Race Rights and the Law Blog
Sahar Aziz
July 23, 2020
Where does one begin to process this richly detailed, cognitively jarring book by Ibram X. Kendi? No matter your race or gender, this tome on America’s curse – anti-black racist ideas – forces you to examine the country in a different light. What you thought was racial progress turns out to be merely racism in different forms.
You wonder when, not whether, you have propagated racist ideas. …
Vinay Harpalani
July 21, 2020
Professors Ediberto Román (Florida International University School of Law) and Ernesto Sagás (Colorado State University) recently published an op-ed entitled "Trump vs. Puerto Rico: Bigotry in action" in the NY Daily News. They critique Trump's desire to sell Puerto Rico, noting that his " antiquated mindset is one in which white Americans rule supreme but are unfortunately burdened with non-…
SpearIt
July 20, 2020
On July 7, President Trump announced a new policy that would in effect cancel foreign student visas, and threatened these students with deportation if they did not attend school in-person (the ban). One week later, on July 14, Judge Allison D. Burroughs of the District Court of Massachusetts, where Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology filed a lawsuit to halt the ban,…
Vinay Harpalani
July 19, 2020
Professors Ediberto Román (Florida International University School of Law) and Carrie Rosenbaum (UC-Berkley, Golden Gate) were ready to challenge the Trump Administration's now rescinded policy to cancel student visas of international students who only took online classes. In a Bloomberg op-ed entitled "INSIGHT: Reversal on Trump’s Student Visa Curbs Exposes Flawed Policy Efforts", they argued…
SpearIt
July 13, 2020
On June 26, a federal court demanded Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) free children from custody in response to health concerns at their facilities. Judge Dolly M. Gee found ICE had failed “at the basics,” such as keeping these children in “safe and sanitary” living conditions during a time when COVID-19 was devastating the country.
Journalist Rachel Maddow described the detention of…
Vinay Harpalani
July 12, 2020
Now that Joe Biden has wrapped up the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, everyone is wondering whom he will pick as the Vice Presidential nominee. Race and gender representation are playing a key role in his decision-making. The 2020 Democratic primary showcased the excellence of women and people color in politics, and many were disappointed that a 77-year old White male became the…
Vinay Harpalani
July 9, 2020
Professor Sunita Patel of UCLA School of Law recently published Jumping Hurdles to Sue the Police, 104 MINNESOTA LAW REVIEW 2257 (2020).
Abstract
The view that the Supreme Court has limited judicial review of unconstitutional government practices is evident in varied quarters of legal scholarship. With respect to structural reform litigation against the police there are good reasons for pessimism…
Vinay Harpalani
July 7, 2020
Professors Ruqaiijah Yearby and Seema Mohapatra recently posted a manuscript entitled "Law, Structural Racism, and the COVID-19 Pandemic", published in the Journal of Law and the Biosciences. Here is the abstract:
Racial and ethnic minorities have always been the most impacted by pandemics because of: disparities in exposure to the virus; disparities in susceptibility to contracting the virus;…
Vinay Harpalani
July 5, 2020
Professor Maurice Dyson has a very timely proposal for an act to address police violence and reform criminal justice: https://www.racism.org/index.php/en/articles/law-and-justice/criminal-j…
The proposal draws from Professor Dyson's article, Excessive Force, Bias, and Criminal Justice Reform: Proposals for Congressional Action, 63 Loyola Law Review 27 -75 (Spring, 2017). Here is the abstract to…
Vinay Harpalani
July 2, 2020
Kevin Johnson, Dean of the University of California at Davis School of Law, recently published "Trump's Latinx Repatriation" in the UCLA Law Review. The abstract is given below, and the Article is available for free download at this link: https://www.uclalawreview.org/trumps-latinx-repatriation/
Abstract
Two historical episodes have indelibly influenced the development of Latinx identity and…