A divided US Supreme Court on Wednesday granted an application to recall and stay lower court orders allowing a transgender student who identifies as a male to use the men’s restroom in school. This comes after the Gloucester County School Board filed an emergency application to block the lower court decisions. Many believe the court’s [...]
A three-member panel for the Supreme Court of Indonesia rejected a radical Islamic leader’s appeal of his conviction on Thursday. Abu Bakar Bashir, religious leader of the southeast-Asian Jemaah Islamiyah militants, had requested judicial review of his June 2011 conviction in relation to his military-style training camp, for which he was facing a 15-year prison [...]
According to the state-run Anadolu news agency, an Istanbul court on Thursday issued an arrest warrant for the Pennsylvania-based preacher Fetullah Gulen on charges of orchestrating the recent July 15 attempted coup, which left more than 270 dead. The court ruled that the so-called Fetullah Terrorist Organization (FETO) had attempted to change constitutional order through [...]
Texas agreed to a deal Wednesday that will weaken their voter identification law and allow voters to cast ballots in the November election even if they lack all documents required by the law. The agreement will require Texas to spend at least $2.5 million in the months leading up to the election to increase voter [...]
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo signed legislation Wednesday that would legalize daily fantasy sports in New York state. The law, SB 8153 , serves to legalize forms of daily fantasy sports, like Draft Kings, while requiring that companies using this platform register with the New York State Gaming Commission , and adhere to its regulations. [...]
A judge for the US District Court for the Middle District of Alabama on Thursday dismissed a suit filed by suspended Alabama Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore against the Judicial Inquiry Commission (JIC) . The federal judge found that he should not intervene in matters relating to a state’s constitution and therefore dismissed the case. [...]
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said Thursday that South Sudan government (SPLA) security forces have killed and raped citizens and looted and destroyed public and private property. The rights chief called on the UN Security Council to take stronger action against these events. While the report explains that some civilian [...]
Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch reported Wednesday that Australia is ignoring inhumane treatment of refugees on the South Pacific island of Nauru in the hopes of deterring additional refugees from traveling to Australia. Individuals caught trying to travel into the country are sent to a camp on Manus Island or in Nauru according to [...]
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed his concern for the human rights violations faced by the Yazidi minority in Northern Iraq on Wednesday, stating that actions of the Islamic State (IS) may amount to genocide. Two years ago the IS attacked the Sinjar area in Iraq killing nearly 5,000 individuals. The statement claims that 3,200 Yazidi [...]
US President Barack Obama commuted the sentences of 214 federal inmates on Thursday, the most at one time during his presidency. Sixty-seven of the inmates whose sentences were commuted were serving life sentences for non-violent drug crimes. The most recent grant of clemency highlights Obama’s call to the Department of Justice (DOJ) to prioritize petitions [...]
