by Paul Alan Levy The current controversy stirred by broad popular revulsion over the Superbowl ad run by Dodge Ram, which included a voice-over excerpted from a speech by Martin Luther King Jr., thus using it to sell a truck, ignores a dirty little secret all-to-well known among those of us who worry about the […]
Ann Fleming of Georgetown has written a book, City of Debtors: A Century of Fringe Finance. I'm pasting in a blurb below, but first, for those who want to know more about this subject but don't have time to read the book just now, here are some other options. Last fall, Ann wrote a WaPo op-ed about the […]
In this article, Reuters reporter Patrick Rucker explains that "Mick Mulvaney, [Trump's interim] head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, has pulled back from a full-scale probe of how Equifax Inc failed to protect the personal data of millions of consumers, according to people familiar with the matter."
Dee Pridgen of Wyoming has written The Dynamic Duo of Consumer Protection: State and Private Enforcement of Unfair and Deceptive Trade Practices Laws, 81 Antitrust L.J. 911 (2017). Here's the abstract: This article focuses on the critical importance to consumer protection of the “dynamic duo” of state and private enforcement mechanisms provided in state unfair and deceptive […]
The Washington Post reports: "The Trump administration has stripped enforcement powers away from Consumer Financial Protection Bureau office that specializes in pursuing cases against financial firms accused of breaking discrimination laws, according to two people familiar with the matter and emails reviewed by The Washington Post." The full article is here.
The decision is here. WSJ report here. Update: Law360 reports here.
by Paul Alan Levy In the past few days there have been a couple of significant developments in the area of ”fake litigation” directed at consumer commentary – the use of fraudulent litigation techniques to obtain judicial relief against consumer criticisms of businesses without giving fair notice to the critic, and often using methods calculated […]
by Jeff Sovern During the Obama administration, the Department of Education adopted a regulation obliging colleges and universities to disclose their contracts with banks governing marketing to students as well as how much the schools receive from the banks. The WSJ went through those disclosures and reported on their findings in an article, Banks Pay Big […]
In Devlin v. Scardelletti, the U.S. Supreme Court held that a class-action objector may appeal a district court's approval of a class-action settlement under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23 without first intervening. Today, the California Supreme Court rejected that approach in Hernandez v. Restoration Hardware for class actions in California state courts. The court's ruling was premised […]
That's the title of this Chicago-Sun Times editorial.

