Hangxiao Che v. Daimler Truck North America LLC — 7th Cir. (Oct 26, 2026)

The Seventh Circuit hears Verizon's challenge to a cell tower denial in Elkhart, Indiana. The proposed tower needed a variance—special zoning permission—for a wooded residential site near two parks. Verizon says it would improve wireless coverage; neighbors objected to its visual impact. The zoning board first denied permission without giving reasons. A federal judge sent the case back for a proper decision, and the board held another hearing and denied it again. The judge then upheld the denial, finding adequate evidence of harm to the area's views. The Telecommunications Act preserves local zoning authority but limits it, including a requirement that denials be in writing and supported by substantial evidence. The appeal concerns the remedy for the first denial, the evidence for the second, and whether the board effectively prohibited wireless service. Joseph Diedrich of Husch Blackwell will ask the court to reverse that ruling for Verizon.

The Ninth Circuit hears a Guatemalan woman's challenge to the denial of protection from removal. Maria Domingo-Lucas fears private violence and says the Guatemalan government cannot protect her. An earlier effort to obtain protection reached the Eighth Circuit. This petition challenges the denial of withholding of removal and protection under the Convention Against Torture. Withholding can bar removal to a country where someone's life or freedom would be threatened because of a protected characteristic, including membership in a particular social group. In Perdomo, the Ninth Circuit held that the agency could not reject Guatemalan women as a group simply because that group was broad, but left further analysis to the agency. Recognizing a group does not by itself establish that an applicant qualifies for protection.

The Ninth Circuit hears a tax advisory firm's challenge to IRS guidance on the employee retention credit. This refundable pandemic-era credit supports qualifying employer wage costs. The firm helps businesses claim it, and its fees depend on their refunds. It says IRS Notice twenty twenty-one dash twenty unlawfully narrowed eligibility without the required rulemaking process. The district judge ruled for the IRS, treating the notice as an interpretation of existing law rather than a new legislative rule. Under section five fifty-three of the Administrative Procedure Act, legislative rules normally require public notice and an opportunity to comment; interpretive rules generally do not. The firm will ask the Ninth Circuit to overturn that ruling. But first comes a separate question about access to judicial review: does the ability of the firm's clients to sue for tax refunds provide an adequate alternative remedy, blocking this challenge under the Act?

The Ninth Circuit hears Lopez versus Suzuki Motor of America. Motorcycle buyers brought a proposed class action against Suzuki over allegedly defective motorcycles sold through California dealerships. Suzuki moved the suit from state to federal court under the Class Action Fairness Act, or CAFA. The district judge sent it back under CAFA's mandatory home-state exception: at least two-thirds of the proposed class, and the primary defendants, must be citizens of the state where suit was filed. The buyers relied on warranty-registration addresses and an updated address search. Suzuki challenges whether those data prove citizenship. For individuals, state citizenship requires U.S. citizenship and domicile: the permanent home where they live intending to remain or return. The court will also consider whether Suzuki's unnamed Japanese parent counts as a primary defendant. This is a dispute about which court should hear the lawsuit, not a decision on the alleged defect. Dominic Draye represents Suzuki.

The Second Circuit hears a special-education dispute concerning N.B., a young child with autism. His parents believed he needed intensive applied behavior analysis, or ABA, to make progress. ABA uses observation and structured behavioral interventions to teach skills and address behavior. The city offered a specialized public-school program, related therapies, and one-to-one classroom assistance, without expressly requiring ABA in the written plan. The parents enrolled him in private school and sought tuition reimbursement for the twenty-twenty-three to twenty-twenty-four school year. Administrative officers rejected their claim; the district court agreed that the public offer was adequate. An IEP is an individualized education program, the written plan of services. FAPE means a free appropriate public education. De minimis means trivial; the legal benchmark is progress appropriate to this particular child's circumstances. The dispute concerns what the written plan had to promise and how much weight courts should give the education officers' judgment. Caroline Heller, of Greenberg Traurig, represents the parents.