LAW360 (Native feed)

An Ohio federal judge overseeing sprawling opioid multidistrict litigation adopted the recommendation of a Harvard Law School professor that more information is needed before he can approve a request for a common benefit fund setting aside $3.3 billion in attorney fees.

The Treasury Department expects to take an additional week past its planned date to begin sending $3.2 billion in COVID-19-related funding to tribal governments, telling a D.C. federal judge Wednesday it needs the extra time because hundreds of tribes have not submitted the right data to receive the much-delayed money.

The Second Circuit unanimously upheld the convictions of attorney Timothy Muir and his client, former racing driver Scott Tucker, for their roles in a $2 billion payday loan scheme, rejecting on Tuesday a tribal sovereignty defense that failed at trial.

Updating old protocols governing oil spill response methods is not optional for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a California federal court said Tuesday in refusing to dismiss claims the EPA is shirking that responsibility.

The federal government has moved to ax claims against it in a proposed class action that aims to halt construction of a NextEra Energy Inc. wind farm in Kansas and alleges the project lacks proper review of its potential to harm a local tribe and rural agricultural community.

The Trump administration has completed some of its top deregulatory efforts, weakening environmental rules for power plants, cars and waterways. But the administration is racing to beat a statutory deadline after which Democrats can undo final rules if they sweep the November elections.

A significant challenge in practicing law remotely is the use and handling of documents without paper, because common digital tools such as email or even secure file transfer applications are problematic, say attorneys at Baker McKenzie.

A man in Texas was hit by federal authorities this week with a temporary restraining order demanding that he stop selling what he advertised as cures for COVID-19 through his website.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security can exclude certain immigration policies from review over environmental harm after a California federal judge ruled that the exemption doesn't lead to higher immigration numbers, let alone population-driven ecological degradation.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency this week ended years of deference to state and tribal governments to enforce Clean Water Act requirements on pipeline projects that cut through their jurisdictions, in a bid to deliver more regulatory certainty to developers, but the landmark change is far from cemented as it likely will face tough challenges in court.

The Trump administration cannot proceed with a planned land exchange that would allow an isolated Aleutian community to construct a road through Alaska's Izembek National Wildlife Refuge, a federal judge has said, in a win for environmental groups.

More than a dozen groups have urged the U.S. Supreme Court to review a Ninth Circuit majority's ruling in favor of the Democratic National Committee that found two Arizona voting regulations to be discriminatory. 

A Florida judge has reluctantly dismissed a group of young people's suit accusing local officials of violating their state constitutional rights to a safe environment by promoting fossil fuel use despite knowing its climate change impacts, ruling from the bench that it isn't the court's place to legislate.

The federal government, business groups and a coalition of states have said the Trump administration's rule narrowing the scope of the Clean Water Act's jurisdiction was a reasonable move that shouldn't be halted just because some states like California disagree with the result.

A Canadian First Nations-owned cigarette company has urged the Second Circuit to revive its challenge to Connecticut's enforcement of a state tobacco law, saying a reporting provision meant to stem illegal cigarette trafficking is unconstitutional.

The legal industry is uniquely positioned, and indeed obligated, to respond to the racial disparities made clear by the recent killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, but lawyers must be willing to be uncomfortable, says Tiffani Lee at Holland & Knight.

Three Native American tribes have asked a Washington federal judge to stop the Lummi Nation from acting on its plans to begin winter crab fishing in their essential fishing territories north of Seattle in violation of a federal fishing plan, saying that the tribe has only recently decided to fish there after staying away for 45 years.

The U.S. Department of the Interior's chief attorney has killed part of an Obama-era decision by his predecessor backing tribal claims against North Dakota to mineral rights, saying the state legally owns submerged lands beneath the Missouri River where it flows through a tribe's reservation.

The Federal Communications Commission in an order Monday made it easier for low-income consumers living on rural tribal lands to obtain discounts on broadband internet and phone services during the coronavirus pandemic.

A California federal judge has rejected the Yurok Tribe's bid to lift a stay in a suit against the federal government seeking to protect a salmon species from the impacts of an irrigation project in the Klamath River.