Judge in Catholic bankruptcy recuses over church donations

A federal judge overseeing the New Orleans Roman Catholic bankruptcy recused himself in a late-night reversal that came a week after an Associated Press report showed he donated tens of thousands of dollars to the archdiocese and consistently ruled in favor of the church in the case involving nearly 500 clergy sex abuse victims. U.S. District Judge Greg Guidry initially announced hours after the AP report that he would stay on the case, citing the opinion of fellow federal judges that no “reasonable person” could question his impartiality. But amid mounting pressure and persistent questions, he changed course late Friday in a terse, one-page filing. “I have decided to recuse myself from this matter in order to avoid any possible appearance of personal bias or prejudice,” Guidry wrote. The 62-year-old jurist has overseen the 3-year-old bankruptcy in an appellate role, and his recusal is likely to throw the case into disarray and trigger new hearings and appeals of every consequential ruling he’s made. But legal experts say it was the only action to take under the circumstances, citing federal law that calls on judges to step aside in any proceeding in which their “impartiality might reasonably be questioned.” “This was a clear and blatant conflict that existed for some time,” said Joel Friedman, a longtime legal analyst in New Orleans who is now a law professor at Arizona State University. “It creates the exact problem the rules are designed to avoid, the impression to the public that he’s not an impartial decisionmaker.” Guidry’s recusal underscores how tightly woven the church is in the city’s power structure, a coziness perhaps best exemplified when executives of the NFL’s New Orleans Saints secretly advised the archdiocese on public relations messaging at the height of its clergy abuse crisis.

Supreme Court rejects Turkish bank’s arguments in Iran case

The Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected a Turkish bank’s main arguments for dismissing a lawsuit accusing it of helping Iran evade U.S. sanctions, but the court sent the case back for additional review. Halkbank, a bank owned by Turkey, had argued that a federal law, the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976, gave foreign states absolute immunity from criminal prosecution in U.S. courts. It also said federal courts don’t have jurisdiction to oversee the case. “We disagree with Halkbank on both points,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote for himself and six of his eight colleagues. Still, Kavanaugh said the case should go back to a lower court for further review. He said the lower court “did not fully consider the various arguments regarding common-law immunity that the parties press in this Court.” The federal government says the bank “participated in the largest-known conspiracy to evade the United States’ economic sanctions on Iran,” laundering billions of dollars worth of Iranian oil and natural gas proceeds. The government says that working with an Iranian-Turkish businessman, the bank created ways for Iran to access the funds — including shipments of gold and fake food shipments. The government says that the schemes “freed up approximately $20 billion of restricted Iranian funds.” The businessman, Reza Zarrab, has pleaded guilty. The case was initiated under the Trump administration but was continued by the Biden administration. The case is Turkiye Halk Bankasi A.S. v. United States, 21-1450.

Wisconsin Supreme Court control, abortion access at stake

Control of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, and likely the future of abortion access, Republican-drawn legislative maps and years of GOP policies in the key swing state rests with the outcome an election Tuesday that has seen record campaign spending. The winner of the high-stakes contest between Republican-backed Dan Kelly and Democratic-supported Janet Protasiewicz will determine majority control of the court headed into the 2024 presidential election. The court came within one vote of overturning President Joe Biden’s narrow win in 2020, and both sides expect another close race in 2024. It’s the latest election where abortion rights has been the central issue since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last June. It’s also an example of how officially nonpartisan court races have grown into political battles as major legal fights play out at the state level. All of it has fueled spending that will double, and likely triple or more, the previous high of $15.4 million spent on a state court race in Illinois in 2004. Democrats have spent heavily for Protasiewicz and Republicans for Kelly. Democrats are trying to flip control of the court, which has had a majority of conservative justices the past 15 years. That has allowed the court to uphold an array of Republican priorities, including banning absentee ballot drop boxes last year and affirming the 2011 law all-but ending collective bargaining for most public workers.