Professor and Associate Dean Milena Sterio participated in a one-day workshop at the NYU Center for Global Affairs on February 10, on the topic of “The Future of the Field of International Justice.”  All participants were asked to participate in three different discussions regarding the future of international criminal justice: a scenario where the International Criminal Court is the primary institution in international criminal law; a scenario where the ICC and hybrid tribunals are such primary institutions; and a scenario where the ICC and domestic war crimes chambers and tribunals are such primary institutions.  Participants included academics as well as representatives from various United Nations’ missions in New York, including the United Kingdom, Canada, Belgium, Ecuador, Japan, etc.

Professor John Plecnik was quoted in an article published in Tax Notes on February 7th, entitled 2017 TNT 24-2 Treasury May Lack Authority on Draft Trump Child Credit Order.  The portions of this article where Professor Plecnik is quoted are available below:

John T. Plecnik, a professor at Cleveland State University’s Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, said there are reasonable arguments on both sides of the debate over whether the IRS can require an SSN to claim tax credits without legislative action. Requiring an SSN could be deemed an appropriate way for the agency to use its authority to enforce tax laws, he said.

“On the other hand, one could argue that Congress knows how to require a Social Security number for claiming a tax credit when it wants to do so, given that it explicitly requires a Social Security number to claim the earned income tax credit under section 32(m) of the Internal Revenue Code,” he said. “In the absence of Congress doing the same for the additional child tax credit, you can argue that it chose not to require a Social Security number to claim that credit.”

. . . . . .

While the draft order would reduce the incentive for unauthorized immigrants to file returns because they would be less likely to receive refunds, it could substantially reduce tax credit fraud, Plecnik said. The order is “consistent with the ongoing crackdown” on such fraud, he said.

“To me, it indicates that President Trump, like presidents [George W.] Bush and Obama, is likely to continue the push for more enforcement activity in this area,” he said.

The full-text version of the article is available here: 2017-tnt-24-2-treasury-may-lack-authority-on-draft-trump-child-credit-order-_section-24-chil

Professor and Associate Dean Milena Sterio participated as moderator in a City Club of Cleveland event entitled “Understanding the Executive Order on  Immigration.”  The event was held on February 1 at the Happy Dog and it included Professors Joe Mead (CSU College of Urban Affairs and Cleveland-Marshall College of Law) and Jonathan Adler (Case Western Reserve University School of Law).  Audio and video of the event are available here.

In addition, Professor Sterio participated as moderator and discussant in the International Dispute Resolution Works-in-Progress conference at the University of Missouri Law School in Columbia, Missouri, on February 2-3.  The conference was sponsored by the American Society of International Law.

Professor and Associate Dean Milena Sterio will contribute two different book chapters to two books in 2017-18. First, Professor Sterio wrote a chapter entitled “United States Legal and Policy Responses in the Global War on Terror” in a collected volume entitled “The War on Terror and Beyond” (to be published by the University of Wisconsin Academic Press in 2017).  Second, Professor Sterio will contribute a chapter on the legacy of international criminal tribunals for a collected volume entitled “Human Rights Institutions and Tribunals – Legacy and Promise,” which is part of Springer’s “Major Reference Works” handbook series.  Expected publication date is late 2017 or early 2018.

Professor Heidi Gorovitz Robertson published another column in Crain’s Cleveland Business.  The column is entitled “Personal View: New House bill strips some power from local jurisdictions” and it is available here.

In addition, Professor Robertson’s Letter to the Editor, Thanks to Gov. Kasich for vetoing poor legislative judgment, was published by the Plain Dealer and it is available here.

Finally, Professor Robertson was appointed to be a Peer Reviewer for the Fulbright Specialist Program.  Professor Robertson has been the recipient of two prior Fulbright grants – one to India and another to Sweden.

Heidi Robertson, Steven W. Percy Distinguished Professor of Law, was elected Secretary of the Section on Natural Resources and Energy Law at the AALS Annual Meeting in San Francisco.  In addition, Professor Robertson was elected to the executive board of the Section on Environmental Law.

Professor Chris Sagers

Chris Sagers, the James A. Thomas Professor of Law, wrote in the online magazine Slate to discuss meetings last week between President-Elect Donald Trump and large firms with pending merger matters that will require approval by Trump’s antitrust officials. Such meetings break significantly with traditional practice, and Sagers considers what they might portend for antitrust and white-collar enforcement in the Trump administration. Sagers’ article is available here. 

Professor Karin Mika completed her 4-year appointment to the Teaching Methods Section this year and will continue on with consultation and committee duties as outgoing Chair of this AALS Section.  At the Annual Meeting in San Francisco, Professor Mika also gave the eulogy at the Legal Writing Section luncheon for Professor Marjorie Rombauer, who passed away earlier in the year.  According to Professor Mika, Marjorie was THE first full-time tenured Legal Writing professor in the country (in Seattle, at the University of Washington) and one of the founders of the AALS Section on Legal Writing, Reasoning, and Research.  In addition, Professor Mika served once again as one of the editors for International Section’s “Year in Review” AALS publication.

Professor Deborah Geier has published the updated 2017 edition of her freely downloadable open textbook: The Federal Income Taxation of Individuals 2017. In addition to updating the textbook for changes in the law, for the first time, Professor Geier added hyperlinks to significant Code sections and Treasury Regulations as they are discussed in the text. She cites to the Legal Information Institute at Cornell University, an open-access resource. The textbook is available in Word, PDF, iPub (for iPads) and MOBI (for Kindles). Here is the link: https://www.cali.org/books/us-federal-income-taxation-individuals.