Category: 4th Circuit
-
CSPI Sues FDA for Delay in Response to Mercury-Labeling Petition
The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) and Mercury Policy Project have sued the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), seeking a declaration that the agency’s delay in responding to their citizen petition on labeling fish with high levels of mercury is unreasonable and violates the Administrative Procedure Act and Federal Food, Drug,…
-
Black Farmers Not Included in Settlement Denied Reconsideration
A federal court in Washington, D.C., has reportedly refused to reconsider its denial of hundreds of claims by African-American farmers who alleged that they were owed a share of the $1.25-billion settlement fund established to compensate a class of farmers allegedly discriminated against by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) loan application process. In re…
-
Red Lobster Sued for Sexually Hostile Environment
As the fiscal year came to a close and on the eve of the federal government shutdown, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) filed nearly two dozen employment discrimination lawsuits including one against GMRI, Inc. alleging discrimination based on sex on behalf of a class of women employees at a Salisbury, Maryland, Red Lobster Restaurant.…
-
D.C. Court Dismisses Humane Society Pork Checkoff Suit
A federal court in the District of Columbia has dismissed, for lack of standing, a lawsuit filed by the Humane Society of the United States and several other plaintiffs against the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), challenging the secretary’s approval of the National Pork Board’s purchase of the slogan “Pork, The Other White Meat” from…
-
Fourth Circuit Rules Alcohol Ad Ban Unconstitutional As Applied
A divided Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals panel has determined that a Virginia Alcohol Beverage Control Board prohibition on alcohol advertisements in college newspapers, as applied, violates the First Amendment rights of two campus newspapers because the majority of the papers’ readers are age 21 or older, and thus the rule is “not appropriately tailored…
-
EEOC Files Gender Discrimination Complaint Against Food Distributor
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has filed a complaint against Performance Food Group, Inc., alleging that it had a “standard operating procedure of denying employment to female applicants for operative positions in its [warehouse] facilities on the basis of their gender”; EEOC also alleges that the defendant failed to promote a woman at its…
-
Federal Court Refuses to Enjoin Amended COOL Rules
A federal court in the District of Columbia has denied the American Meat Institute’s motion for a preliminary injunction in a challenge to the amended country-of-origin labeling (COOL) rules adopted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) Agricultural Marketing Service in response to a World Trade Organization (WTO) determination that the original rules violated the…
-
Federal Court Could Rule in COOL Dispute Within Two Weeks
According to a news source, the federal court that heard a challenge to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) revision to its country-of-origin labeling (COOL) rules to comply with a World Trade Organization ruling stated during the hearing that it would issue a decision on the plaintiffs’ request for a preliminary injunction within 14 days.…