Raak Law v. Gast
Fighting gender discrimination in Iowa’s judicial selection process
Rachel Raak Law is a realtor and mom of three in the western Iowa town of Correctionville. She spent six years as a gubernatorial appointee to a District Judicial Nominating Commission, which vets and recommends individuals to serve as judges on state trial courts. She also served on the Woodbury County Drug Court, the nation's ...
Roberts et al. v. Bassett et al.
Fighting New York’s illegal racial preferences in COVID treatment
Facing a severe shortage of two oral antiviral drugs and monoclonal antibodies that effectively treat COVID-19, New York's Health Department issued directives that providers use when allocating treatments in both the state and city of New York. The directives instruct healthcare providers to prioritize people based not just on objective, scientific ...
National Center for Public Policy Research v. Weber
California’s race quota requires discrimination on corporate boards
By the end of 2021, every company subject to AB 979 must have a minimum of one director from an underrepresented community on its board. By the end of 2022, any company with four or fewer directors must have one underrepresented minority board member, any company with between four and nine directors must have two underrepresented board members, and ...
Mark Shirley and Ole Time Smokehouse v. Town of Farmville, et al.
Food truck entrepreneur defends livelihood from North Carolina town’s unlawful interference
Mark Shirley was making a good living as the general manager of an auto dealership in Eastern North Carolina, but even his comfortable salary couldn't feed his lifelong passion for cooking. So, in September 2019, after a year of exhaustive research into the restaurant industry, Mark left his profitable job to launch a food truck business called Ole ...
Celeste Mohr, D.D.S., et al. v. Texas State Board of Dental Examiners et al.
Defending the right to practice teledentistry from state-sponsored protectionism
Dr. Celeste Mohr began practicing teledentistry as a way to pursue a livelihood while also staying at home to care for her two autistic children. She offers her remote dental consultations via TheTeleDentists, a startup teledentistry platform that offers direct-to-consumer services. As with other types of telemedicine, teledentistry uses video, pho ...
Ursula Newell-Davis & Sivad Home and Community Services, LLC v. Courtney N. Phillips, et al.
New Orleans social worker challenges Louisiana law that stopped her from helping special needs children and their families
Ursula Newell-Davis cares deeply for those most in need in her New Orleans community. After two decades of working with special needs children, she decided to launch a company that would provide much-needed respite services to this vulnerable population. Inspired by her experience as a special needs parent herself, Ursula wants to give these childr ...
Crystal Waldron and Club 519 v. Governor Roy A. Cooper
North Carolina couple fights to save bar from governor’s unlawful COVID power grab
When the COVID-19 pandemic struck, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper unilaterally declared a state of emergency that only he is authorized to end. Since then, the governor has issued a series of executive orders that allow nearly every establishment that sells alcoholic beverages to remain open but that force most private bars (establishments whic ...
Anthony Barilla v. City of Houston
Accordionist fights government squeeze on free expression and livelihood
Anthony (Tony) Barilla is a highly accomplished accordionist who wants to busk—that is, perform in public for tips—on the streets of Houston, Texas. A city law, however, prohibits busking activities everywhere except Houston's very small Theater District. There, artists may accept tips for their performances, but only after completing an onerou ...
Creighton Meland Jr. v. Shirley N. Weber, Secretary of State of California
Fighting California’s discriminatory woman quota law
Last year, California enacted a woman quota law, which requires all publicly traded companies that are incorporated or headquartered in the state to have a certain number of females on their boards of directors. This law ignores that women are making great strides in the boardroom without a government mandate, and therefore perpetuates the myth tha ...