News featuring a faculty member
The Illinois State Bar Association (ISBA) has named the University of Illinois College of Law Immigration Law Clinic as one of the recipients of the 2026 John E. Thies Excellence in Legal Education Award. The award recognizes law school programs that emphasize real world skills for law students. The clinic will be honored at the ISBA Member Appreciation and Recognition Reception on Thursday, May 14 at the Morton Arboretum.
According to the New York Sun, President Trump suggested during remarks at a private luncheon that the federal government may no longer support essential care programs and that states should instead rely on state-level funding to do so.
Professor and tax law expert Richard Kaplan says that the president’s remarks about Medicare, in particular, rest on a fundamental misunderstanding of how the program is financed.
“Medicare is almost entirely funded by the federal government through payroll taxes paid by almost all employees, the great majority of self-employed persons, and most employers; premiums paid by program enrollees; and general federal funds,” Kaplan said. “States have no role of any consequence.”
On Tuesday, April 28, 2026, Dane County Circuit Court Judge Rhonda Lanford ruled that the Wisconsin Department of Justice must release its list of approximately 16,000 law enforcement officers currently certified in the state. The judge rejected the DOJ’s arguments that releasing the list would identify undercover officers, subject officers to harassment, or put them in danger.
“When responding to records requests, there is a strong presumption of openness and liberal access to public records,” wrote the judge. “[T]he DOJ has not met its burden to show that this is an ‘exceptional case’ warranting nondisclosure.” The judge concluded that DOJ’s denial “was not the product of a genuine, case-by-case balancing analysis, but rather a habitual denial based on [its] past inability to garner compliance from local agencies.”
The suit was brought by The Badger Project and Invisible Institute. The media organizations are represented by the Wisconsin Transparency Project and the University of Illinois College of Law First Amendment Clinic.
The Badger Project is a nonpartisan journalism nonprofit that focuses on and investigates government, politics, and related matters in Wisconsin. Invisible Institute is a nonprofit public accountability journalism organization based in Chicago. Both organizations have litigated cases seeking police records and written extensively about law enforcement issues, particularly the problem of “wandering officers” who jump agencies to avoid discipline.
The Badger Project and Invisible Institute asked for officers’ names, birth years or ages, zip code, and work history. Most states release this information, but have not experienced any significant problems caused by making the information public. The request did not ask for home addresses.
Both organizations have reported on the lawsuit:
“Courts have ruled time and time again that speculative fears of harm do not justify withholding government records from the public,” said Tom Kamenick, president of the Wisconsin Transparency Project. “Government officials must do more than merely claim that, hypothetically, something bad might happen if the records are released. Rather, they must show that harm is likely to occur and is sufficiently serious to overcome the presumption of access to government records. DOJ could not do that here.”
“We are incredibly proud to have represented the Invisible Institute in this critical fight for accountability,” said Lena Shapiro, Director of the First Amendment Clinic. “Securing this victory took three years of sustained effort, with nine students and two fellows from the First Amendment Clinic pouring their energy into this matter to ensure that the public’s right to know prevailed over blanket government secrecy.”
The Clinic students handled discovery, including resolving disputes and taking depositions, and briefed the successful motion for summary judgment, which was ultimately argued in January by advanced student Gabriela De La Llana.For a copy of the complaint, contact the First Amendment Clinic at the University of Illinois College of Law at law-firstamend@illinois.edu.
Professor Heidi Hurd was recently a featured guest on the Just Theory podcast, where she spoke about morality and the concept of mercy. Funded by Newcastle University, the mission of the podcast is to change the face of legal theory and champion female-led scholarship in analytic legal philosophy and jurisprudence.
Professor Jacob Sherkow was a speaker at the recent CRISPRMED conference in Copenhagen, Denmark. He participated in a satellite meeting structured around the topic of Access, IP Landscape and FTO, and spoke specifically about “CRISPR Patent Licenses: Lessons from History.”
As consumer bankruptcy filings continue to rise, the role of arbitration has also increased. Because the Federal Arbitration Act and the US bankruptcy code can be at odds with each other and that tension has not yet been tested by the Supreme Court, experts expect that the matter will eventually make its way there.
Professor and bankruptcy expert Bob Lawless, who has written a paper on arbitration and bankruptcy, says that unless amended or repealed, courts should follow both statutes.
Speaking to Bloomberg, he said, “You’ve got to look and say, ‘For this matter in this arbitration agreement, is this subject to arbitration, and does the arbitral demand conflict with a command in the bankruptcy code?’”
In late March, the Supreme Court issued a ruling in Chiles v. Salazar, overturning a Colorado law that bans conversion therapy for minors because it violates First Amendment protections on free speech. The ruling is expected to impact similar laws in many other states, but according to Robin Fretwell Wilson, Utah’s law may survive any legal challenges. She consulted with the state legislature on the language of its 2023 law banning conversion therapy and says that their approach differs, allowing neutral speech and banning harmful conversion practices.
“I think it’s remarkable that Utah has found a way through what has just been a slog with the rest of the country,” Wilson said. “We don’t have to be divided about these things that are so deeply personal to us, like our identity or how we choose to love. People, you know, can find a way to protect everybody in the same law.”
Read more at ksl.com, fox13now.com, and deseret.com.
On March 13, 2026, Patrick Keenan was invested as the Albert J. Harno Professor of Law in a ceremony at the College of Law Building. In remarks shared at the ceremony, Dean Jamelle Sharpe quoted Professor Andy Leipold in designating Keenan as a pillar of the law school community: “Pat is a highly regarded voice in international human rights law; his careful, thoughtful scholarship has enhanced our international reputation, his teaching is terrific—just ask the students—and he has been a wonderful colleague, someone who is supportive and fair to all.”
Professor Keenan joined the University of Illinois College of Law faculty in 2001. He is an expert in human rights and international law, and he holds campus appointments not only at the College of Law but also at the Center for Global Studies, Center for African Studies, and the Lemann Center for Brazilian Studies. He has published articles and book chapters on a variety of issues, including the U.S. drone program, human trafficking and tourism, and international criminal law and conflict minerals, and he is the co-author of “The International Criminal Court in a Nutshell.” His work has appeared in leading law reviews, and he has been quoted in numerous prominent media outlets. Professor Keenan’s scholarship has also been cited in the United States Supreme Court and other federal courts. Prior to his time in academia, Professor Keenan defended indigent criminal defendants facing the death penalty in Georgia and Alabama at trial, on appeal, and in habeas proceedings as an attorney with the Southern Center for Human Rights. His full bio is available on his faculty profile page.
Professor Keenan’s endowed position was made possible through the thoughtful planning and a generous estate donation of Albert E. Jenner, Jr. ’30 in honor of Dean Harno. Dean Albert J. Harno served as a Professor of Law at the University of Illinois from 1921-1957 and was the dean of the College from 1922-1957, overseeing the College’s move from Altgeld Hall to the current College of Law building in 1955. At the campus level, he served as University Provost from 1931-1944. Dean Harno was also one of the leading scholars in the field of criminal law, producing a critical chapter entitled “The Supreme Court, In Felony Cases” in the 1929 Illinois Crime Survey, along with bringing forth the texts, “Sentencing and Parole in Illinois” and “Cases and Materials on Criminal Law and Procedure.”
Utah has introduced a first-in-the-nation pilot program that allows AI to independently renew certain prescriptions for patients with chronic conditions. The 12-month initiative, which launched in January 2026, uses an AI system developed by the health tech company Doctronic, and operates under a special state “regulatory sandbox” designed to test emerging technologies. A New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) article, authored by Sara Gerke, Ravi B. Parikh, and I. Glenn Cohen, raises serious questions about its efficacy and legality.
The program currently applies to nearly 200 commonly used medications, including treatments for conditions such as high blood pressure, diabetes, and depression. State officials say the goal is to improve medication adherence. After an initial review period of 250 cases by a physician, the AI system will begin making prescription renewal decisions without direct human oversight.
While the authors agree that “autonomous prescription renewal may offer benefits in narrowly defined clinical contexts,” they focus on several medical and legal issues raised by the program, including:
The article also discusses the complex relationship between state and federal law at play in such autonomous AI systems. “Such systems hold a lot of potential benefit for patients,” said I. Glenn Cohen, a Professor and Deputy Dean at Harvard Law School and one of the article’s authors, “but especially as the first-in-the-nation, it is important for patients that the developers consider all the legal and ethical issues raised.”
Following the Supreme Court decision in Chiles v. Salazar, which found that a Colorado law banning conversion therapy for minors violated the First Amendment rights of therapists, Professor Robin Fretwell Wilson co-authored an op-ed (with Utah state legislator Mike Petersen) for Deseret News.
The pair wrote that they don’t believe the ruling will impact Utah’s own law banning conversion therapy. An excerpt follows:
“Unlike Colorado’s law, Utah’s legislation is viewpoint-neutral. Rather than dictating conversation, Utah’s law protected virtually everything a therapist would want to explore with a minor client through “safe harbors.” Therapists can talk with kids about body image, family dynamics, social media use, religious beliefs or risky behaviors — and children can raise doubts, fears or questions — without being funneled into a single script of affirmation. Destructive aversive practices remain banned — but dialogue, exploration and honesty are protected.”