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March 18, 2026
NEW YORK — Saying in part that it found no error “in the district court’s decision to assign minimal weight to [the claimant]’s self-reported symptoms and to focus, instead, on the paucity of objective record evidence supporting her claimed inability to work,” the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals issued a March 17 summary order affirming judgment for a long-term disability (LTD) plan administrator that denied a claim that was based on a nurse practitioner’s purported symptoms of long COVID.
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March 18, 2026
DURHAM, N.C. — Three months after granting a commercial property insurer’s motion to dismiss claims for breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing and unfair and deceptive trade practices brought by four Durham restaurants seeking coverage for their business interruption losses arising from the lockdowns prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic, a federal judge in North Carolina denied the insurer’s motion to dismiss the insureds’ amended complaint because it now includes facts that make the claims plausible to the extent that they are based on the insurer’s conduct since the North Carolina Supreme Court’s ruling in N. State Deli, LLC v. Cincinnati Ins. Co.
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March 17, 2026
BOSTON — Finding that physicians’ professional groups and others are likely to prevail in their challenge to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) changes to vaccine recommendations and the reconstitution of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) as violations of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), a Massachusetts federal judge on March 16 stayed both a January U.S. Department of Health and Human Services memorandum announcing the reduction of the recommended childhood vaccinations from 17 to 11 and the appointment of 13 new ACIP members.
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March 17, 2026
HOUSTON — A sole proprietorship filed an amended complaint against the Small Business Administration and its administrator to challenge as a violation of the Administrative Procedure Act the SBA’s denial of forgiveness of a $367,296 Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan based on the proprietorship’s ineligibility for a PPP loan.
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March 16, 2026
CINCINNATI — The Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on March 13 imposed $30,000 in sanctions for “rampant misconduct,” including fake citations and representations of law, while affirming lower court sanctions and other rulings in consolidated appeals stemming from a defamation and free speech dispute that started with a protest at a fireworks show held under COVID-19 restrictions.
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March 16, 2026
NEWARK, N.J. — In a lawsuit brought by a medical testing lab seeking reimbursement from health insurers for COVID-19 testing, a New Jersey federal judge on March 13 dismissed state law counterclaims by the insurers related to fraudulent overbilling with prejudice and counterclaims based on duplicative billing and billing for ancillary tests without prejudice but left in place overpayment claims sought under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA).
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March 12, 2026
INDIANAPOLIS — A unanimous Indiana Supreme Court held that a trial court may bypass a medical review panel in a malpractice case and rule on an affirmative defense that does not require an expert opinion and further found that health care providers, while negligent in the treatment of a bed sore developed by a COVID-19 patient that ultimately proved fatal, were immune from civil liability under state and federal law.
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March 11, 2026
NEW ORLEANS — A partially divided Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel affirmed a trial court’s certification of only one subclass out of several proposed classes and subclasses in a case by workers who accuse United Airlines Inc. of discrimination by failing to provide religious and medical accommodations, finding no abuse of discretion in the certification only of employees who sought an accommodation due to religious beliefs and were accommodated with unpaid leave.
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March 10, 2026
NEW YORK — The Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals issued a mandate denying a motion to stay and related petition for a writ of mandamus challenging lower court proceedings in which a judge denied recusal in qui tam suits alleging that the lab and related parties violated the False Claims Act (FCA) by submitting false claims to government insurers for reimbursement for COVID-19 testing services.
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March 09, 2026
NEW HAVEN, Conn. — In a lawsuit brought by a taxpayer seeking to compel the Internal Revenue Service to process its claim of employee retention credits (ERC) it says it is owed under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act and apply the credits to its tax liability, the government moved to dismiss with prejudice the taxpayer’s second amended complaint, telling a Connecticut federal court that all of the relief the taxpayer seeks is barred by statute.
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March 09, 2026
NEW ORLEANS — Despite a dissenting judge calling her “the sort of employee who haunts the nightmares of HR managers everywhere,” a fired Trader Joe’s crew member will be reinstated to her job and compensated for lost earnings and further make-whole relief pursuant to Thryv, Inc., following a ruling by a Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals majority that granted the National Labor Relations Board’s cross-petition to enforce an order finding that the employee was unlawfully fired after she engaged in protected activity regarding COVID-19 safety protocols.
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March 09, 2026
PHOENIX — Contending that the changes to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine recommendations were made without the use of the usual science-based protocols and that recent appointments to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) made by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. were in violation of the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), several states and the governor of Pennsylvania sued the HHS, CDC, Kennedy and other federal officials seeking to set aside the recommendation changes and committee appointments as arbitrary, capricious and contrary to law in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA).
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March 06, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Survivors of nursing home residents who died of COVID-19 after a state directive prevented nursing homes from denying admission to patients having or suspected of having COVID-19 petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court for review of a Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruling affirming the judgment of a New York federal court that found that New York state officials had qualified immunity from claims stemming from the deaths.
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March 04, 2026
COLUMBUS, Ohio — The entire Ohio Supreme Court agreed that a property owner has standing to sue the prior owner’s lender for failing to timely record the release of the mortgage; however, the high court split on the issue of applying retroactively an amendment to the state’s mortgage-release statute prohibiting classwide collection of damages with the majority finding retroactive application appropriate.
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March 04, 2026
RICHMOND, Va. — Affirming a lower court’s use of the de novo standard of review in a long-term disability (LTD) benefits case because the plan administrator failed to meet a regulatory deadline during the administrative appeal of its initial decision, the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on March 3 upheld a ruling that the appellee is owed past-due benefits because long COVID symptoms have disabled her from working as an engineer.
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March 03, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a case in which the U.S. Supreme Court will review a Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel decision striking down a COVID-era Mississippi state law providing that mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day may be received by the registrar within five days of Election Day and still be valid, the court on March 2 granted the U.S. solicitor general’s motion to participate in oral argument as amicus curiae and for divided argument, while denying two separate motions by other respondents for divided argument.
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March 02, 2026
ALEXANDRIA, Va. — A Virginia federal judge largely dismissed a doctor’s suit against her former employer, the CIA, its director and a former Republican political candidate for due process violations and defamation related to the candidate’s comments about the doctor on a podcast regarding the military COVID-19 vaccine mandate, finding that the due process claim failed in part because the allegedly defamatory statements were not made by government employees.
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February 27, 2026
BOSTON — Both the government and physicians’ professional groups and others challenging the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s changes to vaccine recommendations on Feb. 26 opposed the emergency motion to intervene as defendants and counterclaim plaintiffs filed by a children’s advocacy group known for questioning the safety and efficacy of vaccinations and others who claimed that their interests were not properly protected by the current parties.
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February 27, 2026
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Finding a lack of evidence that airlines barred an airline passenger from flying because of a disability that prevented him from wearing a mask rather than in attempt to comply with the federal transportation mask mandate during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Kentucky federal court granted the airlines’ motion for judgment on the pleadings in the passenger’s lawsuit alleging violations of the Rehabilitation Act and the California Unruh Act.
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February 23, 2026
BURLINGTON, Vt. — Granting judgment on the administrative record against a claimant who unsuccessfully sought short-term and long-term disability (STD and LTD) benefits due to symptoms he attributed to long COVID despite being awarded disability benefits by the Social Security Administration (SSA), a Vermont federal judge on Feb. 20 said she found “no evidence that Plaintiff was intentionally deceitful” but concluded that he “is not a reliable source of information due to his conflicting statements, self-described poor memory, psychiatric symptoms, and extensive marijuana use.”
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February 23, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Feb. 23 denied two petitions filed by members of the U.S. Air Force and Space Force that asked the justices to consider in two class cases whether the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) allows for their reinstatement following their refusal to get the COVID-19 vaccine to include awards of back pay and retirement points.
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February 23, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Feb. 23 denied a business’s petition for a writ of certiorari seeking review of a Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel decision, which affirmed a Virginia federal trial court’s grant of summary judgment to the Small Business Administration (SBA) in a lawsuit alleging that the SBA’s denial of relief payments violated the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, was arbitrary and capricious in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and violated due process.
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February 23, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The city of Chicago waived its right to respond to a petition for writ of certiorari filed by current and former police officers asking the U.S. Supreme Court to address a circuit split regarding discovery and determine if a decision in an early 20th century smallpox case “should be limited or overturned in favor of a tiers-of-scrutiny approach in assessing First Amendment religious discrimination claims” in challenging the dismissal of claims that collection of their COVID-19 testing results and vaccination statuses violated federal and state law.
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February 23, 2026
CHICAGO — Contending that it is untimely and suffers from other deficiencies, the Chicago White Sox (CWS) and Major League Baseball moved to dismiss the complaint of a former pitching prospect alleging negligence and violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in requiring that he be vaccinated for COVID-19 and in treating the symptoms that resulted from the vaccination and ultimately ended his career.
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February 20, 2026
SAN FRANCISCO — In a lawsuit brought by a COVID-19 diagnostic test provider seeking to force the federal government to enforce provisions of COVID-era legislation providing for reimbursement for COVID-19 testing by health insurers, a California federal judge granted the government’s motion to dismiss after finding that whether and how to enforce the statutes was within the discretion of the government.