Justice Gorsuch, he added, “appears to have put his cards on the table as firmly in favor of allowing class actions to be stamped out through arbitration agreements.”
As a result, Professor Fitzpatrick said “it is only a matter of time until the most powerful device to hold corporations accountable for their misdeeds is lost altogether.”
.. Arbitration clauses in employment contracts are a recent innovation, but they have become quite common. In 1992, Justice Ginsburg wrote, only 2 percent of non-unionized employers used mandatory arbitration agreements, while 54 percent do so today.
.. Some 23 percent of employees not represented by unions, she wrote, are subject to employment contracts that require class-action waivers.
Under those contracts, Justice Ginsburg wrote, it is often not worth it and potentially dangerous to pursue small claims individually. “By joining hands in litigation, workers can spread the costs of litigation and reduce the risk of employer retaliation,” she wrote.
.. The contracts may also encourage misconduct, Justice Ginsburg wrote.
“Employers, aware that employees will be disinclined to pursue small-value claims when confined to proceeding one-by-one, will no doubt perceive that the cost-benefit balance of underpaying workers tips heavily in favor of skirting legal obligations,” she wrote, adding that billions of dollars in underpaid wages are at issue.
.. By a 5-to-4 vote, the court said a California couple who objected to a $30 charge for what had been advertised as a free cellphone were barred from banding together with other unhappy customers.
Uber Ends Mandatory Arbitration Clauses for Sexual-Harassment Claims
The move, a rarity in corporate America, comes amid pressure from employees and customers
Uber Technologies Inc. is taking a step toward moving past its scandal-ridden history by ending the company’s use of the widespread but controversial practice of mandatory arbitration for claims of sexual harassment and assault.
The move, coming after pressure from both former employees and customers, will immediately free U.S.-based litigants to sue Uber in open court, rather than in private with an impartial arbitrator.
Uber Technologies Inc. is taking a step toward moving past its scandal-ridden history by ending the company’s use of the widespread but controversial practice of mandatory arbitration for claims of sexual harassment and assault.
The move, coming after pressure from both former employees and customers, will immediately free U.S.-based litigants to sue Uber in open court, rather than in private with an impartial arbitrator.
.. Legal experts say mandatory-arbitration clauses may lead some victims to walk away from harassment or discrimination claims in part because they can’t find plaintiffs’ lawyers to take their cases, many of whom work on contingency fees.
.. Arbitrators usually don’t follow federal rules of civil procedure and, compared with courts, impose tighter limits on pretrial discovery. And such cases are generally confidential and harder to appeal.
Trump Organization Tied to Deal to Keep Ex-Porn Star Quiet
An assistant general counsel at the president’s flagship holding company intervened in arbitration proceeding in California to enforce a nondisclosure deal with former porn star
Documents marked “HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL PROCEEDING” for the first time tie President Donald Trump’s flagship holding company to the continuing effort to silence a former adult-film actress who says she had an affair with Mr. Trump.
.. A Trump Organization lawyer, Jill A. Martin, is listed as counsel in an arbitration demand for Essential Consultants LLC, a Delaware company formed by Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer and used to pay $130,000 to Stephanie Clifford in exchange for her silence, according to Feb. 22 arbitration documents filed in Orange County, Calif.
.. Mr. Cohen, who was employed by the Trump Organization when he brokered the deal with Ms. Clifford shortly before the 2016 presidential election, has maintained he was acting on his own and has called it a “private transaction.”
.. Proving any violation would require evidence of coordination between Messrs. Cohen and Trump or his campaign, campaign-finance experts say.
.. Ms. Martin emailed a statement from the company that said she facilitated the filing “in her individual capacity” until a New York-based lawyer gained approval to practice in California. “The company has had no involvement in the matter,” the statement said
.. The arbitration filings, revealed by Michael Avenatti, Ms. Clifford’s attorney, show a direct connection between Mr. Trump’s company and the nondisclosure agreement with Ms. Clifford.
.. Ms. Martin signed a declaration listing her office address as One Trump National Drive, which is at the Trump Organization’s Trump National Golf Club in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.
.. She was a lead attorney for the Trump Organization in lawsuits alleging Mr. Trump’s real-estate seminars, Trump University, had defrauded customers.
.. Ms. Martin vouched for his character in media interviews during the 2016 campaign, after several women accused him of sexual harassment and assault
.. “Thousands of women have worked for him, including myself, and he’s treated us with nothing but respect and appropriately. And he’s always been someone who none of us would ever imagine he would do something like this,”
.. Mr. Cohen said he hadn’t been reimbursed by the Trump Organization or by Mr. Trump’s campaign, but declined to say if he had been reimbursed by Mr. Trump or anyone else.
.. He was listed as “David Dennison,” also a pseudonym,
The President and the Porn Star: A Story’s Slow Rise Above the Din
Here is a leader who crowds out scandal with more scandal, who tends to insist that the buck stops elsewhere, who boasted of sexual assault on tape and got to the White House anyway. It is not quite that nothing sticks to Mr. Trump; it is that so much sticks that nothing stays visible for very long.
.. It’s either too outrageous to be covered, or there’s just too much else that’s important
.. the ordeal has begun showing signs of an elusive longevity, coaxed by a lawsuit filed by her lawyer and an acknowledgment from Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary, that Mr. Trump’s side had pursued an arbitration proceeding against Ms. Clifford.
.. “Scandals run on shame. Trump is completely exempt from any shame,” Mr. Murphy said. “So instead of talking about the crime, we just score-keep.”
.. Evangelicals knew they were not electing an altar boy,” said Robert Jeffress
.. “Forgiveness is part of the evangelical gospel message. We are all sinners.”
.. He clarified that Mr. Trump had denied the accusations and did not require forgiveness anyway.
.. Others have reached for history, or at least historical conspiracy theory, to dull the shock value. “Kennedy had orgies,” said Wayne Allyn Root, a Trump-boosting radio host
.. “But he was a damn good president. My point is, did the orgies matter?”