In the News

High Court Won’t Take Up SEC In-House Judges Debate
Law360 (January 11, 2021, 11:29 AM EST) -- The U.S. Supreme Court said Monday it would not take up another challenge to the constitutionality of U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission administrative law judges, rejecting a case from a former investment adviser who...

Illinois Eviction Moratorium Extended to February 2021 for Renters
As of January 9, 2021, Governor J.B. Pritzker's administration extended a version of the statewide ban on residential evictions until February 6, 2021. This reprieve is welcomed by certain Illinois renters facing severe financial shortfalls due to the economic...

Stop Protecting Unconstitutional Judges
Imagine your amateur softball league has a bylaw that all umpires must be hired by the league commissioner. Before a big game, some emergency umps‐for‐hire pile out of a van and start officiating without the commissioner’s approval. You’re skeptical, but it’s...

The Fallout of CDCs Eviction Moratorium Order
Caleb Kruckenberg, NCLA Litigation Counsel, speaks on Stacy on the Right on Sirius XM about the CDC’s Eviction Moratorium.

In Support of Arthrex – Amicus Briefs Urge Court To Leave Remedy To Congress
In the wake of Arthrex’s initial merits brief, amicus briefs in support of Arthrex’s position were filed December 29th and 30th. In the Arthrex cases (docketed as 19-1434), the parties have persuaded the Supreme Court to review a decision by the Federal Circuit...

How The Supreme Court Could Frustrate Biden’s Plans
Law360 (January 3, 2021, 12:02 PM EST) -- President-elect Joe Biden may need to flex his administration's regulatory muscle to fulfill many of his ambitious campaign pledges, a strategy that could run headlong into a conservative U.S. Supreme Court wary of...

SEC Administrative Law Judges are Unconstitutional
James Madison once said that the concentration of all government powers in one branch is “the very definition of tyranny.” Yet, today, administrative agencies regularly exercise all three of those powers. They issue rules with the force of law. They enforce laws. And...

NJ Landlords Sue Over COVID-19 Rule On Security Deposits
Law360 (December 16, 2020, 4:43 PM EST) -- New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy and members of his cabinet were hit with a lawsuit Tuesday by a group of landlords challenging his executive order allowing tenants to use their security deposits to cover back rent during the...

Pandemics can’t be fought by committee
When it comes to a public-health crisis of this magnitude, you can’t fight city hall — in this case the state’s chief executive officer. As expected, the state’s highest court last week upheld Gov. Charlie Baker’s exercise of emergency powers enacted in response to...

Illinois Eviction Moratorium Extended to January 2021 for Renters
Eviction Moratorium in Illinois Continues through January 11, 2021 In an expected move, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker once again extended the state’s eviction ban for another 30 days on December 11, 2020. The revised executive order defined new financial conditions...

Mass. SJC rules against NCLA in Desrosiers v. Baker
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court rendered its decision in the Desrosiers v. Baker case upholding Governor Baker’s pandemic orders as consistent with the Civil Defense Act (CDA). The order delivers a blow to the plaintiffs who include mom-and-pop businesses,...

Families relying on moratorium on some evictions worry about policy expiring Dec. 31
Samantha Vernon paid what she could in rent but she was evicted anyway. Landlords say they shouldn’t be forced to foot the bill for the pandemic crisis.

NCLA client Clark Aposhian discusses his lawsuit against ATF’s unconstitutional ban on bump stocks
NCLA client, Clark Aposhian is challenging ATFs ban on bumpstocks in the case Aposhian v. Barr. May a federal agency rewrite a federal statute? May that rewrite turn otherwise innocent Americans into criminals? Those questions are what this case is about. A federal...

The looming eviction crisis
Rick Brown is not Jennifer Pierson's landlord. He does own eight similar properties in Winchester, Va., mainly single-family homes in roughly the same price range as Pierson's. He tries to maintain those homes himself. He said half of his tenants aren't paying their...

IRS Seeks Dismissal of Cryptocurrency Records Seizure Lawsuit
The courts aren’t allowed to rule on a lawsuit alleging that the IRS’s seizure of cryptocurrency records was unconstitutional, the IRS said in a motion to have the case tossed. New Hampshire resident James Harper, in a lawsuit filed in July and amended in August,...

Free People Don’t Social Distance Themselves From Civil Liberties During a Pandemic, Mike Degrandis
NCLA Senior Litigation Counsel, Michael DeGrandis joins The Answer on Philadelphia's AM 990 with Chris Stigall to address the issue of government overreach during the pandemic with executive orders that are trampling over our civil rights under the auspices of a...

The NLRB’s Humorless Insensibility
The text of the National Labor Relations Act does not, so far as we can tell, require the National Labor Relations Board or its personnel to have their sense of humor surgically removed. Nor does it prohibit the NLRB’s judicial proceedings from considering context,...

SJC Told High Court’s Church Ruling Nixes Mass. Virus Rules
A group challenging COVID-19 rules in Massachusetts told the state's top court that the U.S. Supreme Court's recent decision striking down restrictions on New York church gatherings overrides legal precedent relied on by Gov. Charlie Baker. In a supplemental brief on...

EDITORIAL: CDC’s eviction moratorium on shaky legal ground
Three months ago, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a national order that banned certain residential evictions until the end of this year. The move was intended to keep renters in their homes during the coronavirus pandemic. Americans have accepted...

NCLA’s Mike DeGrandis addresses SCOTUS Covid-19 Ruling Blocking NY Exec. Order Limiting Worship
NCLA's Senior Litigation Counsel, Michael P. DeGrandis joins The Wilkow Report on Sirius XM to discuss how the SCOTUS decision in the case of Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Cuomo could impact pending cases like NCLA's case against Governor Charlie Baker's Civil...

U.S. Supreme Court ruling on houses of worship cited in suit against Charlie Baker
A group suing over Gov. Charlie Baker’s pandemic executive orders is citing last week’s U.S. Supreme Court order to stop capping religious gatherings in coronavirus hot zones in New York. In that case, the court ruled 5-4 that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo could not...

Governor’s office: Mass. pandemic restrictions on churches ‘consistent’ with US Supreme Court ruling
Pandemic restrictions on places of worship in Massachusetts won’t run afoul of a US Supreme Court ruling this week that barred certain capacity limits on religious gatherings in areas of New York where coronavirus infections were rising, according to legal scholars...

‘It’s A Matter Of Principle’: Conservative Publisher Downplays NLRB Ruling That Said His Tweet Violated Labor Law
The publisher of conservative media organization The Federalist responded to a government ruling that stated he violated labor law when he tweeted workers who wanted to unionize would be sent “back to the salt mine.” Read the full article

The Federalist Publisher’s Tweet Violated Labor Law, NLRB Rules
The publisher of conservative online magazine The Federalist unlawfully threatened workers when he said via Twitter that he’d send them “back to the salt mine” if they attempted to form a union, the National Labor Relations Board held. Read the full article

Really? NLRB upholds ruling that Federalist publisher Ben Domenech threatened ‘workers’ rights’ with ‘back to the salt mine’ joke
If you’ll recall, last year, Federalist publisher Ben Domenech responded to Vox writers staging a walkout with this jokey tweet: Little did he know how much trouble he was in. Read the full article