(New Orleans, Louisiana — July 10, 2023) — StandWithUs celebrates the July 10 ruling by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in A&R Engineering and Testing, Incorporated v. John Scott, Attorney General of Texas , a victory for anti-BDS laws throughout the country. The Court just vacated a previously issued injunction by a local district court, meaning that the State of Texas can continue to enforce its anti-BDS law. 36 states now have binding anti-BDS laws, (one state has a non-binding resolution) and the highest courts to date to rule on such matters remain our country’s appellate courts, which have either upheld or refused to invalidate our countries’ anti-BDS laws.
StandWithUs was proud to arrange an amicus brief for this case, and sincerely thanks attorneys Jonathan M. Rotter from Glancy Prongay & Murray LLP as well as Aaron Stiefel and Avishai Don from Arnold Porter Kaye Scholer LLP for their research and work on the brief.
Anti-BDS laws combat discrimination by preventing state agencies from awarding funds or contracts to entities that engage in national origin-based commercial discrimination against Israel. As determined by the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in Arkansas Times vs. Waldrip , anti-BDS laws do not infringe upon freedom of speech. The A&R Engineering case originated after the City of Houston offered a contract to an engineering firm, whose owner sued after the city refused to remove from its contract an anti-boycott provision.
Roz Rothstein, CEO of StandWithUs, noted, “This last month has been monumental for the fight against BDS and national-origin discrimination. Parties who sought to defend their states’ anti-BDS laws have prevailed victoriously in both the Fifth and the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals . And on July 6, New Hampshire became the newest state to adopt anti-BDS as state policy. Let the record reflect that anti-BDS laws are here to stay.”
About StandWithUs
StandWithUs (SWU) is an international, nonprofit, and non-partisan Israel education organization that works to inspire and educate people of all ages about Israel, as well as challenge misinformation and fight against antisemitism.
Through university fellowships, high school internships, middle school curricula, conferences, materials, social media, educational films, and missions to Israel, StandWithUs supports people around the world who want to educate their schools and communities about Israel.
Founded in 2001 and headquartered in Los Angeles, the organization has chapters and programs throughout the U.S., Israel, the UK, Canada, South Africa, Brazil, and the Netherlands.
For the last eleven years, StandWithUs has consistently received the highest possible ratings from Charity Navigator and GuideStar, two charity watchdog groups that assess hundreds of thousands of charities in the United States.
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