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Speaker 1 (00:12):
Hello, and welcome to the Votes and Verdicts podcast, hosted
by the Litigation and policy team at Bloomberg Intelligence, the
investment research platform of Bloomberg LP on the Bloomberg Terminal.
Bloomberg Intelligence has five hundred analysts and strategists working across
the globe and focused on all major markets. How our
coverage includes over two thousand equities and credits, and we've
(00:34):
outlooked on more than ninety industries and one hundred market industries,
currencies and commodities. This podcast series examines the intersection of
business policy and law, and today's our weekly look at
the litigation and policy catalysts that we're currently watching and
that we think will impact companies across a number of
different sectors. My name is Elliott Stein. I'm an analyst
(00:57):
with Bloomberg Intelligence covering litigation in the financial sector, and
I'm delighted as always to be joined by several of
my BI colleagues. As always, you can find all of
our research on the Bloomberg terminal at BI go, and
you can find most of our litigation and policy research
on our dashboard BI laws Go. Today is October ninth,
(01:20):
twenty twenty five. It's one thirty pm here in New York.
And to get the conversation started, let me bring in
Nathan Dean, who's our chief policy analyst down in Washington,
d C. Nathan, how you doing the zeros closed? Oh? No,
the effects of the shutdown are starting to be felt.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
But actually, I think the biggest issue with the shutdowns
so far Now I'm joking, but like the Army ten
milers supposed to supposed to be canceled this weekend, so wow. Uh,
And the Marine Cools Marathon is on October twenty fourth,
So I mean there is there is some significant impact
that's happening here with the government shutdown. And you know,
as we're recording this on October ninth, I don't have
(02:03):
a good idea of when this is going to end
anytime soon, because both parties are feeling fairly confident in
where they are at the moment. The Democrats are looking
at pulling data that suggests that independents are blaming Republicans
for the shutdown, and Republicans are looking at pulling data
amongst their base, saying that the base is quite happy
with their strategy at the moment. Just as a reminder,
(02:25):
the Republicans have offered a seven week clean CR, although
I think it would be a six week clean CR
now because it would keep the government open until November twentieth.
The Democrats are looking for that plus an agreement to
extend some Obamacare subsidies that expire at the end of
the year. Both sides are feeling good. Both sides are
(02:46):
you know, Senator Chuck Schumer even said this morning that
every day it gets better for us. Republicans are using
that as already started using that to attack him. But
things are getting a little heated up on Capitol Hill.
Just yesterday, you know, the Arizona Democratic the Arizona Democratic
delegation confronted Speaker Johnson outside of his office. Subsequently, Representative
(03:10):
Waller from Long Island confronted Representative Jeffries and outside of
the Democratic press conference. President Trump then put a sombrero
on Representative Jeffries on a truth social post. So things
are getting a little heated. So where I think it
goes from now is the Senate is going to go
home this weekend. I think they're going to go home.
I think they are going to take a time out
to like I would tell to my children who are
(03:32):
fighting in room, I said that on TV. They said,
would why is the Senate going home? And I'm like, well,
first thing that popped in my head was, well, when
my two children are fighting in the room, I don't
keep them in the room. I separate them, say go
cool down, and then we'll discuss. But the Senate's going
to come back next week, and the biggest pressure point
that's going to come up is on October fifteenth. That
is when the military pay. The military misses the first paycheck,
(03:55):
and it's going to be extremely difficult for policymakers in
both sides of the aisle to explain why they're getting
paid in the military isn't. In fact, just this morning,
Speaker Johnson did the call in show on c SPAN
and received a couple of calls that were fairly harsh
on that on that topic alone. So I think when
the solution does come, it's going to most likely be
(04:17):
from a group of moderate senators that have no connection
to leadership. I think they will be together. They will
come together and they'll say, look, we know this deal
is going to reopen the government. We know this deal
is going to have some form of an agreement on
Obamacare subsidies, whether it's an unofficial handshake to have a
vote or something like that. They'll present it to leadership.
Leadership will say okay, fine, let's run with this, and
(04:38):
then they send it to the House. The biggest challenge
at that point, though, is the Hazard Rule. This is
the rule that Speaker Johnson has to follow. It's a
Republican rule that essentially states that the majority the Speaker
of the House won't bring a bill to the floor
of the House of Representatives if the majority of his
or her party doesn't support it. So if you get
a deal from the Senate that has Obamacare subsidies in it,
(04:59):
does represent it or a Speaker of Johnson actually bring
that to the floor. I would take the point if
President Trump wants it on the floor, he'll get it
on the floor. But we'll see what happens. So I
think I.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Mean on that point, on that point, how what does
MTG Marjorie Taylor Green's tweets? How did those play into this?
Because you know, she seems sort of sympathetic to the
Democrats arguments about Obamacare or healthcare costs going up.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Yeah, even just some morning, she just did another podcast
about three hours ago where she did double you know,
doubled down on this, saying that she had individual family
members that were going to be severely harmed by the
premium increases here. And I think that's one of the
cracks that the Republicans are showing at the moment. And
I think, you know, I'm not trying to be partisan here,
but I'm just saying that, like President Trump has said,
(05:46):
he supports this idea of Obamacare subsidies. Now, whether it's
a one year extension, whether it's income based, you know something.
You know, I'm not simply just a pure extension, but
there's something there there, and we've seen it from moderate
Republicans in purple districts. You've seen it represented MARGINALLYE. Tayler Green,
but still the bulk of the party doesn't want to
see if that happen. So I think this is ultimately
(06:07):
going to be a President Trump call. And if President
Trump tells the party to do it, then I think
the party will do it.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
But you don't see that happening this coming week. I mean,
there's no indication that something will happen this week.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Now. The first missed paycheck for government employees is tomorrow,
October tenth. Senate's going home for the weekend. I think
they'll come back. Remember Monday is a holiday, so the
Senate's not in session. Then they'll come back next week,
and then they'll start dealing with the pressure of the
military and not getting their paychecks. Last thing, though, just
a heads up, we do see one potential market catalyst
(06:42):
or one market pressure coming for the grocery stores and
consumer SNAP benefits were appropriated for October. SNAP benefits are
not appropriated for November. Now, the USDA does have some
way of appropriating it if they were to play around
with funds, essentially move money from columns A to B.
It's tricky. So we're going to be on the look
(07:02):
next week to see if we're seeing any started pressure
in the consumer grocery store space. So just something to
keep your eye on.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
Interesting, very interesting. All right, well, we'll check back with
you next week about that. Maybe. All right, let's stick
with DC and bring in Matt settinhelm our TMT litigation
and policy analyst. Matt. How you doing good?
Speaker 3 (07:22):
Good Elliott? Yeah, putting on my immigration law hat here
for you know of a rare, rare time a little
different field of telecom regulation today, but interesting issue at
the Department of Homeland Security we can talk about.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
Yeah, that's what I wanted to ask you about. It
sounds like DHS wants to issue a rule that would
shift the H one B visa application process from I guess,
what's basically a purely randomized lottery system to one that
gives you know, higher priority to higher wage positions. I
know you put out a note this morning say and
(08:00):
that such a rule would likely fall in court. You
want to just tell us a little bit more about
this potential rulemaking, who it might impact the most, and
why you don't think it will survive judicial scrutiny.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
Yeah, absolutely, so that's exactly right. So this H one
B process has been going on for a number of
years where the DHS has used a random lottery to
allocate There are eighty five thousand applications granted every year
as part of this H one B visa program. This
(08:32):
is for foreign professionals hired in specialty occupations. These visas
run for three years, they can be extended to a
total of six years. And what this rule proposal would change,
as you said, is that instead of it being a
random lottery, the higher wage applicants would have more balls
(08:55):
in the pot. So level four is the highest wage level,
they would get four balls in the pot, whereas level
one would get one one ball in the pot.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
Do they really use like lottery balls like we see
the lottery or like the NBA draft, Like that's what
I'm envisioning.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
No, it's it's all computerized unfortunately. Yeah, metaphorical balls we're
talking about here. But it helps me get my head
around it. And and and so this would have an
impact I think on companies that have relied on the
H one B program to pay lower wage workers and
(09:32):
and obtained a number of of lower wage workers. There
are a number of of IT companies that that have
used the program in that way. Whereas big tech companies
traditionally UH have paid higher salaries, they're probably less directly
disrupted by this. If this goes through. So the question
(09:53):
is will it go through? So will DHS adopt it?
As I said in September, they put out this notice
of proposed rulemate and made pretty clear where they're going
with it and the role making itself. Talked about why
they believe a random lottery doesn't work nearly as well
as what they want to do, which is this prioritization
(10:17):
of the higher wage applicants, and so pretty clear they're
going to move ahead with that. And so the interesting
question then is going to be a litigation about it,
because I think it's very likely that DHS will get
challenged on this. They actually tried to do this under
the first Trump term, something very similar to this, and
(10:38):
they ended up losing in court, not on the legal issue,
on a technicality, but a very similar legal issue was
briefed there. So we have the benefit of all that
briefing already. And when I went through that briefing and
looked at how DHS tried to defend itself the last
time around, you just come away thinking this is going
(10:59):
to be a really tough case for for DHS to win.
Congress passed a law. You know it'd be had it
had been. It would be one thing if Congress had
passed a law that said DHS fashion a lottery selection
process that furthers certain interests for us, that sort of delegation.
We don't have anything like that here. All Congress said
(11:19):
was H one B. Visas shall be issued in the
order in which petitions are filed for such visas. That's it,
And and and so when the first Trump administration tried
to use that statute to justify its changes here, it said, well,
Chevron deference, this law is ambiguous. We can you know,
(11:41):
we can interpret silence or ambiguity in this law to
make a reasonable policy choice. And you court have to
defer to us on this. Well, as you know, Elliott,
the Supreme Court, you know, killed Chevron deference.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
This is where we played the Alanis Moore said, isn't
an ironic Yes, yes, overlaid your commentary.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Yes, that will be nice. And it so that that
whole line of defense is gone. And when when we
do this again, so you can't just say, look it's
sort of unclear. We get to do it because we're
being reasonable. And and then when you look at you know, okay,
what did Congress actually give them, it's not very much. Now,
DHS did win one court case about because the statue
(12:25):
doesn't say use a lottery at all. So DHS sort
of has read that into the law. And they got
challenged on that once and they because you know, they said,
the challengers said, look, it doesn't say lottery, and you're
doing a lottery and and and but the court allowed
it because it said you know, this was an administrative
mechanism to deal with an overwhelming number of applications that
(12:48):
are coming in, and and and to me that the
court's very likely to see it. This is very different,
not a neutral random lottery, but actually policy choices that
looks a lot more more like something Congress would need
to do, something it would need to empower the agency
UH to do for this to go ahead.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
What's the administration's stated rationale for this change.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
It's really a concern that that that there are too
many low wage workers being hired through this process, and
and and that that really we should be prioritizing the
the the more accomplished, the higher salaried workers and bringing
in that skill to the country, not the lower wage
(13:36):
workers to you know, replace workers at that level. So
that that seems to be the consistent push from the administration.
I'm just not sure that that the agency can do
it without Congress coming in, you know, with a new
law to address that.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
Got it? So what so you said in September they
had this advanced artists of proposed role making. I think
what's the timing going forward?
Speaker 3 (14:02):
Yeah, so they take comments on that through this month.
Comments are due at the end of this month. Then
there's another procedural step in November, which would probably prevent
them from acting that fast. So I was thinking December
is probably when you start watching closely for action from
DHS on this. Now, these auctions are sorry, these lotteries
(14:23):
run typically in March and April every year, so I
think there's there's probably going to be a push to
get some legal clarity before March or April next year,
so you could see you could see all this sort
of playing out in the first quarter of next year
in the courts.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Right, yeah, I mean that makes sense. I guess if
they finalize the rule by December, you would see lawsuits
right after, and then you'd have preliminary injunction motions and
rulings pretty quickly after that. I think that's right, gotcha.
All right, super interesting issue. We'll leave it there with you, Matt,
Thank you. Justin, Let's bring you in. That's away from
(15:00):
DC for the moment, but let's stick with litigation in
the tech sector. Justin THREESI is one of our anti
trust analysts, so let's bring him in. Justin. How you doing.
Speaker 4 (15:12):
I'm good, Elliott, thanks so much.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
Good. So Justin, there is no shortage of anti trust
litigation against Google. It seems the most high profile of course,
are you know a pair of Justice Department cases against
the company over its ad tech stack would you cover
and its search engine in which our colleague General recovers.
But you wrote this week about a different case brought
(15:36):
by Penske Media, which is the publisher of Billboard and
Rolling Stone. It's a case against Google for allegedly coercing
web publishers to participate in the training of generative AI.
That's all I know about it. So why don't you
come in and tell us more about what the case is, about,
what's at stake, and how you see it playing out.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
Yeah, thanks, elliot. So you know, just when your thought
maybe Google is approaching a place of resolution on its
edit trust issues. I think what we have here is
a situation where maybe roll upening the door to a
whole other set of claims that Google could be facing
this time with regard to its practices in AI. Right,
So what's happening here? So met Penske, As you said,
they publish a ton of different things that they've got
(16:19):
the website properties for Rolling Stone, for Billboard, and what
they're basically saying is look, Google, we consent to allow
you to kind of crawl our web page so that
our web pages appear in your search results on Google itself.
But what they're also saying is that they're being coerced
by Google. They need that traffic coming from Google, right,
Like people aren't going to come to their websites if
(16:40):
they're not showing up on Google's search results, because hey,
Google's monopolized search. That's where people go when they want
to visit a web page. Right, So they're saying, look,
Google search results, that's a must have for us. But
what Google's allegedly also doing is taking that website content
from Penske on Billboard, a rolling Stone, on other publications,
and it's using that content to train its own AI.
Speaker 5 (17:00):
Right.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
So when you go to Google and you see those
AI overviews or those snippets on Google, now that kind
of summarize the content on Penske's web pages, you're staying
on Google. You're not going on to get the answer
you're looking for front Penske, And therefore Penske is losing
advertising revenue that they otherwise would have gone. And if
you visited their web page, that's the basic crux of
the case here is that Google's got this must have
(17:23):
search result kind of power, and because they need that
from Google, they're kind of forced and thought and Google
train it's AI on their websites.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
It's so interesting because in the in thej cases, AI
was sort of a defense that Google was using right
to yeah, you know, as part of its defense against
those cases, and now it's sort of being attacked for
the way it uses AI. But yeah, I mean, I
hear what you're saying, because when you do Google something,
(17:50):
you do get those AI results and you can just
expand the screen, which is different than like the search results,
which just give you a you know, part of a perigraph,
but it doesn't but you're not able to expand that,
so it does right.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Right.
Speaker 4 (18:03):
So so Google's basically you know, you're saying on Google,
and Google's keeping that ad revenue, right if you're saying
on Google and perhaps picking ads there instead of kind
of using those referral links or advertising that you might
otherwise visit on Penske's pages. Right. So that that's the
kind of central issue here. But the case, I think,
as smart as it is, it's a little unusual and
I don't think it's without some issues in terms of
(18:25):
moving forward here, right, because what we have here is
an edit trust claim of reciprocal dealing, which is very rare.
We don't see these very often. You can open a
treatise and try to read about reciprocal dealing and there's
very little lot of it. I can tell you because
I did not myself google yah yah, you cant google it.
That is true, but you're not going to get what
you want from that. But the thing is here is
(18:46):
that look, Penske is saying they have this monopoly in search, right,
and that's why they're so dependent on search. But the
thing is is that this AI overview stuff that Google's
basically trying to train with using Penske's content, Penske's not
in that market. So if they're monopolizing that market, does
Penske even have standing to bring this lawsuit. They're not
necessarily in the market that's being harmed by this whole
(19:09):
effort at Google, So that's a big question too.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
So right, so it seems like they have a claim,
but not necessarily an antitrust claim.
Speaker 4 (19:17):
Right, right, Yeah, I think that's right, and there could
be a monopoly leveraging claim here, we think that one
probably has some teeth to it, so we're watching that closely.
But look, at the end of the day, this case
got assigned to Judge Meta and DC who just finished
up all of this this work on Google Search, right,
and I think throughout Google Search, he's really shown that
he's not looking to take this expansive, non traditional view
(19:40):
of the law and the way he applies things either.
So I think that's probably a hurdle here for Penske
because you know, a personal stamp when I think he's saying,
wait a minute, I thought it was all done with
this at a professional standpoint, I think he's looking at
this kind of claim which is somewhat unusual, and maybe
he says, wait a minute, this is a copyright case.
Why are you trying to bring this under under anti
trust claim? So as smart as the case is, you know,
(20:03):
it probably gets past the motion to dismiss on the
monopoly leveraging stuff. But you know, I think it could
be a pretty tall bar here for in terms of
proceeding you know, this way instead of copyright, and so
they'll plug our colleague Tamlin basket on this too. Has
been a huge, whole deep Dive product on these kind
of copyright cases and how they're you know, things are
being used to train generative AI.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
And was also the subject of a previous Wrote Some
Verdicts episode. I'm yeah, there's no shortage. Yeah, those are
that's a super interesting line of cases. And so did
they not include a copyright claim in this complaint?
Speaker 4 (20:34):
No, in this complaint it's all anti trust, right, So
I think it's just this this separate kind of you know,
it's this back door in many ways, if you will,
of kind of bringing this copyright claim.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
Right.
Speaker 4 (20:42):
It's a smart case, it really is. I think, you know,
it has some potential behind it. But you know, I
think the real thread here, you know, book Penskey's damage
is in this case, we're probably talking about you know,
a few million dollars maybe tens of million dollars, millions
of dollars at most, and lost ad revenue. The real
threat is that if this case is successful, how many more?
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Yeah? Every single company, Yeah, every single company could sue them. Right.
That opens up the slippery slope there, absolutely so super interesting.
So the case was just filed recently, right, So the
next thing is you expect emotion to dismiss.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
Yeah, absolutely, that's right. Cases filed in the September, So
motions to dismiss and the briefing around that come in
probably over the fall here and I think we probably
have a hearing on that before Judge Meta sometime for
a staff next year.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Got it all right? So every time you say Penske,
all I think about is that Seinfeld episode with the
Penske file. But you and Jennery Booth, all right, good stuff,
thanks Justin. All Right, Holly, let's bring you in Holly
from covers litigation and policy in the consumer and industrial
sectors for US. Holly, how you doing im?
Speaker 5 (21:45):
Thanks Elliott.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
So, Holly, you've been tracking litigation against Abbott Laboratories and
me Johnson's Record Unit alleging. The litigation alleges of companies
failed to warn customers that their baby formulas could cause
is necrotizing enterra colitis NEC in pre term babies, which
(22:08):
has resulted allegedly in injuries and death. What's the latest
in these cases? You know, maybe give us an overview
of where we are in this litigation and how much
does it stake for the companies and what you're watching
currently in the cases.
Speaker 5 (22:23):
So that's right. So there are about seven hundred cases
in federal court, a little more than seven hundred cases
seven hundred and sixty cases and more in state court
against Abbott and recas meet Johnson overclaims that their infant formula,
as you mentioned, causes necrotizing entero colitis, which is an
(22:44):
intestinal disease in pre term infants. So there were two
big verdicts, and the first one was for I believe
it's sixty million, and the second one was for five
hundred million. Those were both state court verdicts, and then
there was another state court verdict which was a defense
verdict that was overturned by the judge. But what's playing
(23:07):
out now in federal court is that there is a
trial coming up on November fourth, and the judge already
decided to allow the plaintiffs's general causation experts to testify.
So she's allowing them to testify. But she just missed
the first two Bellweather trials or test cases, because with
(23:30):
regard to the first one, she said the plaintiff couldn't
show an alternative available. In other words, the mom wasn't
producing breast milk donor milk wasn't available. There was no
other formula that the infant could have, So in these
types of cases you have to show an alternative, alternative,
safer design, and there they couldn't do that, and the
(23:53):
doctor testified that he would have done the same thing.
There was nothing else to feed this baby. So even
if they had warned put a warning on that this
causes you know, this could cause necrotizing intro colitis, which
the plaintiffs wanted and said was necessary, it wouldn't have
changed things. And then the second case was dismissed because
(24:14):
the court found that the plaintiffs did not produce sufficient
epidemiology to show that formula caused necrotizing intro colitis in
this baby, which was of a certain weight and of
a certain doestational age.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
They didn't.
Speaker 5 (24:31):
They had evidence for other distational ages, but not this
distational age, so she dismissed the case on that ground.
So the question is is the third case going to
be dismissed. There are summary judgment motions that have been filed,
but those are heavily redacted. In these types of cases,
they want to protect the privacy of the infant, so
those are heavily redacted. So I can't really comment on
(24:52):
those but in terms of the expert testimony, they have
moved to exclude the plaintiff's causation expert again, and this
time it's like a specific causation issue, So did this formula?
Did formula causes babies? This specific babies necrotizing entro colitis?
(25:17):
And what the defendants are arguing is that the expert
should be barred from testifying because he didn't say what
is the minimum dose that causes necrotizing entro colitis? And
in some jurisdictions, in some case, while that's necessary, courts
have found that that's necessary, but in this circuit, I
(25:38):
the case Lirad says it's not necessary. So I don't
think that this expert is going to be barred on
those grounds, but there is so but there are these
summary judgment issues which I don't have access to. But
there is a hearing on October fourteenth on the summary
judgment and the Dowbert motions. If the motions are experts,
and so that could provide better guidance as to which
(26:00):
way the court's leaning and what the summery judgment motions
are about.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
And that's ahead of the trial that starts in November.
Speaker 5 (26:06):
That's right, So she dismissed. So the last I think
the first case was dismissed the friday, if I'm remembering correctly,
I think the first case was dismissed the friday before
the trial is supposed to start.
Speaker 3 (26:17):
Wow.
Speaker 5 (26:18):
Yeah, so these this can happen, you know, days before
the trial's art.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
But you said there's the seven hundred cases total, So
these are just some of the very early ones.
Speaker 5 (26:27):
Yeah, that's just in federal court. There are more cases in.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
State court, got it? And have some have any others
gone to trial or not yet?
Speaker 5 (26:39):
Yeah? Well, none of those federal cases have gone to trial.
There have been two state court verdicts for plaintiffs. So
that was the one for sixty million, and that was
out of Illinois, and then the second one was out
of Missouri and that was for five hundred million. The
third case out of that was tried out of Missouri,
was a defense verdict, but the judge overturned it after
(27:00):
after the jury written their decision. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Wow, And so how do you what's your like overall
outlook for how these cases get resolved. I mean it
sounds like sort of it sounds a little unwieldy, you know,
hundreds of cases, some in state courts, some in federal court,
different outcomes. What do you think the company's overall exposure
is here.
Speaker 5 (27:20):
Well, we don't know. We don't know exactly how many
cases will be filed. One of the Planets attorneys has
said that they expect ten thousand cases to be filed,
anywhere between five and ten. So we're estimating that, you know,
there could be like three thousand viable cases. And if
that's the case, including six we think you know, we've
(27:40):
assume that there's going to be verdicts, like ten verdicts. Uh,
but we assume that with those verdicts, settlement value could
be two to four billion dollars for those cases.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
Go in with the b you said, correct, yeah, all right,
and so this here in on the fourteenth, are you
going to be able to listen in or okay? So
we'll follow up with you. Good.
Speaker 5 (28:04):
This is a judge who puts everything you know, makes
everything TELEPONICX great.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
You love judges like that. What judge is it?
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Judge pala Meyer. She's on the Northern District of Illinois.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Got it?
Speaker 1 (28:17):
Okay, Well that's great, So we'll I guess this time
last week we'll follow up with you to see how
you think that here and went yep, okay, great, thanks Holly.
All right, I think we're going to leave it there.
We'll wrap up this episode of Votes and Verdicts. As always,
thank you for listening. If you have any questions about
any of the matters that we discussed on today's episode,
(28:38):
please don't hesitate to reach out to us at your
convenience with questions. As a reminder, you can find all
of our research on the Bloomberg terminal at BI go.
You can find our litigation and policy research on our
Litigation and Policy Dashboard, which is available on the terminal
at BI space laws go. We want to thank our producer,
Adja Somani, without whom this podcast us would never publish
(29:01):
on time. Thank you again for listening, and have a
great day.
Hello, and welcome to the Votes and Verdicts podcast, hosted
by the Litigation and policy team at Bloomberg Intelligence, the
investment research platform of Bloomberg LP on the Bloomberg Terminal.
Bloomberg Intelligence has five hundred analysts and strategists working across
the globe and focused on all major markets. How our
coverage includes over two thousand equities and credits, and we've
(00:34):
outlooked on more than ninety industries and one hundred market industries,
currencies and commodities. This podcast series examines the intersection of
business policy and law, and today's our weekly look at
the litigation and policy catalysts that we're currently watching and
that we think will impact companies across a number of
different sectors. My name is Elliott Stein. I'm an analyst
(00:57):
with Bloomberg Intelligence covering litigation in the financial sector, and
I'm delighted as always to be joined by several of
my BI colleagues. As always, you can find all of
our research on the Bloomberg terminal at BI go, and
you can find most of our litigation and policy research
on our dashboard BI laws Go. Today is October ninth,
(01:20):
twenty twenty five. It's one thirty pm here in New York.
And to get the conversation started, let me bring in
Nathan Dean, who's our chief policy analyst down in Washington,
d C. Nathan, how you doing the zeros closed? Oh? No,
the effects of the shutdown are starting to be felt.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
But actually, I think the biggest issue with the shutdowns
so far Now I'm joking, but like the Army ten
milers supposed to supposed to be canceled this weekend, so wow. Uh,
And the Marine Cools Marathon is on October twenty fourth,
So I mean there is there is some significant impact
that's happening here with the government shutdown. And you know,
as we're recording this on October ninth, I don't have
(02:03):
a good idea of when this is going to end
anytime soon, because both parties are feeling fairly confident in
where they are at the moment. The Democrats are looking
at pulling data that suggests that independents are blaming Republicans
for the shutdown, and Republicans are looking at pulling data
amongst their base, saying that the base is quite happy
with their strategy at the moment. Just as a reminder,
(02:25):
the Republicans have offered a seven week clean CR, although
I think it would be a six week clean CR
now because it would keep the government open until November twentieth.
The Democrats are looking for that plus an agreement to
extend some Obamacare subsidies that expire at the end of
the year. Both sides are feeling good. Both sides are
(02:46):
you know, Senator Chuck Schumer even said this morning that
every day it gets better for us. Republicans are using
that as already started using that to attack him. But
things are getting a little heated up on Capitol Hill.
Just yesterday, you know, the Arizona Democratic the Arizona Democratic
delegation confronted Speaker Johnson outside of his office. Subsequently, Representative
(03:10):
Waller from Long Island confronted Representative Jeffries and outside of
the Democratic press conference. President Trump then put a sombrero
on Representative Jeffries on a truth social post. So things
are getting a little heated. So where I think it
goes from now is the Senate is going to go
home this weekend. I think they're going to go home.
I think they are going to take a time out
to like I would tell to my children who are
(03:32):
fighting in room, I said that on TV. They said,
would why is the Senate going home? And I'm like, well,
first thing that popped in my head was, well, when
my two children are fighting in the room, I don't
keep them in the room. I separate them, say go
cool down, and then we'll discuss. But the Senate's going
to come back next week, and the biggest pressure point
that's going to come up is on October fifteenth. That
is when the military pay. The military misses the first paycheck,
(03:55):
and it's going to be extremely difficult for policymakers in
both sides of the aisle to explain why they're getting
paid in the military isn't. In fact, just this morning,
Speaker Johnson did the call in show on c SPAN
and received a couple of calls that were fairly harsh
on that on that topic alone. So I think when
the solution does come, it's going to most likely be
(04:17):
from a group of moderate senators that have no connection
to leadership. I think they will be together. They will
come together and they'll say, look, we know this deal
is going to reopen the government. We know this deal
is going to have some form of an agreement on
Obamacare subsidies, whether it's an unofficial handshake to have a
vote or something like that. They'll present it to leadership.
Leadership will say okay, fine, let's run with this, and
(04:38):
then they send it to the House. The biggest challenge
at that point, though, is the Hazard Rule. This is
the rule that Speaker Johnson has to follow. It's a
Republican rule that essentially states that the majority the Speaker
of the House won't bring a bill to the floor
of the House of Representatives if the majority of his
or her party doesn't support it. So if you get
a deal from the Senate that has Obamacare subsidies in it,
(04:59):
does represent it or a Speaker of Johnson actually bring
that to the floor. I would take the point if
President Trump wants it on the floor, he'll get it
on the floor. But we'll see what happens. So I
think I.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Mean on that point, on that point, how what does
MTG Marjorie Taylor Green's tweets? How did those play into this?
Because you know, she seems sort of sympathetic to the
Democrats arguments about Obamacare or healthcare costs going up.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Yeah, even just some morning, she just did another podcast
about three hours ago where she did double you know,
doubled down on this, saying that she had individual family
members that were going to be severely harmed by the
premium increases here. And I think that's one of the
cracks that the Republicans are showing at the moment. And
I think, you know, I'm not trying to be partisan here,
but I'm just saying that, like President Trump has said,
(05:46):
he supports this idea of Obamacare subsidies. Now, whether it's
a one year extension, whether it's income based, you know something.
You know, I'm not simply just a pure extension, but
there's something there there, and we've seen it from moderate
Republicans in purple districts. You've seen it represented MARGINALLYE. Tayler Green,
but still the bulk of the party doesn't want to
see if that happen. So I think this is ultimately
(06:07):
going to be a President Trump call. And if President
Trump tells the party to do it, then I think
the party will do it.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
But you don't see that happening this coming week. I mean,
there's no indication that something will happen this week.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Now. The first missed paycheck for government employees is tomorrow,
October tenth. Senate's going home for the weekend. I think
they'll come back. Remember Monday is a holiday, so the
Senate's not in session. Then they'll come back next week,
and then they'll start dealing with the pressure of the
military and not getting their paychecks. Last thing, though, just
a heads up, we do see one potential market catalyst
(06:42):
or one market pressure coming for the grocery stores and
consumer SNAP benefits were appropriated for October. SNAP benefits are
not appropriated for November. Now, the USDA does have some
way of appropriating it if they were to play around
with funds, essentially move money from columns A to B.
It's tricky. So we're going to be on the look
(07:02):
next week to see if we're seeing any started pressure
in the consumer grocery store space. So just something to
keep your eye on.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
Interesting, very interesting. All right, well, we'll check back with
you next week about that. Maybe. All right, let's stick
with DC and bring in Matt settinhelm our TMT litigation
and policy analyst. Matt. How you doing good?
Speaker 3 (07:22):
Good Elliott? Yeah, putting on my immigration law hat here
for you know of a rare, rare time a little
different field of telecom regulation today, but interesting issue at
the Department of Homeland Security we can talk about.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
Yeah, that's what I wanted to ask you about. It
sounds like DHS wants to issue a rule that would
shift the H one B visa application process from I guess,
what's basically a purely randomized lottery system to one that
gives you know, higher priority to higher wage positions. I
know you put out a note this morning say and
(08:00):
that such a rule would likely fall in court. You
want to just tell us a little bit more about
this potential rulemaking, who it might impact the most, and
why you don't think it will survive judicial scrutiny.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
Yeah, absolutely, so that's exactly right. So this H one
B process has been going on for a number of
years where the DHS has used a random lottery to
allocate There are eighty five thousand applications granted every year
as part of this H one B visa program. This
(08:32):
is for foreign professionals hired in specialty occupations. These visas
run for three years, they can be extended to a
total of six years. And what this rule proposal would change,
as you said, is that instead of it being a
random lottery, the higher wage applicants would have more balls
(08:55):
in the pot. So level four is the highest wage level,
they would get four balls in the pot, whereas level
one would get one one ball in the pot.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
Do they really use like lottery balls like we see
the lottery or like the NBA draft, Like that's what
I'm envisioning.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
No, it's it's all computerized unfortunately. Yeah, metaphorical balls we're
talking about here. But it helps me get my head
around it. And and and so this would have an
impact I think on companies that have relied on the
H one B program to pay lower wage workers and
(09:32):
and obtained a number of of lower wage workers. There
are a number of of IT companies that that have
used the program in that way. Whereas big tech companies
traditionally UH have paid higher salaries, they're probably less directly
disrupted by this. If this goes through. So the question
(09:53):
is will it go through? So will DHS adopt it?
As I said in September, they put out this notice
of proposed rulemate and made pretty clear where they're going
with it and the role making itself. Talked about why
they believe a random lottery doesn't work nearly as well
as what they want to do, which is this prioritization
(10:17):
of the higher wage applicants, and so pretty clear they're
going to move ahead with that. And so the interesting
question then is going to be a litigation about it,
because I think it's very likely that DHS will get
challenged on this. They actually tried to do this under
the first Trump term, something very similar to this, and
(10:38):
they ended up losing in court, not on the legal issue,
on a technicality, but a very similar legal issue was
briefed there. So we have the benefit of all that
briefing already. And when I went through that briefing and
looked at how DHS tried to defend itself the last
time around, you just come away thinking this is going
(10:59):
to be a really tough case for for DHS to win.
Congress passed a law. You know it'd be had it
had been. It would be one thing if Congress had
passed a law that said DHS fashion a lottery selection
process that furthers certain interests for us, that sort of delegation.
We don't have anything like that here. All Congress said
(11:19):
was H one B. Visas shall be issued in the
order in which petitions are filed for such visas. That's it,
And and and so when the first Trump administration tried
to use that statute to justify its changes here, it said, well,
Chevron deference, this law is ambiguous. We can you know,
(11:41):
we can interpret silence or ambiguity in this law to
make a reasonable policy choice. And you court have to
defer to us on this. Well, as you know, Elliott,
the Supreme Court, you know, killed Chevron deference.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
This is where we played the Alanis Moore said, isn't
an ironic Yes, yes, overlaid your commentary.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Yes, that will be nice. And it so that that
whole line of defense is gone. And when when we
do this again, so you can't just say, look it's
sort of unclear. We get to do it because we're
being reasonable. And and then when you look at you know, okay,
what did Congress actually give them, it's not very much. Now,
DHS did win one court case about because the statue
(12:25):
doesn't say use a lottery at all. So DHS sort
of has read that into the law. And they got
challenged on that once and they because you know, they said,
the challengers said, look, it doesn't say lottery, and you're
doing a lottery and and and but the court allowed
it because it said you know, this was an administrative
mechanism to deal with an overwhelming number of applications that
(12:48):
are coming in, and and and to me that the
court's very likely to see it. This is very different,
not a neutral random lottery, but actually policy choices that
looks a lot more more like something Congress would need
to do, something it would need to empower the agency
UH to do for this to go ahead.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
What's the administration's stated rationale for this change.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
It's really a concern that that that there are too
many low wage workers being hired through this process, and
and and that that really we should be prioritizing the
the the more accomplished, the higher salaried workers and bringing
in that skill to the country, not the lower wage
(13:36):
workers to you know, replace workers at that level. So
that that seems to be the consistent push from the administration.
I'm just not sure that that the agency can do
it without Congress coming in, you know, with a new
law to address that.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
Got it? So what so you said in September they
had this advanced artists of proposed role making. I think
what's the timing going forward?
Speaker 3 (14:02):
Yeah, so they take comments on that through this month.
Comments are due at the end of this month. Then
there's another procedural step in November, which would probably prevent
them from acting that fast. So I was thinking December
is probably when you start watching closely for action from
DHS on this. Now, these auctions are sorry, these lotteries
(14:23):
run typically in March and April every year, so I
think there's there's probably going to be a push to
get some legal clarity before March or April next year,
so you could see you could see all this sort
of playing out in the first quarter of next year
in the courts.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Right, yeah, I mean that makes sense. I guess if
they finalize the rule by December, you would see lawsuits
right after, and then you'd have preliminary injunction motions and
rulings pretty quickly after that. I think that's right, gotcha.
All right, super interesting issue. We'll leave it there with you, Matt,
Thank you. Justin, Let's bring you in. That's away from
(15:00):
DC for the moment, but let's stick with litigation in
the tech sector. Justin THREESI is one of our anti
trust analysts, so let's bring him in. Justin. How you doing.
Speaker 4 (15:12):
I'm good, Elliott, thanks so much.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
Good. So Justin, there is no shortage of anti trust
litigation against Google. It seems the most high profile of course,
are you know a pair of Justice Department cases against
the company over its ad tech stack would you cover
and its search engine in which our colleague General recovers.
But you wrote this week about a different case brought
(15:36):
by Penske Media, which is the publisher of Billboard and
Rolling Stone. It's a case against Google for allegedly coercing
web publishers to participate in the training of generative AI.
That's all I know about it. So why don't you
come in and tell us more about what the case is, about,
what's at stake, and how you see it playing out.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
Yeah, thanks, elliot. So you know, just when your thought
maybe Google is approaching a place of resolution on its
edit trust issues. I think what we have here is
a situation where maybe roll upening the door to a
whole other set of claims that Google could be facing
this time with regard to its practices in AI. Right,
So what's happening here? So met Penske, As you said,
they publish a ton of different things that they've got
(16:19):
the website properties for Rolling Stone, for Billboard, and what
they're basically saying is look, Google, we consent to allow
you to kind of crawl our web page so that
our web pages appear in your search results on Google itself.
But what they're also saying is that they're being coerced
by Google. They need that traffic coming from Google, right,
Like people aren't going to come to their websites if
(16:40):
they're not showing up on Google's search results, because hey,
Google's monopolized search. That's where people go when they want
to visit a web page. Right, So they're saying, look,
Google search results, that's a must have for us. But
what Google's allegedly also doing is taking that website content
from Penske on Billboard, a rolling Stone, on other publications,
and it's using that content to train its own AI.
Speaker 5 (17:00):
Right.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
So when you go to Google and you see those
AI overviews or those snippets on Google, now that kind
of summarize the content on Penske's web pages, you're staying
on Google. You're not going on to get the answer
you're looking for front Penske, And therefore Penske is losing
advertising revenue that they otherwise would have gone. And if
you visited their web page, that's the basic crux of
the case here is that Google's got this must have
(17:23):
search result kind of power, and because they need that
from Google, they're kind of forced and thought and Google
train it's AI on their websites.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
It's so interesting because in the in thej cases, AI
was sort of a defense that Google was using right
to yeah, you know, as part of its defense against
those cases, and now it's sort of being attacked for
the way it uses AI. But yeah, I mean, I
hear what you're saying, because when you do Google something,
(17:50):
you do get those AI results and you can just
expand the screen, which is different than like the search results,
which just give you a you know, part of a perigraph,
but it doesn't but you're not able to expand that,
so it does right.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Right.
Speaker 4 (18:03):
So so Google's basically you know, you're saying on Google,
and Google's keeping that ad revenue, right if you're saying
on Google and perhaps picking ads there instead of kind
of using those referral links or advertising that you might
otherwise visit on Penske's pages. Right. So that that's the
kind of central issue here. But the case, I think,
as smart as it is, it's a little unusual and
I don't think it's without some issues in terms of
(18:25):
moving forward here, right, because what we have here is
an edit trust claim of reciprocal dealing, which is very rare.
We don't see these very often. You can open a
treatise and try to read about reciprocal dealing and there's
very little lot of it. I can tell you because
I did not myself google yah yah, you cant google it.
That is true, but you're not going to get what
you want from that. But the thing is here is
(18:46):
that look, Penske is saying they have this monopoly in search, right,
and that's why they're so dependent on search. But the
thing is is that this AI overview stuff that Google's
basically trying to train with using Penske's content, Penske's not
in that market. So if they're monopolizing that market, does
Penske even have standing to bring this lawsuit. They're not
necessarily in the market that's being harmed by this whole
(19:09):
effort at Google, So that's a big question too.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
So right, so it seems like they have a claim,
but not necessarily an antitrust claim.
Speaker 4 (19:17):
Right, right, Yeah, I think that's right, and there could
be a monopoly leveraging claim here, we think that one
probably has some teeth to it, so we're watching that closely.
But look, at the end of the day, this case
got assigned to Judge Meta and DC who just finished
up all of this this work on Google Search, right,
and I think throughout Google Search, he's really shown that
he's not looking to take this expansive, non traditional view
(19:40):
of the law and the way he applies things either.
So I think that's probably a hurdle here for Penske
because you know, a personal stamp when I think he's saying,
wait a minute, I thought it was all done with
this at a professional standpoint, I think he's looking at
this kind of claim which is somewhat unusual, and maybe
he says, wait a minute, this is a copyright case.
Why are you trying to bring this under under anti
trust claim? So as smart as the case is, you know,
(20:03):
it probably gets past the motion to dismiss on the
monopoly leveraging stuff. But you know, I think it could
be a pretty tall bar here for in terms of
proceeding you know, this way instead of copyright, and so
they'll plug our colleague Tamlin basket on this too. Has
been a huge, whole deep Dive product on these kind
of copyright cases and how they're you know, things are
being used to train generative AI.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
And was also the subject of a previous Wrote Some
Verdicts episode. I'm yeah, there's no shortage. Yeah, those are
that's a super interesting line of cases. And so did
they not include a copyright claim in this complaint?
Speaker 4 (20:34):
No, in this complaint it's all anti trust, right, So
I think it's just this this separate kind of you know,
it's this back door in many ways, if you will,
of kind of bringing this copyright claim.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
Right.
Speaker 4 (20:42):
It's a smart case, it really is. I think, you know,
it has some potential behind it. But you know, I
think the real thread here, you know, book Penskey's damage
is in this case, we're probably talking about you know,
a few million dollars maybe tens of million dollars, millions
of dollars at most, and lost ad revenue. The real
threat is that if this case is successful, how many more?
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Yeah? Every single company, Yeah, every single company could sue them. Right.
That opens up the slippery slope there, absolutely so super interesting.
So the case was just filed recently, right, So the
next thing is you expect emotion to dismiss.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
Yeah, absolutely, that's right. Cases filed in the September, So
motions to dismiss and the briefing around that come in
probably over the fall here and I think we probably
have a hearing on that before Judge Meta sometime for
a staff next year.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Got it all right? So every time you say Penske,
all I think about is that Seinfeld episode with the
Penske file. But you and Jennery Booth, all right, good stuff,
thanks Justin. All Right, Holly, let's bring you in Holly
from covers litigation and policy in the consumer and industrial
sectors for US. Holly, how you doing im?
Speaker 5 (21:45):
Thanks Elliott.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
So, Holly, you've been tracking litigation against Abbott Laboratories and
me Johnson's Record Unit alleging. The litigation alleges of companies
failed to warn customers that their baby formulas could cause
is necrotizing enterra colitis NEC in pre term babies, which
(22:08):
has resulted allegedly in injuries and death. What's the latest
in these cases? You know, maybe give us an overview
of where we are in this litigation and how much
does it stake for the companies and what you're watching
currently in the cases.
Speaker 5 (22:23):
So that's right. So there are about seven hundred cases
in federal court, a little more than seven hundred cases
seven hundred and sixty cases and more in state court
against Abbott and recas meet Johnson overclaims that their infant formula,
as you mentioned, causes necrotizing entero colitis, which is an
(22:44):
intestinal disease in pre term infants. So there were two
big verdicts, and the first one was for I believe
it's sixty million, and the second one was for five
hundred million. Those were both state court verdicts, and then
there was another state court verdict which was a defense
verdict that was overturned by the judge. But what's playing
(23:07):
out now in federal court is that there is a
trial coming up on November fourth, and the judge already
decided to allow the plaintiffs's general causation experts to testify.
So she's allowing them to testify. But she just missed
the first two Bellweather trials or test cases, because with
(23:30):
regard to the first one, she said the plaintiff couldn't
show an alternative available. In other words, the mom wasn't
producing breast milk donor milk wasn't available. There was no
other formula that the infant could have, So in these
types of cases you have to show an alternative, alternative,
safer design, and there they couldn't do that, and the
(23:53):
doctor testified that he would have done the same thing.
There was nothing else to feed this baby. So even
if they had warned put a warning on that this
causes you know, this could cause necrotizing intro colitis, which
the plaintiffs wanted and said was necessary, it wouldn't have
changed things. And then the second case was dismissed because
(24:14):
the court found that the plaintiffs did not produce sufficient
epidemiology to show that formula caused necrotizing intro colitis in
this baby, which was of a certain weight and of
a certain doestational age.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
They didn't.
Speaker 5 (24:31):
They had evidence for other distational ages, but not this
distational age, so she dismissed the case on that ground.
So the question is is the third case going to
be dismissed. There are summary judgment motions that have been filed,
but those are heavily redacted. In these types of cases,
they want to protect the privacy of the infant, so
those are heavily redacted. So I can't really comment on
(24:52):
those but in terms of the expert testimony, they have
moved to exclude the plaintiff's causation expert again, and this
time it's like a specific causation issue, So did this formula?
Did formula causes babies? This specific babies necrotizing entro colitis?
(25:17):
And what the defendants are arguing is that the expert
should be barred from testifying because he didn't say what
is the minimum dose that causes necrotizing entro colitis? And
in some jurisdictions, in some case, while that's necessary, courts
have found that that's necessary, but in this circuit, I
(25:38):
the case Lirad says it's not necessary. So I don't
think that this expert is going to be barred on
those grounds, but there is so but there are these
summary judgment issues which I don't have access to. But
there is a hearing on October fourteenth on the summary
judgment and the Dowbert motions. If the motions are experts,
and so that could provide better guidance as to which
(26:00):
way the court's leaning and what the summery judgment motions
are about.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
And that's ahead of the trial that starts in November.
Speaker 5 (26:06):
That's right, So she dismissed. So the last I think
the first case was dismissed the friday, if I'm remembering correctly,
I think the first case was dismissed the friday before
the trial is supposed to start.
Speaker 3 (26:17):
Wow.
Speaker 5 (26:18):
Yeah, so these this can happen, you know, days before
the trial's art.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
But you said there's the seven hundred cases total, So
these are just some of the very early ones.
Speaker 5 (26:27):
Yeah, that's just in federal court. There are more cases in.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
State court, got it? And have some have any others
gone to trial or not yet?
Speaker 5 (26:39):
Yeah? Well, none of those federal cases have gone to trial.
There have been two state court verdicts for plaintiffs. So
that was the one for sixty million, and that was
out of Illinois, and then the second one was out
of Missouri and that was for five hundred million. The
third case out of that was tried out of Missouri,
was a defense verdict, but the judge overturned it after
(27:00):
after the jury written their decision. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Wow, And so how do you what's your like overall
outlook for how these cases get resolved. I mean it
sounds like sort of it sounds a little unwieldy, you know,
hundreds of cases, some in state courts, some in federal court,
different outcomes. What do you think the company's overall exposure
is here.
Speaker 5 (27:20):
Well, we don't know. We don't know exactly how many
cases will be filed. One of the Planets attorneys has
said that they expect ten thousand cases to be filed,
anywhere between five and ten. So we're estimating that, you know,
there could be like three thousand viable cases. And if
that's the case, including six we think you know, we've
(27:40):
assume that there's going to be verdicts, like ten verdicts. Uh,
but we assume that with those verdicts, settlement value could
be two to four billion dollars for those cases.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
Go in with the b you said, correct, yeah, all right,
and so this here in on the fourteenth, are you
going to be able to listen in or okay? So
we'll follow up with you. Good.
Speaker 5 (28:04):
This is a judge who puts everything you know, makes
everything TELEPONICX great.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
You love judges like that. What judge is it?
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Judge pala Meyer. She's on the Northern District of Illinois.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Got it?
Speaker 1 (28:17):
Okay, Well that's great, So we'll I guess this time
last week we'll follow up with you to see how
you think that here and went yep, okay, great, thanks Holly.
All right, I think we're going to leave it there.
We'll wrap up this episode of Votes and Verdicts. As always,
thank you for listening. If you have any questions about
any of the matters that we discussed on today's episode,
(28:38):
please don't hesitate to reach out to us at your
convenience with questions. As a reminder, you can find all
of our research on the Bloomberg terminal at BI go.
You can find our litigation and policy research on our
Litigation and Policy Dashboard, which is available on the terminal
at BI space laws go. We want to thank our producer,
Adja Somani, without whom this podcast us would never publish
(29:01):
on time. Thank you again for listening, and have a
great day.
Host
Elliott Stein
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