“Late Friday night, the Fifth Circuit adopted the extreme minority view—that the government can indefinitely detain without bond millions of non-citizens who have been here for generations; who have never committed a crime; and who pose neither a risk of flight nor any threat to public safety.”

No joke: I got angry hate mail today for writing an obituary of a Black woman scientist—because the person felt she did didn’t deserve the recognition. Which just makes me want to share it again: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

New episode! Clocking in at over 2 hours. We have some THOUGHTS about the recent DOJ lawyer meltdown in Minneapolis this week. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/l...

This part of @willbunch.bsky.social's piece really stuck with me: A 24-year-old server's Republican father told her the camps were "just taking care of the illegal people" and she said, "I don’t feel like that’s true at all. I feel like they’re going after everyone.”

We put on an all-Yiddish community production of fiddler on the roof in Philadelphia and cast member and local artist Sofie Rose Seymour created the most amazing show poster that ever was

Breaking, from me: An executive order from Oklahoma's governor directs most of the state's public colleges to "phase out tenure." #AcademicSky #HigherEd @chronicle.com www.chronicle.com/article/tenu...

This one is a doozy

While reporting this, I had something happen that's never happened. A comms rep for one of the co's disputed my reporting and said what I was telling them was untrue because it was not in Grok, xAI's chatbot. I was looking directly at the files. And this person was using AI to challenge the truth.

5/ Rather than blanket prohibitions on any AI use in the production of a writing sample, I hope employers will take a more nuanced approach. If they are concerned about an applicant’s skills without an AI assist for ongoing work, that’s different than building skills in producing a writing sample

Time for an old-school #legalwriting thread crowdsourcing all of the lawyers on here. I'm interested in what you think about law student use of generative AI in writing samples. If you are hiring students, do you think about this? Do you care? 1/2

Dear men, This isn't mentoring. Regards, Women.

For fuck's sake this is not "how men behave" it's how abusers behave. To whatever extent it's how too many men behave, it's because those men are abusers. And people who cater to abusers ... are also abusers. David Gelernter should never be allowed near students again.

God, this is powerful. And a demonstration of how well great art remains relevant for centuries.. and that the inhuman behavior of humans remains current as well.

Sir Ian McKellen performing a monologue from Shakespeare’s Sir Thomas More on the Stephen Colbert show. Never have I heard this monologue performed with such a keen sense of prescience. Nor have I ever been in this exact historical moment.TY Sir Ian, for reaching us once again. #Pinks #ProudBlue

Finally, some good news on the museum front..! Its stint as the "Phart Museum" can now be forgotten as a short, sad chapter in its history; good riddance, in my opinion www.artnews.com/art-news/new...

Ok. A wild, silly, and strange legal ethics question, inspired by real events and bad ideas I wouldn’t act on (this would absolutely be my exam if I was teaching this right now). You had a represented opposing party you know goes to ChatGPT and uploads all filings. (1/x)

New tort final just dropped

They’ve been on this for a minute. More teaching + post tenure review (and contracts) plus ai supercharged productivity surveillance tools also makes professors more vulnerable to student evals, which gives admin more power to fire you. That’s the plan.

There are so many violations of our ethical rules here by government lawyers, but I want to highlight Rule 5.1, which MN has adopted. Supervisory lawyers have a duty to supervise, meaning they need to make sure juniors are performing competently, diligently, & in compliance w all other rules

in short: YES you have to resign if you cannot practice competently despite your best efforts BUT this is on the attorney-managers, who should also resign or face disciplinary action on their licenses AND the rules do have quite a lot to say about safeguarding the rights of third persons

This story demonstrates collapse of safeguards—our brilliant tech press being fired by tech oligarch and fired brilliant journalist exposing deliberate and knowing harms of tech oligarch run platform.

This level of depravity simply breaks the brain

Come work with me! The Eastern District of Virginia Federal Public Defender's Office is hiring an appellate attorney! We're excited to find someone excellent to join our team doing the best law job around. Apply now! www.fd.org/sites/defaul...

Here’s a link to the transcript fyi drive.google.com/file/d/1FnY2...

I can now report that Judge Blackwell did not grant Julie Le’s request for a nap, and also noted that, as overwhelmed as she may be, the people who the Trump administration is detaining in violation of court orders have it worse ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...

Holy shit. Hard to think of anything lower than embezzling from the public defender queenseagle.com/all/2026/2/3...

No university faculty should be hired for their political views. Doing so is true preferential treatment. Partisan political views have nothing to do with quality teaching or research; they should never be considered as part of responsible, merit-based hiring practices. That’s the news here.

It wasn’t so long ago that the richest people in the world used their wealth to create great things - foundations, universities, etc. Not saying they were great people or didn’t earn their money in horrible ways. But they at least gave back a bit? What happened?

An exchange from CA5 oral arguments today: Lawyer: Okay. I feel awkward walking away with some time, but I'm not going to waste your time. Court: We feel grateful when you walk away. Lawyer: I should have done it a little earlier. Court: It's a sign of assurance. Thank you.

Following on, she’s only not leaving because she can free some folks while there. Tough ethical quandary: leave, honorably, or stay, and get some amount of good through. Unrelated: some good people are enablers because they don’t let things fall to chaos.

"In a well-functioning constitutional democratic republic, free speech, courageous newsgathering, and nonviolent protest are all permitted, respected, and even celebrated. In an authoritarian regime, that is not the case. Our nation is now at a crossroads" oregoncapitalchronicle.com/2026/02/03/f...

www.nytimes.com/interactive/... Unpopular opinion: Meme law is bad and if you have the New York Times movie and poetry critic writing your legal analysis it’s still the bad place even if the outcome is righteous.

Floored by this story. A man wrote a pollite email to a federal prosecutor objecting to the deportation of an Afghan seeking asylum. DHS responded with an administrative warrant to get the man's info from Google, then visited his home to intimidate him.

Not giving a newborn a Vit K shot puts them at risk of Vit K Deficiency Bleeding a dangerous, often fatal condition where the body can’t form blood clots. Without infants are over 80 Xs more likely to experience severe bleeding in the brain or intestines, leading to permanent brain damage or death

I’m not sure non-lawyers realize how unheard of this is.

This is unreal. An AUSA talking like that in open court is about as close as you can come to a total breakdown. Never heard of anything like it.

Apparently, Google Books deliberately removed search for previewed books?? For ANYONE doing research, this is a BIG deal. Not to be able to search for specific things that you need? For books that will help? For references used by other authors? My last book would have been impossible without it.

NEW: Florida's high court will hear arguments tomorrow in Hubbard v. State of Florida, a case challenging the legality of one of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’s prosecutions of people with felony convictions who thought they were eligible to vote. @berrypatrick.bsky.social on what you need to know:

3d Cir. holds that habeas corpus petitions challenging immigration detention are "civil actions," so prevailing noncitizens may be entitled to attorneys' fees and costs under the Equal Access to Justice Act. Gonna be a loooooooooot of these. www2.ca3.uscourts.gov/opinarch/242...

There was a time leading up to Obergefell where judges knew they were about to say their piece in the apex of a historical moment and wrote accordingly. This reminds me of that time, with the existential threat turned up to 11.

Even if you don't have time to read all 83 pages of Judge Reyes's opinion barring the Trump administration from rescinding Temporary Protected Status for 350,000+ Haitians, please at least check out the four-page introduction. It's a tour de force: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

There are ample professional disincentives to spilling the inner workings of a court; even misconduct is rarely disclosed. Only reason to demand NDAs is if the Justices are engaging in conduct so egregious that the legal profession would recognize the need for court employees to disclose it.

Things you don't want to hear from your Federal Circuit panel

It’s that dreaded time of year when I have to change my password for university systems