Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Interested public. Another behemoth digest this week. Major stories include new research from the Center for American Progress & the American Bar Association and a new executive order extending the moratorium on student debt collections.

Take care of one another,

Sam

Editor’s Choice(s)

• In the United States, the Center for American Progress released “Pipelines to Power: Encouraging Professional Diversity on the Federal Appellate Bench”, a report concluding that:

“professional diversity on the federal appellate courts is severely lacking, with significant implications for the type of legal expertise underlying the opinions these judges issue. Only about 1 percent of sitting circuit court judges have spent the majority of their careers as public defenders or within a legal aid setting. In contrast, the federal appellate bench is swamped with those who spent the majority of their careers in private practice or as federal prosecutors—making up more than 70 percent of all sitting appellate judges. No sitting judge spent the majority of their career with a nonprofit civil rights organization…This lack of diversity not only reflects the closed and elitist nature of the federal appellate bench but also represents a barrier to the courts’ ability to develop intellectually rich jurisprudence grounded in an awareness of a broad set of individuals’ experiences across the country. To improve this state of affairs, significant disruptions are needed—from law school through every stage of an attorney’s prejudicial career—to broaden pathways to the federal bench and challenge long-held assumptions on the “right” type of attorney to take up a gavel.” (emphasis added)

• Also in the United States, the American Bar Association released its “2020 Profile of the Legal Profession”, a report in which “[t]wo new section were created specifically for the 2020 Profile: A statistical look at legal desserts–areas with few lawyers–including the number of lawyers in every U.S. county and maps that show where lawyers are and aren’t, [and a] survey…that measures how law school debt is affecting everyday life for young lawyers.”
  • As one source summarized the report’s student debt section: “student loan debt affects nearly every facet of [new lawyers’] lives: 48% said they had postponed having children or decided not to have children. 29% said they had postponed marriage or decided not to get married. 56% postponed buying a home or decided not to buy a house. Some reported moving in with parents. 37% chose a job because of a higher salary over a job they wanted more.” (emphasis added)

COVID-19 and Remote Legal Practice

• In Philadelphia PA, “[a] family court judge has refused to wear a face mask during in-person court hearings amid the COVID-19 pandemic and has sometimes ordered lawyers to remove their face masks, according to a letter by a public defender group.”
• In Mississippi, “[t]he Mississippi Supreme Court will reevaluate the possibility of allowing plea hearings in felony cases to be done by videoconference.”
• In Alaska, “[w]ith coronavirus on the upswing, a group of recent law school graduates say it’s too risky to sit indoors for the Bar exam. They’re asking the Alaska Supreme Court to allow applicants to practice law without taking the two-day proctored test.”
• In Maryland, “[m]embers of the Maryland General Assembly penned a letter Thursday, appealing to the Maryland judiciary to consider allowing recent law school graduates to practice without passing the bar exam, citing a series of safety concerns surrounding test administration during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
  • Also in Maryland, “[f]our top attorneys with Maryland Legal Aid were fired last month after sending a letter to their boss that pushed back against plans to reopen the offices during the pandemic.”
• In New Jersey, the Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers of New Jersey issued formal objections to the state’s Administrative Office of the Courts plan for partially remote jury trials.
• In Oklahoma, “[t]he COVID-19 pandemic has complicated how…lawyers who serve older Native Americans in rural parts of [the state]…safely continue their work.”

Rule of Law & Voting Rights

• In Washington DC, “President Trump [] suggested he was holding up a deal on coronavirus relief in part to ensure the U.S. Postal Service would not have sufficient funds to handle mass mail-in ballots this fall, falsely conflating various pressures the agency is facing.”f
• In Florida, “felons [and] lawyers face ‘tremendous confusion’ on voting rights.”
• In Boston MA, “[w]ith just under eight weeks to respond to the U.S. census,…[s]everal populations in the city are at risk of being undercounted, including people of color, immigrants, renters and crowded households[; ]Several nonprofit organizations have asked the secretary’s office to release funding previously promised, so that Boston can get the funding and representation it needs for the next 10 years.”
• In New York, “President Donald Trump [] insisted that a grand jury subpoena for his tax returns was overly broad and issued in bad faith and that as President he deserves extra protection from what he called harassment by Manhattan’s district attorney.”

Legal Technology

• In Canada, a policy analyst on technology, cybersecurity and democracy at Ryerson University argued that “[c]ountless studies, inquires and commissions on Canadian policing have identified Black and Indigenous peoples as disproportionately vulnerable to police surveillance and violence…The adoption of data-driven technologies that expand the scope and depth of surveillance by police therefore moves beyond privacy and involves questions related to our democracy, including human dignity and the right to be free from discrimination. This makes the issue a concern for all Canadians.”
• In Dallas TX, “[t]he Dallas County Public Defender’s Office and Uptrust, the social justice communication platform, have announced a new partnership to employ Uptrust’s two-way communication technology to help defendants make it to court.”
• In New Jersey, “[i]n a case involving the intersection of technology, privacy rights and law enforcement, the state Supreme Court ruled 4-3 that neither federal nor state laws protected a former Essex County sheriff’s officer…from disclosing the pass codes to his iPhones.”
• In Florida, residents “facing eviction have access to a new online tool to create a legal response based on the state’s limited extension of a moratorium on evictions for nonpayment directly related to COVID-19.” The tool is http://floridaevictionhelp.org/

Non-Profit & Gov’t Management & Hiring

• In New York, “Attorney General Letitia James announced [a] lawsuit [against the National Rifle Association (NRA),] filed after an 18 month investigation conducted by its office. The lawsuit claims that the NRA has violated the state’s non-profit laws by illegally redirecting tens of millions of dollars from the group through excessive expenses, contracts that directly benefited relatives or close associates of high ranking members and board memebers and grossly excessive salaries and bonuses.”
• In The United States, “[t]he Association of Administrative Law Judges accused the Social Security Administration of breaking federal labor law when it implemented a partial union contract on Monday.”
• In Government Executive, a correspondent took “a look at Kamala Harris’ Record on Federal Workforce Issues.”
• In Maryland, “[s]taff from the state’s office of the public defender are planning to unionize after going public earlier this month.”
• In Hawaii, “nonprofits are adapting their services and business models to patch up sudden funding gaps generated by the financial chaos unleashed by COVID-19. Experts say the current economic climate will undoubtedly force some philanthropic organizations to merge or close.”

Student Loans & Student Debt

• In the United States, “new polling shows that measures to help those with student debt remain overwhelmingly popular.”
• In Washington DC, “President Trump signed an executive memorandum that purports to temporarily extend student loan relief for millions of Americans. Trump issued the memorandum after Congress was unable to reach a compromise on extending student loan relief and other economic assistance programs that are expiring…Advocates for student loan borrowers slammed the president’s memorandum as woefully insufficient.”
  • Meanwhile, Student Loan Hero advised that “the suspension will end eventually, so it’s worth preparing now for that new beginning.”
• Also in Washington DC, a new “investigative report, issued by The American Federation of Teachers and the Student Borrower Protection Center, examined records accessed through state and federal open records requests. The authors argue that there continues to be widespread problems with the PSLF program.”
  • The full report, “Broken Promises: Employer Certification Form Failure,” is available here.
• In Forbes, a contributor discussed “What Kamala Harris Could Mean for Your Student Loans.”

Immigration, Refugee, & Citizenship Issues

• In the United States, “[t]he Trump administration has argued that, because of the pandemic, it must circumvent protections built into immigration law for migrant children, which dictate they should be turned over to the Department of Health and Human Services (and ultimately to sponsors in the U.S.) and given a chance to seek asylum. Administration officials have said that they can’t risk that infected children would spread COVID-19 through the system. Yet even after children test negative for the virus, they aren’t being allowed to access the usual protections.”
• In Farmville VA, “[a] federal judge has ordered immigration authorities to stop transferring people in and out of a detention center [] that has become a hotspot for the coronavirus. The National Immigration Project and Legal Aid Justice Center filed a lawsuit late last month [in which t]hey alleged that large numbers of detainees were transferred into crowded conditions before they were quarantined, leading to what the New York Times called the worst outbreak of coronavirus at any such facility in the U.S.”
• In Bend OR, “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Field Director David Drasin refused an immigration attorney’s demand to meet with men seized from the streets of Bend, Oregon, and held on a bus for hours as protesters tried to block the bus from moving, according to a new lawsuit.”
• In Tijuana Mexico, “[s]ince the US government enacted a policy known as “Remain in Mexico” in January 2019, asylum seekers have been forced to wait for months in violent towns across the border until their US asylum hearing date, forcing many into makeshift camps as shelters filled up – a situation made even more precarious recently as Mexico has some of the highest COVID-19 infection and death rates in the world.”

Access to Justice – Civil & Economic

• In the United States, “legal aid providers are estimating the national price tag for helping tenants facing the prospect of losing their places to live will top $2.5 billion.”
• Also in the United States, “housing experts say that [the executive action President Donald Trump took, which is] being billed as an eviction moratorium is really just a few recommendations that will not actually do much, if anything, to keep renters in their homes.”
• In New York, “[t]he freeze on residential evictions in New York that began in March because of the pandemic will be extended until October 1, state court officials announced on Wednesday…A new memo from Chief Administrative Judge Lawrence Marks says renters cannot be removed from their homes before October, but eviction proceedings filed before March 17 can resume, only if conferenced in front of a judge. Eviction cases filed after March 17 remain suspended.”
• In New York NY, “Mayor Bill de Blasio announced [] the city’s newest initiative to help renters and tenants struggling due to the coronavirus pandemic[:] the Tenant Protection Portal that will be free and accessible to all tenants.”
• In Indiana, “[a] statewide moratorium on evictions and utility shut-offs is set to expire Friday, which could leave thousands of Hoosiers scrambling for help…[T]he director of the Fort Wayne Housing Authority…says he’s seeing more and more clients seeking state rental assistance now that the moratorium on evictions is slated to end.”
• In Northeast Ohio, “housing advocates [] are working to connect those facing eviction with resources and legal representation as courts resume hearings.”

Access to Justice – Criminal & Decarceration

• In San Quentin CA, “[i]n order to minimize the number of COVID-19 patients, health experts recommended cutting San Quentin’s population by 50%. But this recommendation has been met with hesitation. Alameda County Chief Public Defender Brendon Woods told YR Media that before the outbreak happened, he submitted a proposal to Governor Gavin Newsom in which he outlined a plan to cut California’s prison population by about 30% to minimize the chances of major outbreaks. But Governor Newsom didn’t adopt his proposal, and Woods said another major prison outbreak is ‘just a matter of time.’”
• In New York NY, “[t]he Bronx Defenders, one of the city’s largest nonprofit legal advocacies, and the New York Giants pro football team are pairing up ‘to combat inequities in the criminal, immigration, family, and civil legal systems,’ according to a joint news release from the organizations.”
• In Chicago IL, “[a] Cook County judge [] denied a request by the public defender’s office and a coalition of activist groups to immediately make Chicago police give suspects speedy access to phone calls after arrest, saying the circumstances do not constitute an emergency that requires him to step in.”
• In Oahu HI, “[as t]he outbreak of COVID-19 cases in the state corrections system continued to expand…Hawaii Public Defender James Tabe said Sunday night that his office is working on a new request to the Hawaii Supreme Court to take steps to reduce the inmate population to allow for social distancing and help slow the spread of the disease.”

Criminal Justice Reform

• In the United States, “[t]he U.S. Conference of Mayors has tapped Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr to help put together a list of reforms and recommendations aimed at building trust between police departments and their communities while rooting out racist policing practices.”
• Also in the United States, “[m]ass arrests following nights of tumultuous unrest in Chicago and Portland, Ore., have pitted liberal prosecutors against police and even Democratic allies over concerns that lenient charges will lead to further property damage and violence.”
• In Washington DC, “[t]he DC Police Union is seeking an injunction that would block Mayor Muriel Bowser from publicly releasing the body-camera footage and names of police officers who have “committed an officer-involved death” in the nearly six years since the camera program’s inception. A new D.C. law mandates that Bowser release the information by Saturday.”
• In Portland OR, “Multnomah County’s newly elected District Attorney, Mike Schmidt, unveiled a new policy on how his office will prosecute cases for those arrested during the protests in Portland. The policy [] says the district attorney’s office will decline to prosecute cases where charges only involve violations of city ordinances, or cases that don’t involve ‘deliberate property damage, theft, or threat of force against another person.’”
• In Pima County AZ, “[a]fter 40 years of the prosecutor’s office in Pima County being under the same leadership, Laura Conover overwhelmingly defeated the hand-picked replacement of 24-year sitting DA Barba LaWall—out-distancing her nearest opponent, the head of the homicides investigation unit, by a 57-36 margin…Just since May, she is the latest in a string of wins for progressive prosecutors—Mike Schmidt in Portland, Jose Garza in Austin, Mimi Rocah in Westchester, NY, Eli Savit in Michigan, and Kim Gardner in St. Louis.”
• In Hennepin County MN, “[a] study of one year’s traffic data in Minneapolis shows Black Drivers accounted for nearly 80 percent of police searches and routine traffic stops in the predominantly-white city.”
• In Salt Lake City UT, “[s]ome Black Lives Matter protesters…could face up to life in prison if they’re convicted of splashing red paint and smashing windows during a protest, a potential punishment that stands out among demonstrators arrested around the country and one that critics say doesn’t fit the alleged crime.”
• On the Internet, Democracy Now “host[ed] a debate on [Kamala Harris’] record as California attorney general and San Francisco district attorney, when she proudly billed herself as “top cop” and called for more cops on the street. San Francisco Deputy Public Defender Niki Solis says Harris was the state’s most progressive DA and advocated for “so many policies and so many alternatives to incarceration.” Law professor Lara Bazelon says Harris was on the wrong side of history for often opposing criminal justice reform, though her record did change as a senator.”