On March 26, 2026, the Eighth Circuit, in Ghosh v. Abbott Lab’ys, Inc., 170 F.4th 1141 (8th Cir. 2026), affirmed the dismissal of whistleblower claims brought by a remote employee whose connections to Minnesota, where the employer was located, consisted of a 12-day visit to the state to participate in mandatory training.
Case Background
The plaintiff in this case was a Hawaii resident, who was hired by defendants in early 2023 as a district sales manager. Upon hire,…
Continue Reading Eighth Circuit Limits Whistleblower Protection for Remote Employee in Multi-State Employment Arrangement

April 22, 2026 – A statute immunizing health care professionals during the COVID-19 state of emergency did not violate the constitutional right to a jury trial, a unanimous Wisconsin Supreme Court recently ruled in
Wren v. Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital Milwaukee, Inc. (2026 WI 11), barring a medical malpractice lawsuit from a stillborn childbirth. Because the Wisconsin Constitution “empowers the [L]egislature to alter or suspend particular common law causes of action,” the immunity statute suspended Savannah Wren’s…
Continue Reading Wisconsin Supreme Court: Pandemic Doctor Immunity Statute Constitutional

The transfer portal and NIL (name, image, and likeness) payments have recently significantly changed the landscape of college sports. The combination of the two has resulted in free agency for student athletes and hotly contested litigation in connection therewith.

The National Collegiate Athletic Association created the transfer portal in 2018. Prior to its creation, student athletes had to obtain permission from their existing schools to transfer to other schools and had to sit out a year from competition upon…
Continue Reading College Athletics Are A-Changing

The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) recently posted a new factsheet making significant changes to Form I-9 inspections and which “mistakes” are correctable under the Immigration and Nationality Act § 274A (“Immigration Act”).

ICE reclassified many Form I-9 errors from “technical” to “substantive.” The impact is that clerical mistakes that employers formerly could correct during a Form I-9 audit are no longer correctable and instead are subject to immediate fines during a Form I-9 audit.

Under the Immigration…
Continue Reading The Costs of Form I-9 Mistakes Just Went Up Drastically for Employers

The UW Law Library is marking National Library Week this year with a milestone: the 20th anniversary of our Faculty READ Poster series.
You’ve likely seen READ posters before—those images of celebrities holding their favorite books, produced by the American Library Association. Our version features UW Law School faculty and staff. Since the first posters debuted in 2006, dozens of faculty and staff have been featured, each holding a book that has sparked their interest or shaped their…
Continue Reading Happy National Library Week: Celebrating 20 Years of Faculty READ Posters at the UW Law Library

Two recent cases under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) and the PUMP Act provide an early look at how courts and juries are treating these relatively new protections. In both cases, employees prevailed—and recovered significant damages.
Pregnancy Accommodations Must Be Taken Seriously
In Tarango v. PermiaCare (W.D. Tex. 2026), an employee requested relatively modest pregnancy-related accommodations, including permission to wear different footwear and to work remotely after giving birth. Those requests were denied. The employee also experienced…
Continue Reading Early PWFA and PUMP Act Cases Show Strong Enforcement

If you’ve been scheduled for an Independent Medical Examination, or IME, you’re not alone in feeling uneasy about it. For many injured workers in Wisconsin, this is one of the most confusing and stressful parts of the worker’s compensation process.

You may be wondering why it’s happening, what the doctor is really looking for, and whether it could affect your benefits. The short answer is yes, it can affect your claim. But understanding how an IME works can help…
Continue Reading What to Expect at an Independent Medical Examination (IME) for a Wisconsin Worker’s Compensation Case

Settling a long-term disability (LTD) claim is often more complex than it first appears. Most people naturally focus on the settlement amount, since that is the most visible part of the agreement. However, every settlement also includes additional terms that define what rights are being resolved and what both sides agree to moving forward.

At first glance, these provisions can feel overwhelming or overly technical. In reality, they are a standard part of resolving an insurance claim. While they…
Continue Reading What to Expect When Settling a Long-Term Disability Claim

The first nationwide test of a mandatory episode-based payment model has been unveiled. In the Fiscal Year (“FY”) 2027 Inpatient Prospective Payment System (“IPPS”) Proposed Rule, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) proposes resurrecting and expanding the original Comprehensive Care for Joint Replacement (“CJR”) Model to establish a mandatory, nationwide episode-based payment model for most hospitals paid under the IPPS beginning October 1, 2027.     

Under the proposed model, known as the Comprehensive Care for Joint Replacement…
Continue Reading CMS Proposes Resurrection and Nationwide Expansion of Mandatory Joint Replacement Bundled Payment Model (CJR-X) 

The Indiana Court of Appeals (the “Court”) affirmed the trial court’s order for a temporary commitment which authorized forcibly medicating the patient. The Court held that the hospital presented clear and convincing evidence, primarily through detailed physician testimony, that both commitment and involuntary medication are appropriate. In re Commitment of L.F., No. 26A-MH-658, 2026 WL 969885 (Ind. Ct. App., Apr. 10, 2026).
Background
L.F. was admitted to the hospital after being found standing in traffic. While hospitalized, L.F.
Continue Reading Court of Appeals Upholds Commitment Order, Reinforces Evidentiary Standard for Forced Medication

It’s springtime. According to my inbox, graphic designers consider this the best of times to “refresh” your logo.

Cool.

Before relegating the old, though, consider the trademark implications.

United States trademark registrations can be “standard character” — which means the registration covers words in the mark regardless of how they are depicted visually — or, they can be “design” registrations. That means the registration covers only the particular design as depicted in the original drawing file.

And US trademark…
Continue Reading How the ‘Logo Refresh’ Can Wreck Your Trademark

  • JLL reports that the medical outpatient building sector remained active entering 2026, with national occupancy reaching a record 92.7% in Q4 2025 and average rents increasing 3.3% year over year, despite reimbursement pressure and regulatory policy uncertainty. Health systems continued to drive both leasing and development activity, accounting for 46% of MOB leases and 57% of outpatient construction deliveries in 2025.
  • An article highlighted five major 2026 hospital transactions, including Prime Healthcare’s acquisition of Franciscan Health Olympia Fields, RWJBarnabas

    • …
    Continue Reading Weekly Hospital Real Estate Briefing: Orlando Health to Buy Another AL Health System | Hospital M&A Activity Up in Q1 26 | Stark Self-Disclosures Exceed $100M

    Ohio is currently at the center of one of the most significant shifts in name, image, and likeness (“NIL”) rights for high school student-athletes.

    After years of focusing on NIL in college athletics, the most consequential developments are now occurring much earlier in the athletic pipeline, with direct implications for students, schools, and policymakers.

    Until recently, Ohio stood as one of the last holdouts in the country, prohibiting high school student-athletes from earning compensation tied to their name, image,…
    Continue Reading Leveling the Playing Field: How Ohio’s NIL Battle Signals the Future of High School Sports

    A second OWI offense within 10 years in Madison, Wisconsin, carries a mandatory minimum of 5 days to 6 months in jail and a 12- to 18-month driver’s license revocation. In 2026, judges have zero discretion to waive the ignition interlock device (IID) requirement, which must stay for at least one year.

    If you are facing a second OWI charge in Wisconsin, you are facing steep penalties. The penalties that are on the table are even steeper if your…
    Continue Reading Wisconsin Second Offense OWI: 2026 Mandatory Minimums and Ignition Interlock Rules

    The use of artificial intelligence in candidate screening and hiring processes has been a “hot” employment issue for the past several years. This is driven, in part, by the rapid and widespread adoption of these tools by employers: in March 2025, a Forbes article declared that “[t]he world is on the verge of a seismic shift in how talent is hired, one that will redefine the fabric of work itself.” That same article included Gallup survey statistics showing that,…
    Continue Reading Legal Challenges to AI in Hiring: FCRA Has Entered the Chat

    My father loved the sea. By extension he also loved all sea-related tchotchkes, i.e., model sailing vessels, fake shark’s teeth, lighthouses big and small, cute little fishermen in bright yellow rain slickers. You name it, he had one. How did he explain this passion? Growing up in western Wisconsin, he was far from the sea. In a former life he believed he was … a whale. Many years ago, he wandered into an antique store in Florida on the…
    Continue Reading The ‘Masterpiece’ and a Daughter’s Burden, Relieved