The Most-Viewed TLB Posts of 2025
To celebrate the end of another year at TLB, I wanted to highlight the posts that received the most views in 2025. A Primer on Choice-of-Law Clauses A Primer on Choice of Law Choice-of-Law Methodologies: Updating the List Throwback Thursday: The Tate Letter and Foreign Sovereign Immunity The $24 Billion Judgment Against China in Missouri’s…
Continue ReadingSolicitor General Recommends Granting Cert in Cisco
In Doe v. Cisco Systems Inc. (2023), the Ninth Circuit held that claims for aiding and abetting human rights violations could be brought under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) against Cisco Systems and under the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA) against Cisco’s former CEO. The plaintiffs allege that Cisco designed, built, and maintained a surveillance…
Continue ReadingCourt Rejects Trump Administration’s Immunity Statement in UNRWA Case
A federal court has rejected the Trump administration statement of interest regarding the immunity of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). In the Estate of Tamar Kedem Simon Tov et al. v. United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) et al. (SDNY), foreign nationals allege that UNRWA and individual defendants knowingly aided and…
Continue ReadingTransnational Litigation at the Supreme Court, October Term 2025
Today is the first day of the Supreme Court’s October Term. This post briefly discusses transnational litigation cases in which the Court has already granted cert, as well as others that are in the pipeline and could be decided this Term. Cases in which the Court Has Granted Cert So far, the Supreme Court has…
Continue ReadingFirst Circuit Remands Constitutionality of the TVPA to District Court
In Boniface v. Viliena, a Massachusetts jury found a former Haitian mayor liable under the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA) for extrajudicial killing, attempted extrajudicial killing, and torture, awarding the three plaintiffs $15.5 million in compensatory and punitive damages. On appeal to the First Circuit, the defendant’s principal arguments were (1) that the TVPA does…
Continue ReadingCourt Allows Claims of Forced Labor to Build World Cup Stadiums
On June 26, 2025, in F.C. v. Jacobs Solutions Inc., Magistrate Judge Cyrus Y. Chung (District of Colorado) partly granted and partly denied a motion to dismiss claims against U.S. companies under the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) alleging their participation in a venture that used forced labor to build stadiums in Qatar for…
Continue ReadingDoe v. Cisco Systems
DOE v. CISCO SYSTEMS The Ninth Circuit held that aiding and abetting claims may be brought under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) and the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA). Cisco challenges those holdings, as well as the Ninth Circuit’s determination of the mens rea required for such claims under the ATS. Recent Posts Read More Posts…
Continue ReadingFirst Circuit Argument Weighs Constitutionality of TVPA
Last month, the First Circuit (Judge Lara Montecalvo, presiding, with retired Justice Stephen Breyer and Senior Judge Sandra Lynch) heard oral argument in Boniface v. Viliena. Viliena, a Haitian national who has been a legal permanent resident of the United States since 2008, is challenging a $15.5 million jury award under the Torture Victim Protection…
Continue ReadingBusiness and Human Rights Litigation
On January 22-24, 2025, the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights at Mansfield College, Oxford, hosted a roundtable on business and human rights litigation. The roundtable discussed draft chapters for the Cambridge Handbook on Business and Human Rights Litigation, edited by Hassan Ahmad, Ekaterina Aristova, and Rachel Chambers, which is slated for publication next year. The…
Continue ReadingCisco’s Cert Petition
Last Friday, January 31, 2025, Cisco Systems filed a petition for certiorari asking the Supreme Court to review the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Doe v. Cisco Systems, Inc. (2023), a decision holding that claims of aiding and abetting may be brought under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) and Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA). As more…
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