Afternoon Briefs: Several states pause jury trials; suit accuses Texas AG of whistleblower retaliation
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Several states stop jury trials
A surge in COVID-19 cases has led several states to suspend jury trials. They include New York, Maryland, Texas, New Mexico and Wyoming. (The Daily Docket)
Suit accuses Texas AG of abusing his office
A Nov. 12 lawsuit accuses Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton of abusing his office and retaliating against aides who reported him to the FBI. The suit by four former aides alleges violations of the Texas Whistleblower Act. The suit claims that Paxton sought to help a wealthy campaign donor and a woman with whom he had an affair. (The Associated Press, Law.com, the Houston Chronicle, the lawsuit)
Biden won, say opposing lawyers from Bush v. Gore
The two lawyers who represented George W. Bush and Al Gore in the 2000 U.S. Supreme Court case are in agreement in the present presidential election. Biden will be president, and nothing in Bush v. Gore supports pending election challenges, they say in a Washington Post op-ed. The two lawyers are David Boies, chairman of Boies Schiller Flexner, and Theodore Olson, a partner at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. (The Washington Post op-ed)
Acting DHS chief lacked authority to suspend DACA, judge says
U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis of the Eastern District of New York ruled Saturday that Chad Wolf, the acting U.S. Department of Homeland Security secretary, didn’t have the authority to suspend a program that deferred deportation for immigrants brought to the country illegally as children. Garaufis said Wolf had no authority because he was unlawfully appointed. Wolf had banned new and pending requests to participate in the program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA. He had also required those already participating in DACA to renew their status annually rather than every two years. (The Washington Post, NBC News, the decision)
