Senate Bill 1, the Ohio Higher Education Enhancement Act (HEEA), was signed into law on March 28, 2025 and went into effect June 26, 2025, impacting public universities and colleges throughout the state. Ohio schools have...more
The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia recently issued a significant ruling in City of Saint Paul, Minnesota, et al. v. Christopher Wright, addressing constitutional constraints on executive agency conduct in...more
In State v. Barthel, the N.C. Court of Appeals vacated William Barthel’s convictions of disrupting an official meeting and resisting a public officer. At a special meeting of the Avery County Board of Commissioners,...more
Italian parliament debates free expression and the protection of civil rights in advertising - Is banning a sexually suggestive ad considered viewpoint discrimination, or a defense of women's civil rights? In October,...more
In Defending Education v. Olentangy Local School District Board of Education, _ F.3d _ (6th Cir. 2025), the United States Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that an Ohio public school district’s prohibition against...more
Can a public school discipline students for using pronouns that reflect a classmate’s sex assigned at birth, rather than their gender identity? According to the Sixth Circuit’s en banc decision issued November 6, 2025, the...more
On October 1, 2025, according to external reporting by The Wall Street Journal, the Washington Examiner, and others, the White House sent a letter inviting nine universities to enter into an accompanying nine-page Compact for...more
In March, Alabama enacted legislation targeting Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives. The law, SB129, is set to take effect on October 1, 2025. If enacted, it would prohibit public schools and universities from...more
Alan Dershowitz, retired Harvard Law professor and former attorney for Jeffrey Epstein and President Trump, has made some headlines over the past week over his feud with a pierogi vendor on Martha’s Vineyard. According to...more
As we reported on January 21, 2025, and January 29, 2025, the Trump Administration issued Executive Orders targeting diversity, equity and inclusion (“DEI”) initiatives in the federal government and private sector, namely...more
President Trump issued two anti-DEI executive orders at the start of his second term that shook up the workplace and left federal contractors and private employers wondering how to comply. Employers grappled with...more
In a 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court vacated the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit’s stay of a temporary injunction in NetChoice, LLC v. Paxton, a closely watched case involving a novel Texas law purporting to...more
Prior to (and more so during) the pandemic, many individuals who found themselves working from home were limited in ways to express their uniqueness, their personalities, the things that made them, well, them. It started with...more
On December 1, 2021, Judge Pitman of the Western District of Texas granted a preliminary injunction to prevent the Texas Attorney General from enforcing HB 20. NetChoice v. Paxton. HB 20 prohibits large social media platforms...more
The June 14, 2018 post “The President May Not Block Twitter Followers Because They Disagree With Him Politically” reported how the District Court in Knight First Amendment Inst. at Columbia University v. Trump, 302 F.Supp.3d...more
With the presidential election less than a month away, it is more important than ever that employers proactively manage their work environment to protect against the potential pitfalls that can arise when political...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: With the most contentious election of our lifetimes fast approaching, we might expect employees to engage in political conduct and share strong, controversial opinions while off duty, especially on social...more
Welcome to the inaugural issue of Decoded , Spilman's e-newsletter focusing on technology law, including data security, privacy standards, financing technologies, and digital-based means of conducting business. When it comes...more
Widely considered a star of social media, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez backed down from a Twitter fight in the form of a lawsuit filed by one of her Twitter followers. The suit, filed by former New York assemblyman Dov Hikind,...more
On June 24, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Iancu v. Brunetti, struck down the Lanham Act’s prohibition on the registration of “immoral” or “scandalous” trademarks. Justice Kagan wrote for the 6-3 majority, holding that the...more
In a 6–3 opinion, the Supreme Court of the United States affirmed a 2017 US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit decision holding the ban on registration of immoral or scandalous trademarks under the Lanham Act to be an...more
Two years ago, we wrote about a possible First Amendment challenge involving Donald Trump’s practice of blocking certain Twitter users from his @realDonaldTrump account. ...more
“FUCT.” You can pronounce it as four letters, one after the other. Or you can pronounce it like Justice Kagan as the “past participle form of a well-known word of profanity.” Either way, the word can be registered as a...more
In a closely watched case, the Second U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held on July 8, 2019 that President Trump violated the First Amendment by blocking disfavored users on his @RealDonaldTrump Twitter account. This important...more
One-year Clock for Filing IPR Petition Applies to Litigants and Parties that Become Privies of the Litigant Prior to Institution. In Power Integrations, Inc v. Semiconductor Components, Appeal No. 2018-1607, the Federal...more