20 Feb 2024 Our Lawsuit Against the SEC Over Nasdaq Diversity Rules Will Be Reheard

We received good news today regarding our lawsuit against the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC).

The New Civil Liberties Alliance, who represents us in the lawsuit, issued a press release:

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has agreed to an en banc rehearing of the New Civil Liberties Alliance’s National Center for Public Policy Research v. SEC lawsuit challenging “Board Diversity Rules” that SEC promulgated without statutory authority. These rules impose race, gender, and sexual orientation quotas on corporate board membership for companies listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange, along with compelling corporate speech to explain any quota missed.

Scott Shepard

The press release quotes Scott Shepard, director of our Free Enterprise Project, who says:

It is deeply heartening—restorative of a faith in the American Experiment that has taken quite a beating in recent years—that the full Fifth Circuit has proven willing to review the decision of the three-judge panel in this vital manner.

I think, and I hope and trust that they alike think, that the panel simply misunderstood the scope of the SEC’s powers, even as it refused to recognize the vital, existential constitutional problems that lay beneath the question of the locus of and restrictions on SEC authority.

Read the full press release here.