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Artificial intelligence (AI) has risen to the forefront of public discourse as the field has rapidly developed over the last decade. Although the definition of AI has not been agreed upon, it can broadly be described as “us[ing] computers to simulate human intelligent behaviors and… train[ing] computers to learn human behaviors such as learning, judgment, and decision-making.” AI has been integrated into our daily lives through Google, Westlaw, social media, ChatGPT, and more. These examples encompass a variety of types of AI about which regulators have become increasingly alarmed.
Since 2019, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division has ramped up its use of Deferred Prosecution Agreements (DPAs) in criminal antitrust matters. DPAs bypass the traditional plea agreement process. In a DPA, the government defers prosecution for a period of time, provided that a defendant adheres to specific criteria during that period. These pretrial agreements generally involve an admission of wrongdoing, the payment of fines, and the implementation of compliance measures. Charges are dropped if the defendant complies with the requirements of the agreement. After refusing to enter into DPAs for years, the Division’s shift in policy poses novel questions about the future of antitrust enforcement.
Industry standards—often created by private non-profit groups called standards developing organizations or “SDOs”—play a foundational role in modern U.S. industry. A single laptop computer depends on over 250 different standards to operate. These standards can govern areas as diverse as “minimum requirements for product safety, criteria for judging quality, content, environmental sustainability and other product features, uniform metrics for measurement and assessment, and requirements for product interoperability.” In doing so, industry standards provide a variety of benefits to consumers, businesses, and regulatory agencies alike by helping maintain product quality, safety, and convenience.
The second question the petitioner asks in Securities and Exchange Commission v. Jarkesy, a case currently pending before the Supreme Court, is “[w]hether statutory provisions that authorize the SEC to choose to enforce the securities laws through an agency adjudication instead of filing a district court action violate the nondelegation doctrine.” At its simplest, the nondelegation doctrine is a constitutional principle that states that Congress cannot delegate its legislative powers to other entities. Much difficulty has come from attempts to delineate exactly when or how a power is legislative.
The Federal Government uses the tax system to encourage certain behaviors and discourage others. Taxes are not only a way to raise revenue, but also a tool of governance. The Inflation Reduction Act (“IRA”)—the Biden administration’s catchall bill—puts its hand on this lever by allowing taxpayers to sell tax credits which they earn through engaging in renewable energy investments, mostly wind farms or solar fields. Despite its name, the Act has nothing to do with inflation.
Special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) first began to emerge in the 1990s as an alternative means to conduct an initial public offering (IPO) and take private companies public. With the rapid increase in popularity of SPACs in 2020 and early 2021, and with many politicians and mainstream celebrities trying to get a piece of the SPAC action, it has become far more important to evaluate carefully the merits and potential drawbacks of this process. This Article focuses primarily on addressing one key question: Are public investors who sign on to SPACs adequately protected by the current legal and regulatory frameworks, and, if not, what changes ought to be made going forward to help ensure they are?
In the summer of 2023, Lionel Messi agreed to a $150 million, two-and-a-half-year deal with Inter Miami, a U.S. Major League Soccer (MLS) team. Messi took this deal despite offers to return to FC Barcelona, where he has played before, and to play for Al-Hilal, a Saudi team where he was offered compensation over $500 million per season. To compete with these bids and ultimately sign Messi, Inter Miami offered a first-of-its-kind deal structure.
The city of Chicago owns over 10,000 vacant lots with another 16,634 on their way to becoming city-owned due to back taxes and unpaid fees. These vacant properties can “devastate the neighborhood and block, undermine the neighbors’ quality of life and diminish the value of nearby properties[.]” Vacant lots are associated with crime, lack of housing and commercial spaces, and destabilization of the neighborhood, all while bringing in no tax revenue for the city. Chicago has tried numerous reforms to return vacant land to productive (and taxable) uses, but much of the city-owned land has stuck with the city.
This article argues that the accepted resolution to the “bypassed distributor” problem in antitrust law, although adopted by numerous courts, is wrong. As a result of this error, courts have incorrectly permitted bypassed distributors to recover hundreds of millions of dollars despite never actually having suffered any injury. Moreover, these courts have violated Article III of the U.S. Constitution, by permitting plaintiffs with no injuries, and thus no standing, to recover damages. Courts should therefore revisit the bypassed distributor problem.