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Can Trump serve third term? Yale Law prof sees ‘possible loophole’ to 22nd Amendment ban

homesafetytechpros — Fri, 18 Apr 2025 23:57:02 +0000

Constitutional Law

Can Trump serve third term? Yale Law prof sees ‘possible loophole’ to 22nd Amendment ban

April 3, 2025, 3:01 pm CDT

Can President Donald Trump serve a third term? The 22nd Amendment appears to prevent it. “No person shall be elected to the office of the president more than twice,” it reads. But could a president serve a third term if he isn’t “elected” to the office? (Image from Shutterstock)

The use of the word “elected,” rather than “serve,” is “an unfortunate drafting error,” in the view of Michael C. Dorf, a professor at Cornell Law School, who spoke with the Washington Post.

The Wall Street Journal (gift link via How Appealing), the Washington Post and the New York Times have coverage of the constitutional questions.

The issue is getting attention since Trump told NBC News that “there are methods” by which he could serve a third term, and he wasn’t joking.

NBC News asked Trump about a scenario in which Vice President JD Vance would run for president and then hand the office of president to Trump.

“That’s one” method, Trump responded.

But Trump could not be Vance’s vice president, according to many experts who spoke with the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. That’s because of the 12th Amendment, which says, “No person constitutionally ineligible to the office of president shall be eligible to that of vice president of the United States.”

Because Trump wouldn’t be eligible to be president, he wouldn’t be eligible to be vice president under the 12th Amendment, said Akhil Reed Amar, a constitutional law professor at Yale Law School.

Taking a contrary view are the authors of an article in the Minnesota Law Review written when former President Bill Clinton was president. The article argues that the 12th Amendment might not bar a two-term president from the vice presidency because “it is by no means clear that the term ‘eligibility’ as used in the 12th Amendment refers to or incorporates a person’s reeligibility under the 22nd Amendment” that followed.

The 12th Amendment eligibility provision was likely referring to constitutional requirements for the presidency based on citizenship, residency and age, according to the article co-authored by Bruce G. Peabody, a government and politics professor at Fairleigh Dickinson University. The ambiguities might allow a vice presidential run by a two-term president, he told the Wall Street Journal.

There is another possible scenario. What if Vance is elected president, he appoints Trump as the secretary of state, Vance and his vice president resign, and others in the line of succession before the secretary of state step aside?

That could work if Congress changes the federal presidential succession law to eliminate the ban on cabinet officials becoming president if they are ineligible for the job, according to Amar.

“There is a possible loophole. I wish it weren’t true, but there is,” Amar told the Wall Street Journal.

But some experts said there should be no debate on the issue.

The history of the 22nd Amendment’s drafting and ratification “make clear beyond doubt it was written that way to guard against the danger that anyone could use the office to assert long-term tyrannical control in the United States,” said Deborah Pearlstein, a professor at Princeton University, in an email to the Washington Post.

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Suits seeking continued US funding will likely be routed to Court of Federal Claims after SCOTUS decision, law prof says

homesafetytechpros — Fri, 18 Apr 2025 07:41:06 +0000

U.S. Supreme Court

Suits seeking continued US funding will likely be routed to Court of Federal Claims after SCOTUS decision, law prof says

By Debra Cassens Weiss

April 7, 2025, 11:42 am CDT

A decision on Friday by the U.S. Supreme Court in a challenge to an education-grant freeze will likely redirect many other lawsuits regarding Trump administration spending decisions to the Court of Federal Claims, according to a law professor. (Image from Shutterstock)

The Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision allowed the Trump administration to freeze $65 million in education-related grants while a suit filed by eight states is litigated.

The Supreme Court found that the government was likely to succeed in its argument that a district court lacked jurisdiction to order the payment of money under the Administrative Procedure Act. The law waives government immunity but not for court orders to enforce a contractual obligation to pay money along the lines of the order by U.S. District Judge Myong J. Joun of the District of Massachusetts, the Supreme Court said.

Instead, the Court of Federal Claims has jurisdiction to hear such suits, the high court said.

Writing at the Volokh Conspiracy, Josh Blackman, a professor at the South Texas College of Law in Houston, said the ruling “should quickly knock out many other ‘spending’ cases and redirect them to the Court of Federal Claims. This is a court most people have never heard of but will soon become very important.”

The Supreme Court’s decision stayed a March 10 temporary restraining order issued by Joun, report Politico, Reuters, Howe on the Court, the Washington Post and the New York Times.

Chief Justice John Roberts dissented from the decision but did not issue or join a dissent. The Supreme Court’s three liberal justices also dissented.

The Trump administration had canceled the grants because they included diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. The states that sued are California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Colorado, Illinois, Maryland, New York and Wisconsin.

Joun’s order had required the government to pay past-due grant obligations and to continue paying the obligations as they accrue. The judge based the decision on a finding that the challengers were likely to succeed on their claim that the freeze was arbitrary and capricious in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act.

The Supreme Court disagreed with that finding.

Generally, TROs cannot be appealed, but the order issued by Joun was more akin to a preliminary injunction, the majority said.

In a dissent, Justice Elena Kagan said the general rule is that Administrative Procedure Act suits go to federal district courts, even when a remedial order may result in the disbursement of funds.

“So the court’s reasoning is at the least underdeveloped, and very possibly wrong,” she said.

Kagan also criticized the majority for making a decision based on the government’s emergency application.

“The risk of error increases when this court decides cases—as here—with barebones briefing, no argument and scarce time for reflection,” she wrote.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote a separate dissent, joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

“It is beyond puzzling that a majority of justices conceive of the government’s application as an emergency,” Jackson wrote. “It is likewise baffling that anyone is persuaded that the equities favor the government when the government does not even argue that the lower courts erred in concluding that it likely behaved unlawfully.”

The decision is Department of Education v. California.

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This Harvard Law prof thinks constitutional theory is a terrible way to pick a judge

homesafetytechpros — Mon, 24 Mar 2025 04:32:57 +0000

The Modern Law Library

This Harvard Law prof thinks constitutional theory is a terrible way to pick a judge

By Lee Rawles

March 5, 2025, 9:04 am CST

What if we are asking the wrong questions when selecting American judges? Mark Tushnet thinks our current criteria might be off.

“We should look for judges who are likely to display good judgment in their rulings, … and we shouldn’t care whether they have a good theory about how to interpret the Constitution as a whole—and maybe we should worry a bit if they think they have such a theory,” the Harvard Law School professor writes in his new book, Who Am I to Judge? Judicial Craft Versus Constitutional Theory.

In looking at what qualities were shared by great U.S. Supreme Court justices, Tushnet identified five that he thinks were of especial importance:

1. Longevity and age

2. Location in political time

3. Prior experience in public life

4. NOT A JUDGE (“I put this in capital letters because it’s common today to think that justices have to have been judges,” Tushnet writes. He doesn’t see having a past judicial career as disqualifying but points out that many great justices were not sitting judges when appointed.)

5. Intellectual curiosity

In this episode of The Modern Law Library podcast, Tushnet and the ABA Journal’s Lee Rawles discuss how he thinks that people should be evaluated for judicial positions, his experience as a clerk for the late Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, what makes a well-crafted opinion, and why he thinks that any overarching theory about the Constitution will fall short.

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In This Podcast:

Mark Tushnet

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Mark Tushnet

Mark Tushnet is a William Nelson Cromwell law professor emeritus at Harvard Law School. Tushnet, who graduated from Harvard College and Yale Law School and was a law clerk to the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, specializes in constitutional law and theory, including comparative constitutional law. His research includes studies of constitutional review in the United States and around the world. He is the author of more than a dozen books, has edited eight others, and has written numerous articles on constitutional law and legal history.

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Former George Mason University law prof says he’s ‘fully vindicated’ after ‘relatively modest’ defamation suit settlement

homesafetytechpros — Mon, 17 Mar 2025 15:28:05 +0000

Verdicts & Settlements

Former George Mason University law prof says he’s ‘fully vindicated’ after ‘relatively modest’ defamation suit settlement

By Debra Cassens Weiss

March 12, 2025, 2:59 pm CDT

A former professor at the George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School has reached a settlement in his defamation lawsuit against two former students. (Photo from Shutterstock)

A former professor at the George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School has reached a settlement in his defamation lawsuit against two former students who alleged that he abused his power to initiate sexual relationships with them when they were law students.

Professor Joshua D. Wright settled with Elyse Dorsey and dropped his claim against Freshfields counsel Angela Landry, report Law.com, Law360 and Reuters.

His suit, filed in Fairfax County, Virginia, circuit court, had sought $108 million in damages.

The articles identify Dorsey as a Kirkland & Ellis partner, but the law firm’s website page for her appears to have been removed.

Dorsey’s settlement “provides Wright with a relatively modest amount of compensation and allows Dorsey to continue speaking out,” Law.com reports. Wright filed a motion to end the litigation last week.

Wright had maintained that the relationships were consensual, and the two women were “scorned former lovers.” In a statement released to Law360, he said he is “relieved to have been fully vindicated. The evidence has made it undeniably clear that the relationships in question were consensual from the start. I remain fully committed to defending my reputation and will not hesitate to take further legal action if necessary to hold accountable those responsible for false accusations.”

The two defendants said they were pleased with the development.

A statement by Dorsey’s lawyer said the settlement will exclusively be paid from insurance “and constituted less than 0.3% of the damages professor Wright sought in the litigation,” according to Law.com.

“Settling this case was a difficult decision, but it allows me to continue my advocacy work without the distraction or continued trauma of ongoing litigation,” Dorsey said in a statement cited by Law.com.

Wright has the option of refiling his claim within six months against Landry. Her lawyer, Stacey Rose Harris, told Law.com that the dismissal “obviously speaks for itself.”

“Parties ‘vindicated’ in litigation don’t voluntarily dismiss their own claims on the eve of trial,” Harris said.

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Law prof suspended over exam question, class discussion can sue for First Amendment retaliation, 7th Circuit says

homesafetytechpros — Sun, 16 Mar 2025 15:11:23 +0000

First Amendment

Law prof suspended over exam question, class discussion can sue for First Amendment retaliation, 7th Circuit says

By Debra Cassens Weiss

March 13, 2025, 2:14 pm CDT

A federal appeals court has revived a First Amendment retaliation claim by a professor at the University of Illinois Chicago School of Law who used an “expurgated racial slur” on an exam question, leading to an investigation, required diversity training, a suspension and denial of a pay raise.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at Chicago ruled Wednesday in a lawsuit by professor Jason Kilborn, whose 2022 suit was dismissed in December 2023.

His federal suit had alleged retaliation for constitutionally protected speech, due process violations of the 14th Amendment and state law violations.

A university professor’s academic speech is entitled to qualified First Amendment protection under U.S. Supreme Court precedent, the 7th Circuit ruled Wednesday in an opinion by Judge Thomas Lee Kirsch II, an appointee of President Donald Trump during his first term.

“We conclude that Kilborn has plausibly alleged that his speech is constitutionally protected and reverse the dismissal of his claim,” the appeals court said.

Because the appeals court revived the retaliation claim, it also vacated a federal judge’s refusal to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the state law claims and ordered further consideration.

The university had found that Kilborn violated the harassment section of its nondiscrimination police after an investigation that followed the controversial exam question.

The December 2020 final exam in civil procedure included a hypothetical in which a plaintiff alleged that her managers had called her a “n- – – – -” and a “b- – – -.” Kilborn’s exam included only the first letter of the word followed by underlined blanks. Some students were upset by the question.

The university then investigated allegations that Kilborn created a racially hostile environment for minorities in a class that he taught two semesters earlier by commenting on “cockroaches” and a “public lynching.”

The cockroach comment was part of a discussion on why defendants sometimes settle frivolous cases. The media only covers frivolous cases when the defendant loses, not when the defendant wins, he said. Kilborn said defendants fear that the public will learn about losses in frivolous cases, and “then all the cockroaches come out of the walls, they’re thinking, right?”

In the same discussion, Kilborn said, “I’m not subjecting my corporate bottom line to that public lynching; I’m sorry, that’s not the right word to use.”

In a different discussion on race-based traffic stops, the appeals court said, “Kilborn used an African American Vernacular English (AAVE) accent while repeating the lyrics of a Jay-Z song, which describes the pretextual stop of a young Black man (‘You was doin’ 55 in a 54.’).”

In response, the university refused to give Kilborn an across-the-board 2% merit raise and said he could not return the classroom until he completed an eight-week diversity training program.

Kilborn’s exam question, as well as other remarks investigated by the university, “address matters of public concern, notwithstanding the limited size of Kilborn’s audience,” the 7th Circuit said.

“The exam question was designed to give students experience confronting a highly charged situation that they may encounter in real-life practice and to be a continuation of the learning that occurred in the classroom,” Kirsch wrote. “The content, form and context of the exam question give no indication that it involved a matter of private concern, rather than serving broader pedagogical purposes. Kilborn’s in-class statements performed a similar function. They were designed to engage students and stimulate in-class discussion on topics of significant interest to the broader community, including frivolous litigation and pretextual police stops.”

Hat tip to Law360, which covered the decision.

Exam question wasn’t only offensive behavior of UIC law professor, according to internal investigation

Court dismisses part of UIC law prof’s civil rights lawsuit

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Law prof who used F-word while criticizing political leaders can’t be reinstated immediately, appeals court says

homesafetytechpros — Sat, 15 Feb 2025 15:02:11 +0000

Law Professors

Law prof who used F-word while criticizing political leaders can’t be reinstated immediately, appeals court says

By Debra Cassens Weiss

February 4, 2025, 9:14 am CST

A state appeals court stepped in after a judge in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, issued a temporary restraining order that required Louisiana State University to reinstate a law professor to teaching following his suspension for “inappropriate statements” in the classroom. (Photo from Shutterstock)

Updated: A state appeals court stepped in after a judge in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, issued a temporary restraining order that required Louisiana State University to reinstate a law professor to teaching following his suspension for “inappropriate statements” in the classroom.

Judge Donald R. Johnson of the 19th Judicial District Court in Louisiana ordered professor Ken M. Levy’s temporary reinstatement Jan. 30 and set a Feb. 10 hearing to consider the professor’s request for an injunction. The TRO said the university can’t take action against Levy, for now, on account of free speech and due process protections under the state and federal constitutions.

Louisiana’s First Circuit Court of Appeal vacated part of the TRO in a Feb. 4 order, report the Advocate and WAFB via Above the Law. The appeals court said Johnson should not have ordered Levy back into the classroom without a full evidentiary hearing. Still intact is another part of the TRO barring Louisiana State University from interfering with Levy’s employment based on expression that is constitutionally protected.

The Louisiana Luminator, NOLA.com and WAFB (here and here) had coverage of the TRO noted by Above the Law and the Volokh Conspiracy. Law.com has a report on the resignation of Louisiana State University general counsel Winston DeCuir Jr., who was the first Black lawyer to serve in that role for Louisiana State University. DeCuir resigned days after Levy’s suspension.

Levy had used the F-word while criticizing President Donald Trump and Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry. The university told Levy that he was suspended “pending an investigation into student complaints of inappropriate statements made in your class,” according to a Jan. 17 letter cited by NOLA.com.

In a court filing, the university said it was investigating “inappropriate, vulgar and potentially harassing conduct in the classroom,” WAFB reported. The university said it removed Levy after hearing a recording of a classroom lecture.

WAFB obtained a tape of Levy’s statements, made during an introductory lecture to his criminal law class. He spoke after asking students not to record his lectures because he didn’t want to get in trouble with the governor as another law professor did for classroom comments. Here are some of his comments:

• “I frankly, like, forward my s- – – to the governor, like I generally don’t have a problem; I would love to become a national celebrity based on what I said in this class, like f- – – the governor.” Levy said. “But taken out of context, I might seem like a bit of an a- -hole.”

• “You probably heard I’m a big lefty; OK, I’m a big Democrat, um, I’ve been devastated by, I couldn’t believe that f- – -er won. Um, and those of you who like him, I don’t give a s- – -, you can have, you’re already getting ready to say your evaluations. I don’t need his political commentary; no, you need my political commentary, you above all others need my political commentary.”

A court filing said Levy’s comments about Landry were made in a joking manner, and his comments about Trump were his “rather colorful opinion,” NOLA.com reported.

Johnson denied motions by Louisiana State University for a stay or dissolution of the temporary restraining order, according to WAFB.

The university said in a statement cited by NOLA.com it was committed “to upholding academic freedom while maintaining a respectful and professional learning environment.”

Faculty members should respect the views of others, the statement said. And academic freedom doesn’t give professors the freedom to use the classroom “as a platform for personal grievances,” the university said.

Updated Feb. 5 at 8:40 a.m. to report on the Louisiana appeals court’s decision.

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Penn Law is quicker to discipline whites than minorities, controversial prof alleges in lawsuit

homesafetytechpros — Wed, 29 Jan 2025 09:40:00 +0000

Law Professors

Penn Law is quicker to discipline whites than minorities, controversial prof alleges in lawsuit

By Debra Cassens Weiss

January 21, 2025, 12:29 pm CST

The eastern facade of the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School in 2006. (Photo by Jeffrey M. Vinocur, CC-BY-SA-3.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

The University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School is facing a lawsuit alleging that the school violated First Amendment principles and anti-discrimination laws when it disciplined a professor for her controversial remarks.

Tenured law professor Amy Wax filed the Jan. 16 suit in federal court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, report Reuters, Law.com and Law360.

The law school had suspended Wax with half pay and full benefits for the 2025-2026 school year because of alleged “discriminatory and disparaging statements.” She also lost her named chair position and summer pay “in perpetuity.”

Wax’s alleged controversial comments included assertions that Black law students rarely graduate in the top half of their class and warnings about dominance by the “Asian elite” and the loss of bourgeois culture.

Wax’s suit says the school’s disciplinary proceedings against her are “grossly deficient” and “kangaroo-court-like.”

The school’s speech policy “discriminates based not only on the content of speech but also the racial identity of the speaker,” the suit says.

Professors like herself who are white or Jewish are far more likely to be disciplined for their speech than speakers who are racial minorities, the suit claims.

In addition, the suit says, “some races may not be criticized while other racial or ethnic groups can be—and routinely are—subjected to virulently racist speech without consequence.”

As an illustration, the suit says, the school declined to initiate disciplinary proceedings against a male lecturer who created a cartoon labeled “the Anti-Semite” that depicted three Jewish people drinking glasses of blood labeled “Gaza.” The school did criticize the lecturer, however.

The speech policy also punishes speech based on harm, which means that the school punishes speech based on disapproval and emotional reaction to statements, the suit says. That violates the school’s contractual promise to abide by First Amendment principles, according to the suit.

The suit asks the court to ban discipline against Wax and future enforcement of the speech policy, to declare that the policy violates anti-discrimination laws and the First Amendment, and to award damages.

The suit alleges breach of contract, violation of anti-discrimination laws, and false light invasion of privacy for alleged “cherry-picked” depictions of Wax’s speech that cast her as a “virulent racist.” The suit also reserves the right to sue for violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act for the school’s alleged refusal to delay disciplinary proceedings during her cancer treatments.

The university declined to comment when contacted by Law.com, Reuters and Law360.

The case is Wax v. University of Pennsylvania. Wax is represented by Holtzman Vogel.

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Columbia law prof facing probe over campus-protest comments says firm ‘abruptly’ dropped her as client

homesafetytechpros — Sun, 10 Nov 2024 09:15:06 +0000

Law Professors

Columbia law prof facing probe over campus-protest comments says firm ‘abruptly’ dropped her as client

By Debra Cassens Weiss

October 22, 2024, 3:50 pm CDT

A Columbia Law School professor has said in an ethics complaint a law firm “abandoned” her as a client during a probe of her comments about campus protests “with no notice and no explanation.” (Photo from Shutterstock)

Professor Katherine Franke said she had hired employee-side firm Outten & Golden to represent her in a school investigation of her January comments supporting pro-Palestinian students in an interview with Democracy Now!, an independent news program. She learned that she had been “abruptly” dropped in a July 12 letter, according to an Oct. 16 press release posted last week on X, formerly known as Twitter, along with her ethics complaint.

The Outten & Golden lawyer representing Franke, Kathleen Peratis, resigned in protest.

Reuters, Bloomberg Law and the Columbia Spectator have coverage.

Franke filed the Sept. 12 ethics complaint with an attorney grievance committee in New York. In a letter attached to the complaint, Peratis alleged that Outten & Golden dropped Franke as a client “because they believed that Professor Franke had become politically controversial.”

Adam Klein, managing partner at Outten & Golden, said in a statement the firm did not violate ethics rules, according to the Columbia Spectator. Klein said the firm dropped Franke after deciding that it would not handle employee speech matters related to the Israel-Gaza conflict.

“We did this after much consideration, and with the good of our firm and the well-being of our diverse workforce in mind,” the statement said.

The law school investigation initially stemmed from this comment by Franke: “So many of those Israeli students who come to the Columbia campus are coming right out of their military service and have been known to harass Palestinian and other students on our campus.” The school was investigating whether the comment constituted harassment based on national origin.

In the press release, Franke said firms have an ethical duty of loyalty to their clients after they agree to represent them.

Franke said on X her treatment by Outten & Golden “is part of a larger profession-wide problem, a McCarthy-ite reprisal against anyone who defends the dignity and rights of Palestinians. In job interviews, firms are asking my law students: ‘Are you, or have you ever been, a defender of Palestinians?’”

Klein told the Columbia Spectator that Outten & Golden was representing Franke on a pro bono basis, but the required internal approvals were not secured. Peratis told Bloomberg Law that any allegation that she circumvented firm rules before taking on the case were “absolutely, flatly false.”

Peratis told Bloomberg Law that she continues to represent Franke through the Center for Constitutional Rights, a nonprofit legal advocacy organization.

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Penn Law prof gets half-pay suspension for ‘discriminatory and disparaging statements’

homesafetytechpros — Mon, 14 Oct 2024 00:34:24 +0000

Law Professors

Penn Law prof gets half-pay suspension for ‘discriminatory and disparaging statements’

By Debra Cassens Weiss

September 25, 2024, 8:51 am CDT

The eastern facade of the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School in 2006. (Photo by Jeffrey M. Vinocur, CC-BY-SA-3.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

A professor at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School will be suspended with half pay and full benefits for the 2025-2026 academic year because of her “discriminatory and disparaging statements.”

Along with the suspension, professor Amy Wax received a public reprimand, loss of her named chair position and loss of summer pay “in perpetuity.” She will also be required to note in public appearances that she speaks for herself and not the university or its law school.

The New York Times described the sanction as “significant” but said it “falls short of the firing that some students wanted.”

Other publications with coverage include the Philadelphia Inquirer, Law.com, Law360 and Inside Higher Ed.

Wax was accused of publicly warning against dominance by the “Asian elite,” immigrants from third-world countries and the loss of “bourgeois” habits. She was also accused of remarking that same-sex couples aren’t fit to raise children, that people of color have to stop acting entitled to remedies, and that Mexican men were more likely to assault women. And she was also accused of saying Black law students rarely graduated in the top half of their class.

Provost John L. Jackson Jr. published the public reprimand issued to Wax in the University of Pennsylvania’s Almanac on Tuesday. She was previously barred from teaching mandatory classes to first-year law students in 2018.

A faculty hearing board determined after a May 2023 hearing that Wax engaged in “flagrant unprofessional conduct,” Jackson wrote in the reprimand.

Jackson said the conduct “included a history of making sweeping and derogatory generalizations about groups by race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and immigration status.” Wax also made “discriminatory and disparaging statements targeting specific racial, ethnic and other groups with which many students identify” inside and outside the classroom, Jackson said.

As a result of Wax’s conduct, many students were “understandably concerned” that Wax “cannot and would not be an impartial judge of their academic performance,” Jackson wrote.

M. Elizabeth Magill, then the president of the University of Pennsylvania, accepted the hearing board recommendations in August 2023. The school faculty’s Senate Committee on Academic Freedom and Responsibility found no defect in procedures in Wax’s case, making the hearing board findings final.

According to the Philadelphia Inquirer and the New York Times, Wax has denied making some comments and has contended that other remarks were taken out of context. She did not comment when contacted by both newspapers. Nor did she immediately respond to an ABA Journal email seeking comment.

Wax has previously said she will challenge any discipline in court, according to the New York Times.

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MacArthur ‘genius grants’ fellows include law prof, domestic violence researcher

homesafetytechpros — Sun, 06 Oct 2024 13:37:34 +0000

Careers

MacArthur ‘genius grants’ fellows include law prof, domestic violence researcher

By Debra Cassens Weiss

October 3, 2024, 2:30 pm CDT

Among the winners of the 2024 MacArthur Foundation fellowships, commonly known as “genius grants,” are a law professor who studies racial inequities and a researcher who studies the impact of technology on intimate partner abuse. (Image from Shutterstock)

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation announced 22 fellows Tuesday who will each receive no-strings-attached grants of $800,000 paid over five years, report the New York Times and the Associated Press.

The winners include:

• Dorothy Roberts, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. Her work has exposed racial inequities embedded within health and social service systems. One topic of her writing has been the prosecution of pregnant Black women for using drugs, she told the New York Times.

“I started this work in 1988,” Roberts told the New York Times. “To get this kind of recognition is very gratifying. Not only for me personally but for all the people, especially Black women, who’ve been devalued in these systems.”

• Nicola Dell, a computer and information scientist. Dell studied the tactics used by domestic abusers to surveil their intimate partners. Dell co-founded the Clinic to End Tech Abuse. The group is staffed with volunteers who “check survivors’ devices for spyware, disentangle joint accounts, and provide other forms of privacy and safety guidance,” according to the MacArthur Foundation’s description.

• Loka Ashwood, a professor at the University of Kentucky and a sociologist who has examined environmental injustice and anti-government sentiment in rural communities. She co-authored a book in 2023 that provides an overview of right to farm laws. Intended to protect family farms, the laws have been used by agricultural corporations to boost profits, Ashwood found.

• Alice Wong, a writer, an editor and a disability activist. Wong founded the Disability Visibility Project “to amplify the unfiltered voices of disabled people and explore the intersections of race, ethnicity, gender identity and disability,” according to the MacArthur Foundation. She has also brought attention to policies that adversely affect people with disabilities, including bans on drinking straws and health care systems that don’t require masks.

Other grant winners include artists, writers, an oceanographer, an evolutionary biologist, historians, a cabaret performer, a filmmaker and an astronomer.

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