have filled a complaint with the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination calling it incompatible with Australia’s international obligations. The complaint comes one year after the legal destruction of historically and culturally significant rock shelters by the mining company Rio Tinto in the Pilbara region of Western [...]
The Alberta Human Rights Tribunal (ABHRT) dismissed complaints earlier this month from two men, Peter Szeles and James Beaudin, who refused to wear protective masks inside two separate businesses. The decision was made public on Monday. Szeles and Beaudin argued that their respective disabilities prevented them from wearing masks and that the businesses’ health and safety [...]
