The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Monday in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency, a major test of the agency’s authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. The court had been asked to rule on 42 USC § 7411(d), an ancillary provision of the Clean Air Act, to decide how much rule-making power the EPA [...]

Texas Governor Greg Abbott directed state health agencies Tuesday to investigate medical treatment of transgender youth as “child abuse.” Abbott’s directive follows a Friday opinion by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, which found that “each of the ‘sex change’ procedures and treatments enumerated above, when performed on children, can legally constitute child abuse under several [...]

The three white men convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery were found guilty of a federal hate crime on Tuesday. A jury determined that the men were motivated by racism when they chased down and killed Arbery, an unarmed Black man, in February 2020. Father and son duo Gregor and Travis McMichael, along with their neighbor [...]

Colombia’s Constitutional Court has decriminalized abortion up to 24 weeks, continuing a trend that has been spreading across traditionally conservative Catholic Latin American countries. The court had considered two cases over the past several months. One was brought by lawyer Andrés Mateo Sánchez Molina, and the other was brought by Causa Justa, a coalition of [...]

The US Supreme Court Tuesday agreed to take up the case of a web designer who refuses to provide services related to same-sex marriages. In 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, the court will once again consider how to balance religious freedoms with prohibitions against discrimination based on sexual orientation. The court previously addressed these issues [...]

A judge for the US District for the District South Dakota Wednesday blocked an executive order that would have restricted medication abortions. South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem issued the order in September, which would have prevented people from accessing abortion pills through telemedicine appointments by requiring the pills to be taken at an abortion provider [...]

The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit Tuesday upheld the conviction of Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin Archivaldo Guzmán Loera, known as “El Chapo.” Guzmán ran one of the largest narco-cartels in Mexico and as recently as 2009 was listed on Forbes’ list of the world’s richest men. In 2017 he was extradited to [...]

A panel of three federal judges Monday blocked Alabama’s new congressional district map, finding that it unlawfully disadvantages Black voters. In a 225-page decision, US Circuit Judge Stanley Marcus and US District Judges Anna Manasco and Terry Moorer issued a preliminary injunction preventing the new map from taking effect. They found that the map violated [...]

The US Supreme Court agreed Monday to reconsider whether race can be used in college admissions decisions. The court granted certiorari in Students for Fair Admissions v. President & Fellows of Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina, consolidating the cases for one hour of oral argument. The cases will [...]

A judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of Texas Friday blocked the Biden administration’s federal employee vaccine requirement. US President Joe Biden signed an executive order in September requiring all federal employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19. A lawsuit was filed in December. In blocking enforcement of the order Friday, Judge [...]