The campus of Yale University (Michelle McLoughlin/Reuters) In an unfortunate but expected move on February 3, the U.S. Department of Justice dismissed its lawsuit against Yale University. The lawsuit, filed on October 8, 2020, accused Yale of illegally discriminating against undergraduate applicants to the university based on race and national origin. The two-sentence court filing

Michael W. McConnell and Ken Gormley argue in the Washington Post that “the constitutionality of a Senate trial on Trump’s impeachment is not seriously in doubt.” They think that the House may not impeach an official who has left office but that the Senate may try a former official who was impeached while still in

NRPLUS MEMBER ARTICLE D on’t look now, but every major excuse for keeping schools closed — as they still are for about two-fifths of American kids — is crumbling before our eyes. Joe Biden’s CDC says reopening is safe. The winter wave of COVID infections is finally falling back to earth. And teachers are rapidly getting

Stained glass at St. Michael’s Church in New York, N.Y. (Courtesy St. Michael’s Church, NY, NY) The AP doesn’t quite get Catholicism. But why should that stop it from attacking the Catholic Church? In early 2020, a pandemic came to America. We started staying home, then we were ordered to stay home. The market tanked.

President Obama and Sonia Sotomayor in 2009 (Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty) 1996—In a muddled speech on the “majesty of the law” at Suffolk University law school, then-district judge Sonia Sotomayor complains that “the public fails to appreciate the importance of indefiniteness in the law”—indefiniteness that sometimes results from the fact that “a given judge (or judges) may

Rep. Liz Cheney (R, WY) at the “Congress of Tomorrow” Joint Republican Issues Conference in Philadelphia, Pa., January 25, 2017. (File photo: Mark Makela/Reuters) Matt Gaetz may be auditioning for many roles in the Republican Party, but evidently House Republican whip isn’t one of them. Gaetz confidently predicted that a majority of House Republicans would

The Nebraska Republican party is likely to vote on a resolution censuring Senator Ben Sasse for criticizing Donald Trump and blaming the former president for the January 6 attack on the Capitol. Sasse responds to the censure resolution with a video in which he directly addresses members of the Nebraska GOP State Central Committee: “What

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) arrives prior to a vote in the U.S. House of Representives on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., February 4, 2021. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters) The House voted 230-199 to remove Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R., Ga.) from the Education and Budget committees on Thursday evening. Democrats pushed for Greene’s removal because of

(Nicholas Pfosi/Reuters) Jim, it isn’t a solution in search of a problem. They just don’t want to say what the problem is: that there’s a glut of PPE on the market and a lot of slack capacity, and so politically connected firms are leaning on the Biden administration to soak it up through large public

The House of Representatives has 435 members, and rest assured that at any one time there are several cranks and fanatics in the ranks of both parties. But House Democrats want to make a special case of one member. They are pressing to censure or expel Marjorie Taylor Greene, a freshman Republican from Georgia, for

NRPLUS MEMBER ARTICLE O n the eve of the EU’s first antigen-type vaccine clearance, its rollout of COVID shots already had the look of a train wreck. On January 29, the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, a type known as “viral vector,” received a “conditional marketing authorization” for use in the EU on the recommendation of the Union’s European

(Lucy Nicholson/Reuters) Since the 1980s, a Wendy’s has sat right in the middle of the intersections of New York Avenue and Florida Avenue NE in Washington, D.C. It really has no right to be there. But, then again, neither does the intersection itself. Originally the edge of the city proper and hardly accounted for in

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) speaks during a news conference with other House Republicans at the U.S. Capitol, December 10, 2020. (Erin Scott/Reuters) House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy on Wednesday ripped into his Democratic colleagues for refusing to consider a compromise regarding stripping GOP Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of her committee assignments. “I understand

Representative Liz Cheney (R., Wyo.) speaks at a news conference on Capitol Hill, May 8, 2019. (Aaron P. Bernstein/Reuters) Representative Liz Cheney (R., Wyo.) refused to apologize for her vote to impeach former President Trump during a meeting of the House GOP caucus on Wednesday, CNN reported. A number of Republicans have called to oust

The campus of Yale University (Michelle McLoughlin/Reuters) As I noted yesterday, it’s expected that the Biden administration will reverse the Trump administration’s position supporting the appeal to the Supreme Court by Asian-American students who maintain that Harvard discriminates against Asian-American applicants in admissions (Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard). Today, the Justice Department notified the

The Ethics and Public Policy Center, where I’m a visiting fellow, announced today that Roger Severino will be joining our team of scholars — a welcome and gratifying addition, and the first hire we’ve made at EPPC since Ryan Anderson succeeded Ed Whelan as president earlier this week. Roger joins us at EPPC after three

President Joe Biden swears in presidential appointees in a virtual ceremony in the State Dining Room of the White House, January 20, 2021. (Tom Brenner/Reuters) Practically speaking, deference to Europe equals deference to Russian, Chinese, and Iranian interests. A common refrain of the Biden campaign was that as president, the Democratic nominee would seek to

(Abubaker Lubowa/Reuters) Can a former parish music director sue the Archdiocese of Chicago for a parish priest’s supposedly “offensive” speech about plaintiff’s sexuality and other matters? Or does the First Amendment’s ministerial exception — which protects religious autonomy by barring secular authorities from interfering in a church’s selection and supervision of ministers — preclude this

The first two weeks of the Biden administration have been dominated by promotion of “racial equity” and eradication of “systemic racism.” Setting aside the fact that structural/institutional/systemic racism is largely a canard, and the administration’s invocation thereof is primarily a tool to expand progressives’ power, there’s one inarguable case of systemic racism that the administration could

(maroke/Getty Images) Dan Lips of the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity reviews the numbers: In March, Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, which provided $30.75 billion to the U.S. Department of Education for an Education Stabilization Fund. The fund included $16.2 billion for K-12 education, including $13.2 billion for an

NRPLUS MEMBER ARTICLE F or decades, the government of Pakistan has relentlessly persecuted the members of the messianic Muslim Ahmadiyya sect within Pakistani borders. Although Pakistan is a Muslim-majority country, its constitution states that Ahmadi Muslims are non-Muslims, and blasphemy laws that criminalize public displays of worship of the Ahmadi faith empower courts to hand

If you somehow haven’t yet acquired The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law for yourself—co-edited by Sixth Circuit judge Jeffrey S. Sutton and me, and featuring a beautiful foreword by Justice Elena Kagan—and haven’t yet given it as a gift to many of your friends and loved ones, be assured that

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R., Ga.) walks to the House floor during the impeachment debate in Washington, D.C., January 13, 2021. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters) House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer has reportedly given GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy an ultimatum: remove Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R., Ga.) from her committee assignments in 72 hours or Democrats will bring

How can the U.S. get more vaccine shots off shelves and into arms? “By harnessing the power of simple economics,” say economists Jeffrey Clemens and Joshua Gottlieb. In an op-ed in The Hill, they note: For a two-dose COVID-19 vaccine course, Medicare now pays providers $45, too stingy for this crucial service. The crisis calls

Senator Mitt Romney (R., Utah) speaks as bipartisan members of the Senate and House gather to announce a framework for fresh coronavirus relief legislation at a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., December 1, 2020. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters) Signs of life in the legislative branch are always welcome, and the move by ten Republican

Vlad Tenev, co-founder and co-CEO of investing app Robinhood, speaks during an event in Brooklyn, New York, May 10, 2016. (Brendan McDermid/Reuters) Vladimir Tenev, chief executive and co-founder of the online stock brokerage Robinhood, opened up Monday in a conversation with Tesla’s Elon Musk about Robinhood’s decision to restrict trading last week on several spiking

Last month, I had a piece about Joe Biden’s stimulus plan, under which the federal government would fling $1.9 trillion at pretty much everyone in sight. Now ten moderate Republican senators have a $618 billion counteroffer and are meeting with Biden today. The number ten is significant because these senators could combine with the 50

Chicago’s Mayor Lori Lightfoot speaks during a science initiative event at the University of Chicago in Chicago, Ill., July 23, 2020. (Kamil Krzaczynski/Reuters) Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Chicago Public Schools CEO Janice Jackson on Sunday ordered all teachers who don’t have permission to stay home due to medical concerns to come back to the

NRPLUS MEMBER ARTICLE J oe Manchin may be the second-most powerful person in Washington, D.C., right now. He is the 50th senator whose vote Democrats must secure in order to have Vice President Kamala Harris break a tie and pass legislation. “Manchin controls everything,” a senior Democratic Senate aide told Politico’s Playbook today.  Democrats are

GameStop store in Manhattan, January 27, 2021. (Carlo Allegri/Reuters) After the army of day traders that populates Reddit’s WallStreetBets forum started piling into GameStop stock, the company’s share price went from $40 to $400 in the span of a week. The brick-and-mortar video-game retailer garnered so much attention that it ranked as the single most-traded