The United States Commission on Civil Rights (USCCR) on Thursday urged Congress to take drastic actions to remedy the disparity in public school funding in minority and low-income communities. The report calls on “ederal, state, and local government develop incentives to promote communities that are not racially segregated and do not have concentrated poverty, which [...]

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on Thursday issued guidance that will allow states to require people to work as a condition to receiving Medicaid. CMS reasoned that health care is but one determinant of health, and that “a broad range of social, economic, and behavioral factors can have a major impact on [...]

A judge for the US District Court for the Northern District of Alabama on Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit challenging the state’s voter ID law. Alabama’s voter ID law was passed in 2011 in an effort to combat potential voter fraud. The law requires Alabama residents to present a form of photo identification when they go [...]

Eleven Guantánamo inmates filed a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia on Thursday claiming that their indefinite detention is due to President Donald Trump’s anti-Muslim stance. The inmates argue they can only be kept at Guantánamo if their individual circumstances show that they would return to [...]

The US House of Representatives approved a bill Thursday that extends Title VII of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. The bill was approved by a vote of 256-164. Title VII allows the National Security Agency (NSA) to target foreign persons outside of the US for surveillance and intelligence gathering. Title VII was set [...]

The Kenosha Unified School District (KUSD) agreed Tuesday to settle a lawsuit filed by a former transgender student who said the district discriminated against him by not allowing him to use the men’s restroom at his high school. The lawsuit was originally filed on behalf of the student, Ash Whitaker, by the Transgender Law Center [...]

A judge for the US District Court for the District of Columbia on Wednesday denied a motion for preliminary injunction brought by Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Deputy Director Leandra English to remove Mick Mulvaney as interim director. Judge Kelly Timothy wrote in the 46-page decision that, “he court finds that English is not likely [...]

Russian metal tycoon Oleg Deripaska filed suit in New York state court Wednesday against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and associate Rick Gates alleging fraud. Related charges were brought in 2014 in the Cayman Islands. This new claim relies in part on evidence from the unsealed indictment against Manafort stemming from Special Counsel Robert [...]

JURIST Guest Columnist Iryna Chelyshava of Vlasova Mikhel & Partners, a Belarusian law firm, discusses a recent decree by the Belarusian government drastically expanding the use of cryptocurrency… On December 21, 2017, Alexander Lukashenko, the President of the Republic of Belarus signed Decree No. 8, “On the Development of the Digital Economy” (“the Decree”), aimed [...]

EU Advocate General Melchior Wathelet advised the European Court of Justice (ECJ) Thursday that the rights of same-sex spouses must be recognized by every member of the EU, even if a country’s government has not authorized same-sex marriage. EU law permits the spouse of an EU citizen to obtain a residence permit for the EU [...]