Reuters US Domestic News Summary

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Sean Lane entered a court order allowing Giuliani to seek a new trial and challenge the amount of damages awarded to Wandrea "Shaye" Moss and her mother, Ruby Freeman, whom Giuliani had falsely accused of fraud after former Republican President Donald Trump's 2020 election loss.

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs.

US Supreme Court rejects Virginia case over race in high school admissions

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday declined a chance to further restrict efforts to promote diversity in education, turning away an appeal by a coalition of parents and students who argued that an elite Virginia public school's revised admissions policy racially discriminates against Asian Americans. The justices left in place a lower court's ruling rejecting the claim by the plaintiffs that the admissions policy at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology violates the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment equal protection guarantee. Asian Americans make up the majority of students at the school located in the Washington suburb of Alexandria.

'We don't anoint kings': Defying Trump, Nikki Haley pledges to continue campaign

Republican candidate Nikki Haley pledged to press ahead with her long-shot presidential bid on Tuesday, saying "we don't anoint kings in this country" and that she had no intention of dropping out after Saturday's nominating contest in South Carolina. "I feel no need to kiss the ring. And I have no fear of Trump's retribution," she said in a speech in Greenville, South Carolina, where she is expected to lose to former President Donald Trump in this weekend's primary in her home state.

Two men charged with murder in shooting near Kansas City's Super Bowl rally

Two men have been charged with murder in connection with a gunfight in Kansas City, Missouri, that killed one person and left more than 20 others wounded, including the suspects, at the fringe of last week's Super Bowl victory rally, prosecutors said on Tuesday. Their arrests - one charged on Tuesday, the other on Feb. 17 - brought to four the number of suspects facing prosecution in the Valentine's Day shooting, following two teenagers taken into custody and charged last week as juveniles with firearms offenses and resisting arrest.

US Supreme Court declines to decide legality of excluding jurors based on religion

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to decide the legality of excluding jurors on the basis of religion, turning away a Missouri agency's bid to reverse a lesbian worker's win in a workplace bias lawsuit after three prospective jurors were excluded for citing Christian beliefs that being gay is a sin. State officials had appealed after a lower court denied their request for a new trial following a jury decision siding with plaintiff Jean Finney in her suit against the Missouri Department of Corrections. The state had argued that the removal during the jury selection process of the three individuals who expressed their religious views violated the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment promise of equal protection under the law.

Exclusive-Biden administration to approve E15 gasoline expansion starting in 2025, sources say

The White House will approve a request from a group of Midwest governors to allow year-round sales of gasoline with higher blends of ethanol, but will push the start date into next year, two sources familiar with discussions said. The decision will likely be bittersweet for the biofuel industry, which wants to expand sales of corn-based ethanol but might be frustrated by the 2025 start date. The one-year delay could put off any potential localized price spikes and supply issues that the oil industry says could arise from the decision until after the U.S. election, the sources said.

US Supreme Court wrestles with bid to challenge debit card 'swipe fee' rule

U.S. Supreme Court justices on Tuesday grappled with a North Dakota convenience store's challenge to a government regulation on debit card "swipe fees" - a case that could make it easier for businesses to try to undo longstanding federal rules. Arguments in the case focused on whether the store was too late in bringing its 2021 lawsuit challenging a 2011 Federal Reserve regulation governing how much businesses pay to banks when customers use debit cards to make purchases.

Woman ends lawsuit claiming Leon Black raped her in Jeffrey Epstein's mansion

A woman who accused billionaire Leon Black of raping her two decades ago at the Manhattan mansion of disgraced financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has ended her lawsuit against the Apollo Global Management co-founder. Cheri Pierson dismissed her claims in a so-called stipulation of discontinuance filed with a New York state court in Manhattan on Thursday.

Massachusetts man accused of wife's murder sentenced for earlier art fraud

A Massachusetts man who was charged with his wife's murder last year after her disappearance garnered national headlines was sentenced on Tuesday to more than three years in prison for engaging in an earlier scheme to sell counterfeit Andy Warhol paintings. U.S. District Judge William Young in Boston at the request of prosecutors and the lawyer for Brian Walshe did not factor in the pending murder charges related to the death of his wife in deciding what sentence he deserved following his 2021 guilty plea to wire fraud and other charges.

Factbox-Who are the candidates running in the 2024 US presidential election?

Republican former President Donald Trump and former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley are competing to be their party's presidential nominee for the 2024 general election, while President Joe Biden is effectively the Democratic Party's nominee. Several third-party hopefuls are also running. Here is a list of the candidates.

Giuliani can fight $148 million defamation verdict, if someone else pays

Donald Trump's ex-lawyer Rudolph Giuliani on Tuesday secured a U.S. bankruptcy judge's approval to challenge a $148 million defamation verdict won by two former Georgia election workers after he showed that he would not be spending his own money to do so. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Sean Lane entered a court order allowing Giuliani to seek a new trial and challenge the amount of damages awarded to Wandrea "Shaye" Moss and her mother, Ruby Freeman, whom Giuliani had falsely accused of fraud after former Republican President Donald Trump's 2020 election loss.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)