Rebecca LeGrand Appears on CNN to Discuss Trump’s Constitutional Legal Challenges

Rebecca LeGrand recently appeared on CNN’s Laura Coates Live to discuss developments in an Insurrection Clause lawsuit against Donald Trump. Rebecca discussed the lawsuit arguing that the 14th Amendment’s Insurrection Clause prohibits Trump from appearing on the Colorado presidential ballot.

The panel aired live on CNN on November 15.

Rebecca LeGrand Appears on CNN to Discuss Recent Developments in the Trump Trial in Georgia

Rebecca LeGrand recently appeared on CNN’s Laura Coates Live to discuss Donald Trump’s election-interference legal battle. On the panel, Rebecca discussed recent developments in Fulton County’s prosecution of Trump, and more than a dozen other co-defendants, for conspiring to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results after Joe Biden won the state.

The panel aired live on CNN on November 15.

LeGrand Law Urges Supreme Court to Reject Constitutional Challenge to Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

On Monday, we asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reject a constitutional challenge to the mechanism funding the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The amicus brief, filed on behalf of two prominent financial-regulation scholars, addresses a Fifth Circuit decision holding that the CFPB’s funding mechanism violates Appropriations Clause.

As the brief explains, upholding the Fifth Circuit’s decision would stifle credit markets and likely throw the economy into recession. And its logic would invalidate the similar mechanisms funding other federal bank regulators:

[Upholding the Fifth Circuit’s decision] would expose credit markets to acute and systemic distress. The court’s logic would further require defunding all federal banking regulators, not just the CFPB. The Appropriations Clause does not compel this result, and the financial system cannot withstand it.

In addition, the brief details how the Fifth Circuit misunderstood the structure of the Federal Reserve System and hence the mechanism (assessments on Federal Reserve Banks) used to fund the CFPB:

[T]he court of appeals combined the Federal Reserve Banks and the Federal Reserve Board into a chimeric federal agency—named “the Federal Reserve”—which both owns securities and levies assessments on Federal Reserve Banks. According to the court of appeals, the “Federal Reserve” is “funded through interest earned on the securities it owns and assessments the agency levies on banks within the Federal Reserve system.” Pet. App. 34a–35a n.12. But no entity uses that name and no entity has all those characteristics. There is no “Federal Reserve”; there is only a Federal Reserve System, which includes the Federal Reserve Board and twelve regional Federal Reserve Banks. Although the Federal Reserve Board is a federal agency and levies assessments on Federal Reserve Banks, the Board owns no securities. See 2022 Board Statements 5. The securities are owned by the Federal Reserve Banks, which are not federal agencies.

The case is Consumer Financial Protection Bureau v. Community Financial Services Association of America, No. 22-448. We represent Professors Patricia McCoy (Boston College Law) and Adam Levitin (Georgetown Law).

The lead author was Greg Lipper, who has filed briefs in a diverse set of Supreme Court constitutional cases. Recent examples include an amicus brief for federalism scholars urging the Court to reject a dormant Commerce Clause challenge to a California animal-cruelty law (National Pork Producers Council v. Ross); an amicus brief for clergy and religious organizations seeking to protect public-school students from coercive, coach-led group prayers (Kennedy v. Bremerton School District); and, at his previous firm, an amicus brief for congressional scholars defending the congressional subpoenas for President Trump’s financial records (Trump v. Mazars).

LeGrand Law Assists in Amicus Brief in Support of Adding Equal Rights Amendment to the United States Constitution

LeGrand Law recently served as local counsel on an amicus brief filed on behalf of businesses and corporations urging the archivist of the United States to publish the Equal Rights Amendment (“ERA”) as the Twenty Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

The ERA would formally entrench equal rights for women in the Constitution.

The amendment was first approved by Congress in 1972, but fell three votes short of the threshold required for ratification by the states. Earlier this year, Virginia became the pivotal thirty-eighth state to ratify the ERA, clearing the way for the amendment to be published.

LeGrand Law is proud to have played a small role in this important cause.

Rebecca LeGrand on CNBC discussing former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara's new task force on insider trading

Attorney Rebecca LeGrand appeared on CNBC yesterday to share her thoughts on Preet Bharara’s new task force on insider trading. Ms. LeGrand said that she agreed with the message that insider trading laws are outdated and unclear, but argued that we should think hard about why we treat insider trading as a stand-alone crime in the first place.