JD Vance Fails Constitutional Law If Vice President Vance was graded on his knowledge and application of constitutional law, writes Prof. Jules Epstein, he would come up short.

What Are Abortion Shield Laws? Abortion shield laws are in the spotlight as New York protects a doctor from charges in Louisiana and Texas. Dean Rebouché, who helped draft the first such bill in 2022, tells Time Magazine the cases “point to what we can expect moving forward for intense interstate conflict … given that Dobbs returned abortion to the states and a third of the country prohibits abortion from the earliest moments of pregnancy or before six weeks, just as many states have codified abortion rights in their constitutions and their state laws.”

Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies Department hosts LGBTQ+ panel – The Temple News Professor Dara Purvis discussed the series of Executive Orders targeting transgender people at a recent University faculty panel. “It’s direction, it’s not law,” Purvis said. “That’s the important thing. It is a direction to the executive branch, which includes agencies saying, ‘Here’s how I, the president, want you to implement, to execute the law.’ It doesn’t overrule statutes. It doesn’t change the language of statutes. It doesn’t overrule Supreme Court decisions. But it can have a lot of impact.”

The Heat: U.S. Politics Prof. Craig Green joined CGTN’s The Heat to discuss a series of executive orders that aim to reshape how the US government operates..

Shield Laws Are the Fault Line in the Battle Over Abortion Access NY governor Kathy Hochul has refused to honor extradition requests for Dr. Mary Carpenter, charged with violating abortion bans in Louisiana and Texas, citing New York’s shield law. Dean Rebouché explains how such laws depart from democratic norms and why they have become necessary.

  Pennsylvania Law Schools Are Seeing Double-Digit Boosts in 2025 Applications Temple Law is one of three PA law schools experiencing more than a 50% increase in applications over last year.While leaders cited a variety of factors from changes on the LSAT to political issues, they agreed that admissions would be more competitive across the board. “It’s definitely going to be more competitive,” said Asst. Dean for Admissions and Financial Aid Johanne Johnston.”Applicants know … there are more applicants to law schools, so they in turn are submitting more applications to try to hedge their bets.”

Texas legislators have filed bills that would make abortion pills controlled substances, which would introduce recordkeeping and storage requirements that could make pharmacists reluctant to dispense the drugs. Dean Rebouche tells Politico “There’s potential for this to create a kind of fishing expedition for miscarriage management.” Read More

As the power of a US passport falls, dual citizenship provides political risk insurance. Prof. Peter Spiro says “This time around, the stakes are higher. During the first Trump administration, legacy political guardrails were still in place. Now, many are gone. There is a sense that what Trump wants, Trump will be able to get.” Read More

Anti-abortion activists are proposing legislation to curtail speech about the availability of abortion services. Dean Rachel Rebouche tells the Guardian that “controlling what people can find out about services that are not legal in their state but are legal somewhere else is part of this larger conversation post-Dobbs.” Read More

Bankruptcy has become a popular path for companies facing mass tort liabilities, Prof. Jonathan Lipson tells NPR. It “can give the company significant advantages through the bankruptcy process that they never have in ordinary litigation, including halting those other litigations, halting the discovery process, halting determinations of liability on the merits, and many other things that can be quite valuable to the company but might be costly to victims.” Read More