Afternoon Briefs: Prosecutor resigns over Nazi social media post; judge blocks asylum restriction
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Prosecutor resigns over shared Facebook post
A Texas prosecutor resigned Monday after she shared a Facebook post that appeared to compare protesters with Nazis. Assistant District Attorney Kaylynn Williford of Harris County, Texas, had shared a photo with a caption that partly read, “Nazis tore down statues. Banned free speech. Blamed economic hardships on one group of people. Instituted gun control. Sound familiar?” Williford said she had shared the post because she thought it promoted tolerance. (The Houston Chronicle, the New York Times)
Judge blocks rule restricting asylum claims
A federal judge in Washington, D.C., has blocked a rule that denies asylum to many immigrants at the southern border. The rule requires immigrants to have applied for asylum in a country that they traveled through on the way to the United States. U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly, an appointee of President Donald Trump, ruled Tuesday. The U.S. Supreme Court had allowed enforcement of the rule in a different case in September 2019. Kelly said that case was in an earlier stage of litigation, while his ruling was a final judgment. Hogan Lovells had represented the plaintiffs pro bono in one of the consolidated cases before Kelly. (The Washington Post, Law.com, American Civil Liberties Union press release, Kelly’s decision)
Federal prosecutor’s lawsuit alleges wrongful arrest
An African American federal prosecutor in Washington, D.C., has filed a lawsuit alleging that she was wrongfully arrested after a traffic stop in New York City. Assistant U.S. Attorney Bianca Forde said she think race played a role in the traffic stop, supposedly for her partner’s failure to use a turn signal. And she thinks that she was arrested for asking questions, advising her partner of his legal rights and “getting on the officers’ nerves.” (The New York Law Journal, the New York Post)
7th Circuit mostly rules for Wisconsin in voting lawsuit
The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at Chicago mostly ruled for Wisconsin on Monday in consolidated cases challenging state voting laws. The appeals court reinstated limits on early voting and upheld a law that mostly barred distributing absentee ballots by email or fax. The court said lawmakers wrote the laws to help their party, rather than to discriminate based on race. (The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Courthouse News Service)
