On Tuesday afternoon, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit will hear argument on whether to stay the temporary restraining order (TRO), issued Friday by U.S. District Court Senior Judge James Robart in Washington v. Trump. The TRO immediately suspended implementation nationwide of key sections of last week’s executive order banning travel to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries.
On Monday, Lane Powell attorneys Claire Loebs Davis and Jessica Walder filed an amicus curiae brief with the Ninth Circuit on behalf of 11 law professors, addressing the standing of the State of Washington to pursue its lawsuit to halt the executive order. Lane Powell filed a similar brief on behalf of the professors in the district court proceedings last week. The state cited the first amicus brief during the hearing before the district court, and the district court’s order aligned with the brief’s reasoning on the standing issue.
“Whether a state has standing to challenge a federal law raises interesting questions that are not often litigated, and which were key to this case,” comments Davis. “We were honored to be able to assist our law professor clients, who are experts in this field, in clarifying a difficult area of the law.”
While only four other amici filed briefs in the district court, over a dozen groups have appeared in the Ninth Circuit, including leading technology companies, immigration law professors, civil liberties and immigrant rights groups, and former foreign policy officials, including former secretaries of state Madeleine Albright and John Kerry. The State of Minnesota has joined Washington as a plaintiff in the case, and attorneys general from 16 other states have filed briefs opposing the stay.
Lane Powell thanks attorneys Claire Davis and Jessica Walder, who, with the help of attorneys Tiffany Scott Connors and Kristin Beneski, have worked tirelessly on behalf of the law professors to prepare the briefs on very short notice.