National Briefing

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/09/us/national-briefing.html

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A groundbreaking lawsuit filed on behalf of 21 young people demanding that the federal government take aggressive action against climate change can move forward, a federal judge ruled on Friday. Fossil fuel companies and the federal government had asked the judge to dismiss the suit, asserting that, among other things, the young people did not have standing and were presenting claims that were more suited to the political branch of government than the judicial. Thomas M. Coffin, a United States magistrate judge, wrote that the plaintiffs were pursuing a “novel theory,” but he declined to dismiss the case because “the nascent nature of these proceedings dictate further development of the record before the court can adjudicate whether any claims or parties should not survive for trial.” JOHN SCHWARTZ

The White House on Friday relented in its legal fight with congressional Republicans over thousands of pages of documents related to a federal gun-trafficking investigation, Operation Fast and Furious. Republicans have for years assailed the operation, in which guns sold by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives ended up in the hands of Mexican drug cartels, and were found at crime scenes in the United States and Mexico. A House committee repeatedly subpoenaed documents from the Justice Department, but President Obama in 2012 refused to provide many of them, asserting executive privilege. That led the panel, the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, to hold Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. in contempt of Congress. In January, a federal judge ruled against the president, and on Friday the Justice Department declined to appeal the judge’s ruling and delivered the documents. Representative Jason Chaffetz of Utah, the Republican chairman of the committee, said he would continue to seek additional documents.

MICHAEL D. SHEAR

Thomas Pokorny, a retired Cuyahoga County judge, has been chosen to review evidence in the death of a woman who collapsed after struggling with Cleveland police during a mental health crisis. The Ohio Attorney General’s Office asked for someone to review statements made by police during an internal investigation of the 2014 death of Tanisha Anderson. She began struggling after getting into a cruiser. The medical examiner said she had stopped breathing after being placed on the ground on her stomach, and heart problems and mental illness contributed to her death. The city denied that excessive force was used.

(AP)