CA Gov Signs Bill Allowing Victims to Sue Gun Makers, Sellers California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) signed AB 1594 , a bill that allows the state, local governments, gun violence survivors, and the families of victims of gun violence to sue gun makers and...

Heat Wave Shuts Down TX Bitcoin Miners Nearly all industrial Bitcoin miners in Texas shut down their millions of computers this month in response to a conservation request from the Electric Council of Texas, the state’s power operator, as it braced...

CA to Start Manufacturing Insulin In an effort to make insulin more affordable, California plans to start making its own. The state budget signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) last month allocates $50 million for the development of low-cost insulin products...

It has so far been a brutal year for cryptocurrencies, with the value of assets like Bitcoin falling around 70 percent from last November. But to date, the so-called “ crypto winter ” has done nothing to slow the increasing rush by state lawmakers...

Upstate Dems Pressure NY Gov to Halt Crypto Mining New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) is facing pressure from some members of her own party over a pending bill that would pause crypto mining in the Empire State. Eight Democratic officials from county...

Time Running Out for Federal Antitrust, Privacy Bills Aimed at Big Tech After almost five years of promising to rein in Big Tech, congressional lawmakers may finally pass antitrust and privacy legislation that could change how companies like Amazon...

Fight Looming over Abortion Pills A flurry of state legislation aimed at restricting or banning medication abortion was introduced this year. Nineteen states already ban the prescription of abortion pills via telemedicine, and the Supreme Court’s...

The U.S. Supreme Court recently ended its latest term after ruling on several controversial state laws, ranging from restrictions on gun permits to religious school funding. None, however, had the breadth of its ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's...

NY Gov Okays Legal Protections for Abortion Providers New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) signed a suite of bills last week intended to insulate Empire State abortion providers and out-of-state patients from legal actions taken against them in other states...

High Court Limits CA Labor Law The Supreme Court of the United States ruled that federal law preempts a California law that allows private lawsuits on behalf of groups of workers, even if they had agreed to resolve their disputes through individual...

CA Privacy Regulators Begin Debating New Rules The California Privacy Protection Agency voted 4-0 on June 8 th to formally begin the rulemaking process for the impending California Privacy Regulation Act, which is set to go into effect on Jan. 1, 2023...

CA Lawmakers Budget Bonus for Health Care Worker The massive $300 million budget approved by California lawmakers last week has generally been acknowledged as a placeholder that technically meets the June 15 th constitutional deadline for getting a...

With Americans spending so much of their time online - over 1,300 hours a year on social media alone - state lawmakers have increasingly focused on consumer data privacy in recent years. Much of their efforts have been channeled into comprehensive data...

Govs Push Different Directions on Guns If anyone thought another murderous rampage would bring America’s two major political parties together to work on a solution to the nation’s mass shooting epidemic, think again. In the wake of two...

SCOTUS Blocks TX Social Media Censorship Law The U.S. Supreme Court blocked a Texas law ( HB 20 ) that would have prohibited online platforms like Facebook and Twitter from censoring content because of that content’s viewpoint. The law was passed...

Resident Physicians Unionizing in CA, Other States Resident physicians pushed to the brink during the coronavirus pandemic along with nurses and other healthcare workers, have been unionizing in California and other states to demand better wages, benefits...

In show of just how powerful cultural issues can be, hot-button legislation dealing with the transgender community has emerged in dozens of statehouses in recent months, even though transgender people account for less than 1 percent of the nation’s...

Govs Take Opposing Sides on Abortion In the wake of a leaked memo indicating the Supreme Court of the United States will soon strike down Roe. V. Wade , red and blue state governors have quickly acted to further solidify their states’ positions...

Cities, States Easing Off Facial Recognition Bans In the last few years, roughly a couple of dozen state and local governments have imposed bans on the use of facial recognition technology due to concerns about it being racially biased. But with recent...

The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare any number of societal vulnerabilities, perhaps none more so than a growing shortage of health care workers some observers say is fast reaching crisis levels. With that shortfall expected to only get worse in the...

Tide Turns for Traveling Nurses During the pandemic traveling nurses earned double, even triple what staff nurses did. But with state and federal coronavirus relief now drying up, travel nurse contracts are disappearing, and hospitals across the nation...

More GOP Govs Sign Transgender Sports Measures Two more Republican governors, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp and Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee signed measures last week intended to prevent transgender girls or women from participating in sports that align with their...

Twitter Accepts Buyout Offer from Elon Musk Twitter announced last week that its board had accepted the offer from Tesla CEO Elon Musk to buy the company for $54.20 per share, or about $44 billion. If the deal receives shareholder and regulatory approval...

Medical Mall Makeovers on Rise The decline of the American shopping mall over the past decade or so has been a boon for big-city healthcare systems. Healthcare providers now occupy at least some part of 32 enclosed malls across the country, according...

If you’re a sports fan, you could be forgiven for thinking that sports gambling is now legal everywhere in the United States. These days, the logos for gambling brands are plastered all over sporting arenas, betting lines are frequently incorporated...