Hasson Bacote is challenging his death sentence under the North Carolina Racial Justice Act (RJA), a first-of-its-kind law that allowed those sentenced to death to challenge their death sentences where race was a significant factor in decisions to seek or impose the death penalty at the time of their trials. Earlier this year, Mr. Bacote put forth evidence during a two-week hearing which showed that race played an impermissible role in jury selection not only in his own case, but across North Carolina statewide. The evidence presented at this landmark hearing will have significant implications for the over 130 people sentenced to death who filed similar claims under the Racial Justice Act.

North Carolina health care providers filed a lawsuit on June 16, 2023 challenging several provisions in Senate Bill 20, a sweeping law that severely restricts access to abortion from the earliest stages of pregnancy and bans care after 12 weeks in nearly all circumstances. The case was filed one month after the North Carolina General Assembly rushed S.B. 20 through both chambers and overrode a veto from Gov. Roy Cooper to put it into law. The law — which was drafted and passed without any opportunity to amend — is scheduled to take effect on July 1.

This lawsuit contends that the consideration of race as an affirmative action measure in admissions at Harvard and at UNC constitutes racial discrimination in violation of the Equal Protection Clause.