Media Mentions

With all eyes focused on the Republican struggle to replace Obamacare on Thursday, a federal agency (overseen by President Donald Trump) told the Trump Organization (overseen by President Donald Trump) that a Washington hotel (owned by President Donald Trump) could continue leasing the land it sits on from the federal government...But Laurence Tribe, a Harvard Law School professor, described the GSA’s ruling in a Bloomberg News interview as “bizarre.” “It’s not hard to conclude that GSA is disinclined to displease the president of the United States,” Tribe added.

An op-ed by Berkman fellow Ivan Sigal. In his recent manifesto, Mark Zuckerberg asserts that the response to our dysfunctional and conflict-ridden politics is to build a stronger global community based on ubiquitous interconnection. We know of course that Facebook stands to profit from this utopian vision, and we should be skeptical of the motives underlying Zuck’s position. But it’s worth taking a second look at the idea of working on underlying economic and political issues in our societies, rather than focusing on the effects of online expression—particularly in the context of the moral panic over “fake news.”

An op-ed by Noah Feldman. It seems like a perfect storm: Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee were pounding Judge Neil Gorsuch for an opinion he wrote denying assistance to an autistic child, and while he was testifying, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously rejected the standard Gorsuch relied on to do it. The justices’ opinion is the right one, and the standard Gorsuch’s court used was wrong. But unfortunately for Democrats, Gorsuch wasn’t wrong to apply it: It was the binding legal rule in the 10th Circuit, established in 1996, long before he joined the U.S. Court of Appeals.

President Donald Trump’s Washington hotel isn’t violating the terms of a lease with the U.S. government that appeared to ban elected officials from participating, according to the federal agency that serves as the hotel’s landlord. The General Services Administration, which oversees the lease for Trump International Hotel Washington, D.C., said in a letter Thursday that Trump’s company was “in full compliance” with the pact, which was signed in 2013...“It’s not hard to conclude that GSA is disinclined to displease the president of the United States,” said Laurence Tribe, a professor of constitutional law at Harvard University who’s part of CREW’s legal team. He called the agency’s determination “bizarre and hard to account for in terms of what the lease says.”

An interview with Nancy Gertner. Judge Neil Gorsuch faced his third long day of Supreme Court confirmation hearings with the Senate Judiciary Committee today. Yesterday, Gorsuch faced questioning about his judicial independence. Today, Republicans praised his calm demeanor and carefully worded answers. Democrats, however, appealed to Gorsuch's more personal side.

An op-ed by Bruce Schneier. On Monday, the TSA announced a peculiar new security measure to take effect within 96 hours. Passengers flying into the US on foreign airlines from eight Muslim countries would be prohibited from carrying aboard any electronics larger than a smartphone. They would have to be checked and put into the cargo hold. And now the UK is following suit. It's difficult to make sense of this as a security measure, particularly at a time when many people question the veracity of government orders, but other explanations are either unsatisfying or damning.

...The firm celebrates its 100 anniversary this year. Established by William Vinson and James Elkins, the two-person law firm has grown to about 700 attorneys with 16 offices across the world — with the largest office still in Houston...Henderson said a 2010 study of law firms showed many of the top-performing law firms in the 1940s had strong relationships with major commercial and investment banks. Almost 70 years later, those firms were still some of the largest firms, he said. In the early 20th century, many law firms located their offices in the banks they represented, according to David Wilkins, professor at Harvard Law School. “This is unusual in its origin story, but the basic story is very similar,” Wilkins said.

An op-ed by Helen Klein Murillo `17 and Susan Hennessey. The president’s daughter, Ivanka Trump, is set to join his administration in an unspecified, but reportedly influential policy role. She claims she will not be a government employee despite having an office in the White House, holding a high-level security clearance and performing government work. In a statement, Ivanka Trump concedes that there is “no modern precedent for an adult child of the president” but pledges to “voluntarily” comply with ethics rules. What the first daughter fails to acknowledge is that the very nature of her proposed role breaches ethical standards to which previous administrations have adhered for generations.

An op-ed by Noah Feldman. What if we held a confirmation hearing and the Supreme Court nominee actually answered the questions? Conventional wisdom considers that impossible in today’s political climate, but conventional wisdom is wrong. Politically, senators are going to vote the way they want regardless of what the nominee says. And ethically, there’s nothing wrong with a nominee speaking about Supreme Court precedent or issues that might come before the court in the future, unless the nominee commented specifically on the facts of a particular case.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s first list of so-called sanctuary cities produced a lot of names — and not a ton of immediate clarity. The reported inaccuracies notwithstanding, the list — released as part of ICE’s first weekly “detainer” report Monday — of self-identified sanctuaries was just that. It included no information about what might happen to the 118 listed localities — including Boston and four other Massachusetts cities — where law enforcement limits their cooperation with ICE efforts to deport undocumented immigrants...However, Phil Torrey, an immigration lawyer and Harvard Law School lecturer, says the report has another purpose. “Trump is trying to shame localities into using their resources to help ICE arrest and deport individuals,” he said.

Hal Scott, Harvard Law School professor and president of Committee on Capital Markets Regulation, discusses the Trump administration's approach to financial regulation and how it relates to the Federal Reserve and monetary policy. Scott is a potential candidate to be the next Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve.

Earlier this month, Harvard Law School announced that the Graduate Record Examination will be accepted in lieu of the Law School Admissions Test in applications, effective this fall. In the wake of this important announcement, we are glad to see the Law School taking bold, new action in its decisions to update admissions policies, and commend administrators for taking the risk in enacting far-reaching change that many other schools have not considered. This change will allow for greater flexibility for applicants while easing the process. With its prestige and respectability, Harvard Law School is in a unique place to affect change and to begin a national conversation among its fellow law schools and the American Bar.

What is it about our U. S. Constitution that gets everyone so stirred up? It is among the most referred to documents in recent history. It is a secular document but it holds an almost religious sacredness to it...In his new book, "The Farmers' Coup, The Making of the United States Constitution," Harvard Law professor Michael J. Klarman, PhD points out that even in its conception, the U.S. Constitution was drafted from ordinary things (including human limitations) much like today. He told this reporter, when asked what are some of the misconceptions people today still have? "I think people tend to think of the Constitution as reflecting timeless principles of governance, whereas, in fact, there was a great deal of interest-group bargaining over both the drafting and ratification of the Constitution."

An op-ed by Noah Feldman. FBI Director James Comey’s testimony Monday that the bureau is investigating possible connections between Donald Trump’s campaign and Russia sparked complaints among Democrats that he should’ve said so back in July. But that gets things exactly backward. The time for the FBI director to disclose an investigation is not when it’s just getting started, and he chooses to make the announcement unilaterally. It’s when the investigation is under way, and Congress is asking for a sworn statement in reply.

This was the proposal: Deliberately infect a small group of consenting adults with the Zika virus to learn about the disease and speed up the search for a vaccine. The need is clear...That’s why ethics review of human subject research matters. This NIH panel is an especially good model in both its composition — expertise in law, medicine, medical science, social sciences, vaccine research and advocacy and bioethics — and its transparency. The findings are there for all to see on the NIH website, including the researchers, who now have more to do before receiving the NIH go-ahead for their important work. “We didn’t want to be overly protective,” said Holly Lynch, a member of the NIH ethics panel and executive director of the Petrie-Flom Center at Harvard Law School.

Legal experts are having a field day debating whether President Donald Trump has plunged the United States into a “Constitutional crisis,” a loaded term but a somewhat elusive concept...“In mere months, Trump has already embraced policies that threaten basic individual rights, the structure of government, and the foundations of our democratic society. We’ve even had to learn words new to most of us — like 'emoluments' — to grasp the full scope of his illegal conduct,” wrote Laurence Tribe, a professor of Constitutional law at Harvard Law School, in an email.

Two students from Harvard Law School’s Immigration and Refugee Clinic argued that the United States was no longer a “safe country” for refugees before the Inter-American Committee on Human Rights in Washington, D.C. Tuesday...The human rights committee, which promotes human rights in the Western hemisphere, granted the HIRC’s request to participate in this hearing last week. The HIRC’s team—which included HIRC Assistant Director Sabi Ardalan and Law School students Jin U. Kim [`18] and Malenei C. Alleyne [`17]—centered their statements on the status of the agreement, whose integrity Kim said was imperiled by the executive orders.

...In a new book, “#Republic: Divided Democracy in the Age of Social Media,” Harvard Law School’s Cass R. Sunstein argues that social media curation dramatically limits exposure to views and information that don’t align with already-established beliefs, which makes it harder and harder to find an essential component of democracy — common ground. In an email exchange, Sunstein, the Robert Walmsley University Professor at Harvard, talked about how America needs to restore “serendipity” online and bring back the conditions necessary for a healthy democracy in the digital era.

President Trump is poised in the coming days to announce his plans to dismantle the centerpiece of President Barack Obama’s climate change legacy, while also gutting several smaller but significant policies aimed at curbing global warming. The moves are intended to send an unmistakable signal to the nation and the world that Mr. Trump intends to follow through on his campaign vows to rip apart every element of what the president has called Mr. Obama’s “stupid” policies to address climate change. The timing and exact form of the announcement remain unsettled, however....“Trump’s announcements have zero impact,” said Richard J. Lazarus, a professor of environmental law at Harvard. “They don’t change existing law at all.”

The US government’s unexpected ban on laptops, iPads and other electronics “larger than a cellphone” on flights from 10 airports in the Middle East has sparked criticism from technology experts, who say the new rules appear to be at odds with basic computer science...Bruce Schneier, a security technologist, called the new rules an “onerous travel restriction”. “From a technological perspective, nothing has changed between the last dozen years and today. That is, there are no new technological breakthroughs that make this threat any more serious today,” he said in an email. “And there is certainly nothing technological that would limit this newfound threat to a handful of Middle Eastern airlines.”

When the University of Arizona started accepting a generic graduate school exam for law school applicants last year, the national group that oversees such admissions chastised the university and threatened to oust it from its membership. But now that Harvard, the gold standard, is following suit, there is growing hope that dropping the traditional Law School Admissions Test as a requirement for applicants across the country could lead to a larger and more diverse group of lawyers entering the field...Accepting the GRE could make the school more attractive to international students, graduate students applying from fields such as computer science, and low-income students, said Jessica Soban, the associate dean for strategic initiatives and admissions. “Introducing choice into the process can lower the barriers for students, and that could have benefits for any law school,” Soban said.