Law360's Pro Say - News & Analysis on Law and the Legal Industry

Among its flurry of blockbuster end-of-term decisions, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled in favor of an Evangelical postal worker who objected to working on Sundays due to religious reasons. The high court held that the Third Circuit shouldn’t have found that the USPS lawfully denied the worker’s religious accommodation request, raising the bar on what kind of accommodation is so burdensome that an...

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti has had a busy first year as the Volunteer State’s top legal officer. A keynote speaker at this year’s Burton Awards, which recognize excellence in the law, Skrmetti joined Pro Say to talk about his defense of anti-drag show legislation, gun rights and the delicate balance between litigation and policy work. Also at the Burton’s, former Supreme Court Ju...

Former President Donald Trump has once again been indicted, this time by a special federal prosecutor honing in on Trump’s stashing of sensitive documents after he left office. This week on Pro Say, the hosts break down the charges against Trump and shine a light on two men who figure to loom large as the case surges ahead: Trump’s personal aide and co-defendant Walt Nauta and his attorney M. Evan...

The bitter legal dispute that has swallowed up the golf world for the past year vanished in a flash this week, as the PGA Tour and its Saudi-backed rival LIV Golf rolled out a blockbuster agreement to join forces. The union would create a new golf organization, the exact shape of which is still taking place. Those particulars will be crucial, as any arrangement between the former competitors is li...

Already impeached over a raft of ethics violations, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is expected to pursue an unusual legal argument to exonerate himself in the state senate: that voters knew about his purported misdeeds and voted him into office anyway. The so-called “voter forgiveness” doctrine has roots in Texas caselaw, but looks to be a longshot for Paxton. Joining Pro Say this week to lay o...

Montana’s decision to ban the popular social media app TikTok has drawn fierce legal backlash, with the company itself and some of its most prominent users immediately suing to reverse the unprecedented ban. This week on Pro Say, the hosts break down the testy litigation brewing in Montana, and how battles over prior attempts to ban the app might inform the saga to come. Also this week, South Caro...

The Federal Circuit is in the middle of a sensitive inquiry to determine whether 95-year-old judge Pauline Newman is mentally fit to remain on the bench in light of what colleagues have termed “bizarre” and “paranoid” behavior from the judge. Tensions on the court are running high, as Newman has now filed a lawsuit against the court arguing that the investigation into her fitness violates her cons...

A Manhattan jury has found Donald Trump liable for sexually abusing writer E. Jean Carroll and then defaming her with his subsequent denials, following a contentious and sometimes ugly trial in federal court. Law360’s New York court reporter Frank Runyeon joins the show this week to break down the trial, which resulted in an order for Trump to pay Carroll $5 million in damages. Also this week, the...

It’s not every day an international pop star plays guitar on the stand. But that’s precisely what happened just before a New York jury decided that Ed Sheeran’s 2014 ballad “Thinking Out Loud” did not infringe on Marvin Gaye’s iconic hit “Let’s Get it On.” This week on Pro Say, the hosts probe the latest in a series of copyright decisions that have kept the pop music scene on its toes. Also this w...

If you were building a fictional legal dream team, who would you include? That's the question we try to answer on this week's episode, as the hosts draft a roster of fictional lawyers. The Pro Say gang looks to the world of television and film to build a legal dream team with five categories: general counsels and fixers; defense counsel; plaintiffs' attorneys and prosecutors; judges; and wild card...

No one loves participating in jury duty, but would you like it more if you found yourself empaneled with actor James Marsden? How about if after weeks of hearing a case you found out the entire endeavor was an elaborate hoax, where the case is fake, everyone around you is an actor, and you are the only one who didn’t know. That's the premise of Amazon Freevee's new comedy, “Jury Duty,” and on this...

By now you’ve certainly heard about the historic prosecution of Donald Trump, as the former president pleaded not guilty this week to a rash of charges stemming from an alleged hush money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election. Law360 New York courts reporter Frank Runyeon was in the room when Trump entered his plea and joins Pro Say to discuss th...

Artificial intelligence has swept across the culture, animating everything from philosophy to linguistics to cooking, and the legal industry is no different. This week on Pro Say, the hosts dive deep into whether and how lawyers are grappling with how to deploy generative AI tools like ChatGPT into their work across a number of areas. Legal aid groups have been eager to use AI, often covering for...

The litigation finance industry has boomed over the past several years, with investors looking to bankroll contentious cases in the hopes of securing a big payday. But what happens when the financiers begin to take a heavy hand on case strategy? That question is at the center of a new suit against litigation funding behemoth Burford Capital, which has been accused of blocking a client from accepti...

Last week’s collapse of Silicon Valley Bank has jolted the economy, forcing the government to step in and attempt to restore order after the largest bank failure since the 2008 financial crisis. Now, politicians, regulators and SVB customers hope to stave off another banking calamity. Joining Pro Say this week is Law360’s senior banking reporter, Jon Hill, to explain how and why SVB failed, and wh...

A years-long push to update the District of Columbia’s century-old criminal code landed with a thud this week as the U.S. Senate resoundingly defeated a suite of proposed amendments that would have reset sentencing guidelines and lowered penalties for certain crimes. On this week’s episode of Pro Say we welcome Law360 reporter Katie Buehler to explain how we got here, and what comes next in the he...

It’s been hard to look away from the fascinating, bizarre and tragic trial of disgraced South Carolina attorney Alex Murdaugh, who was convicted this week of murdering his wife and son. This week, Pro Say is joined by Law360 senior trials reporter Cara Salvatore, who has been covering every twist and turn. Salvatore walks us through the big revelations that shaped the trial and led to the jury’s d...

The already heated debate over biometric data collection saw a jolt last week as the Illinois Supreme Court ruled that privacy claims pile up with each unlawful logging of employee data, potentially putting employers on the hook for astronomical damages. Joining Pro Say this week is Chicago court reporter Celeste Bott to break down the Prairie State’s high court ruling and what it could mean for w...

The weeks since the disastrous derailment of a Norfolk Southern freight train carrying toxic chemicals have seen a flurry of lawsuits from residents and business owners in and around East Palestine, Ohio. On this week’s Pro Say, we’re joined by Ohio courts reporter Eric Heisig, who breaks down the legal blowback as well as what’s likely to come as we learn more about what exactly went awry and wha...

The sensation of being RickRolled is unmistakable, thanks in no small part to the distinct timbre of the voice Rick Astley on full display in his 1987 smash Never Gonna Give You Up. But now, Astley is locked in a battle with rapper Yung Gravy, who mimicked the singer’s voice in a way that Astley says violates his publicity rights. On this week’s Pro Say, the hosts break down Astley’s legal gambit...

This week the Third Circuit said Johnson & Johnson can’t use the “Texas two-step” to create a talc unit to spin off billions of dollars in liability and then immediately file for bankruptcy protection. The controversial maneuver has faced scrutiny in other suits as well, and this week we’re joined by Law360 senior bankruptcy reporter Vince Sullivan to talk about what the ruling means for J&J and b...

An ugly turf war is playing out at some of New York City’s most hallowed venues, with Madison Square Garden as the epicenter of the dispute. The storied arena’s owner, James Dolan, has barred attorneys litigating against his various business interests from entering the Garden, enforcing the policy with cutting edge facial recognition technology and inviting a flood of litigation from the aggrieved...

This month the Securities and Exchange Commission sued law firm Covington & Burling claiming it needed a list of clients that were impacted by a 2020 cybersecurity breach attributed to Chinese spies. The feds say they need the list to determine whether any securities laws were broken following the hack, but Covington is fighting back, arguing the disclosure would run afoul of attorney client privi...

Decades of tension over the use of noncompete agreements in the workplace has bubbled over to start the year with a Federal Trade Commission proposal to ban those agreements across the board. The early-stage move drew cheers from the labor movement and threats of swift litigation from the powerful business lobby, teeing up a fierce legal and political clash in the coming months. Law360 competition...

The Pro Say podcast is taking a break this week for the holiday. In its place, please enjoy Law360 Explores: The Law School Promise, a two-part series looking at whether the structures of legal education are working. In Episode 2, we take our seats inside the prestigious legal classroom, where law professors teaching a century-old curriculum engage in Socratic dialogue to shape you into thinking l...