Professor Reginald Oh has published an op-ed in Newsweek explaining why Kamala Harris is a natural born U.S. citizen and eligible for the Vice Presidency. Professor Oh’s op-ed rebuts an earlier Newsweek op-ed by Professor John Eastman (Chapman University), which raised doubts about Harris’s citizenship, notwithstanding the fact that she was born in the United States, because Harris’s parents were immigrants.

Professor Oh discusses the text of the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which provides that “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States.” Professor Oh explains that Harris was born in the United States, and that she and her parents were also “subject to the jurisdiction” under the plain meaning of those terms. He explains that “[v]irtually everyone who is physically present in the U.S.,” is subject to U.S. jurisdiction, “including citizens, foreign tourists, authorized immigrants and even unauthorized immigrants,” as all of those people must oby the laws of the nation.

Professor Oh also discusses the key Supreme Court precedent from 1898, U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark, which, Professor Oh explains, “held that a Chinese-American child born in the U.S. to immigrant parents was a U.S. citizen.”

Professor Oh’s article is titled, “Born in the U.S.A.: Kamala Harris Is Eligible to Become Vice President.”

Chris Sagers, the James A. Thomas Professor of Law, spoke with several news outlets in the U.S. and abroad recently concerning antitrust developments. 

Sagers spoke with the tech industry magazine Wired for a story about the remarkable, breaking news of a conflict between Apple and Epic Games, maker of the wildly popular game Fortnite. The case brings to a head some years of controversy over Apple’s maintenance of the App Store, as software developers have long complained about the rules Apple imposes on them and their view that it does so with a purpose to maintain anticompetitive dominance over mobile software distribution. 

He was quoted in a story in the independent investigative news service Pro Publica, concerning a proposed merger in the online tax-prep industry. The deal, undertaken in a heavily concentrated industry that was already the subject of a rare, fully-litigated merger challenge only a few years ago, is particularly interesting in that it involves acquisition of a very small rival, but nevertheless poses special competition concerns because of that rival’s maverick, disruptive nature. If successful challenge is brought, the case might be important precedent for other important sectors, as in Silicon Valley and mass communications, in which many now regret that many such deals have been approved over the last few decades.

Sagers was also quoted by Agence France Presse wire story carried internationally concerning the closely watched congressional testimony of four Big Tech CEOs, the culmination of a year-long investigation into possible antitrust violations by House Judiciary Democrats, and was interviewed about the hearing on a daily news program on BFM radio in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. 

Professor Chris Sagers published a piece in the online news magazine Slate, reviewing the work of President Trump’s high-profile and sometimes controversial Justice Department antitrust chief, Makan Delrahim. The article, titled, “The Utter Failure of the Trump Administration’s Antitrust Chief,” strongly criticizes Delrahim’s tenure as head of antitrust enforcement. Sagers opines, “Probably no U.S. antitrust chief has ever failed quite so thoroughly and variously.”

Professor Sagers is the James A. Thomas Professor of Law.

In August, Legal Educator in Residence Howard Katz made two presentations at the Southeast Association of Law Schools (SEALS) annual conference, which was held online. He spoke about “Teaching Fundamentals: Designing an Effective Law School Course” as part of the Newer Law Teachers Workshop.  He spoke about the Unified Field Theory of Legal Analysis (originally discussed in his book on law school teaching co-authored with Professor Kevin F. O’Neill) as part of a discussion group on “Teaching Torts.”  

Professor Jonathan Witmer-Rich was a panelist on a “Hot Topic” webinar titled “Bail and Bond Reform: The Long Fight,” sponsored by the Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association. The panel was moderated by attorney Jay Milano and also featured Anthony Body, a Bail Disruptor for the Bail Project, and Claire Chevrier, Policy Counsel for the Ohio ACLU. The panelists discussed ongoing problems with bail and pretrial release in Cuyahoga County and statewide, discussed successes and failures in bail reform efforts, and best practices for ongoing bail reform efforts.

On August 5, Professor Kevin O’Neill was a featured speaker on a nationwide webinar conducted by the American Bar Association titled, “The Future of Public Protest.” The webinar also featured the mayor of Savannah, Georgia and the police chief of Phoenix, Arizona. Professor O’Neill explained the case law governing the regulation of mass demonstrations and marches, and answered audience questions. The panel focused on the protest methods employed in the recent Black Lives Matter demonstrations that were ignited by the police killing of George Floyd.