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Problems With New California Bar Exam Spark Lawsuit and Enrage Test Takers

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Problems With New California Bar Exam Spark Lawsuit and Enrage Test Takers

Even under normal circumstances, the California bar exam is one final harrowing hurdle before aspiring lawyers can practice. But last week was worse than any other, as they were thrown into limbo by technical glitches, delays and what many said were bizarrely written questions on a revamped test that didn’t match anything in preparation.

The faulty rollout last week of the new licensing test, which was approved by the California Supreme Court in October and was touted by the state bar as a way to save money, has outraged test takers and the law school community at large, and prompted an investigation by California lawmakers and a lawsuit.

“You can talk to any attorney — because they have all been through the bar experience — and they will tell you how hard it is and how stressful it is to go through the bar exam,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, the dean of the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law. “To have to then take it again because of the incompetence of the bar is inexcusable,” said Mr. Chemerinsky, who had raised concerns along with other law school deans about the new exam before it was approved.

The botched exam, which is administered digitally, has left test takers in a bind that puts their career aspirations and personal finances in jeopardy. Many took weeks off work and missed time with family — and have job offers contingent on passing the February exam.

“I just kind of feel ripped off,” said Zack Defazio-Farrell, who took the exam last week. He added: “You spend a lot of money preparing. You spend a lot of time not making money. And this happens.”

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Test takers reported a range of technological problems over the course of the two-day exam, which on Day 1 included five one-hour essay sessions and a 90-minute section that assesses the ability to carry out legal tasks, and on Day 2 involved 200 multiple choice questions over the course of four 90-minute sessions.

Test takers said they had encountered delays of over an hour to gain access to the exam, and some said they could not access the test at all. Others reported chronic freezing and lags, and an unresponsive copy and paste function.

Some also said the questions were written in a strange manner, were missing key facts, contained typos or simply did not make sense. And according to the state bar, there were reports that on-site proctors often did not have answers to basic questions.

The technology and proctoring of the exam was provided by the company Meazure Learning, which provided the ability to take the exam remotely, a change from previous years. The company now faces a class-action lawsuit by test takers.

Meazure Learning could not be reached for comment. On its website, the company says it has more than 30 years of experience successfully launching licensing programs. “We excel at developing fair, reliable and secure exams that you can trust,” it says.

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The state bar, which said in August that the new test would save the organization up to $3.8 million annually, said that it was examining whether the company’s performance had failed to meet its contractual obligations and that a full accounting of how many people had experienced issues was still underway on Saturday.

Tom Umberg, a state senator who chairs the body’s judiciary committee, which is tasked in part with funding the state bar, said there would be an inquiry. “We are going to be doing a deep dive as to what happened and how to make sure this doesn’t happen again,” he said.

The new exam was written by Kaplan North America, a test preparation company. It replaced questions by the National Conference of Bar Examiners, which writes the exams in a majority of states. The state bar said that the questions developed by Kaplan had undergone the same reviews as previous exam questions.

Russell Schaffer, a spokesman for Kaplan, said in a statement that “the portion of the exam we wrote was subjected to a rigorous quality control process.” He added that the company was unaware of any questions it was responsible for that contained typos.

For generations, California’s bar exam was widely considered the nation’s hardest. Even elite law students often had to take it more than once to clear the high threshold for passage. Former governors Jerry Brown and Pete Wilson and former Vice President Kamala Harris are among the many famous lawmakers who failed the California bar on their first try. The threshold for passing was lowered slightly several years ago, but the test still remains exceptionally rigorous relative to exams in the rest of the United States.

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Some have said the bar was aware of glitches months in advance, after an experimental exam in November contained technical issues for some. But the bar said those problems were isolated.

The state bar appeared to anticipate issues with the new exam before the rollout ahead of last week. Before the test, it offered people who withdrew from or failed the February exam a fee waiver for the next test date. Exams are administered twice a year, in February and July.

“This new exam has not rolled out the way it should have, and we, the board, apologize along with state bar leadership and staff,” the bar’s board of trustees said in a statement on Feb 21. “The continued issues with testing locations, scheduling, technical issues and communication lapses have distracted applicants from their studies and created confusion.”

Of the 5,600 people who registered for the February exam, 1,066 withdrew, the state bar said.

On Friday, the state bar said it was looking into remedies for those who took the exam and experienced technical difficulties, including conducting analyses to adjust scores. Mr. Chemerinsky has called on the bar to offer provisional licenses to test takers and revert to the old exam in the future.

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For some of those who were not able to complete the exam, the bar offered a chance to retake the test this week. But that opportunity has been delayed to later this month after some test takers allegedly leaked the questions online.

But for those who don’t get a chance to retake the test this month, it means waiting until July — which provides little comfort.

Some said that may be too late to avoid devastating financial situations dependent on becoming licensed by May, when February test results are released.

“If I have to take it in July, I probably will not be living in California anymore,” said Alexandra Sennet, who said she was hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt from law school. She added that she has a job offer that is contingent on her becoming licensed in May.

Ms. Sennet said she was also in debt paying for bills associated with a spinal injury she sustained after a car accident. That injury forced her to miss last July’s bar exam and has limited her ability to work a regular job.

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“I’m banking on this to pay my bills, literally,” she said, adding, “This is my livelihood.”

Mr. Defazio-Farrell said he was unsure how he was going to pay off his student loans without a lawyer’s salary.

“I’m not employed at the moment, and getting back into it is going to be difficult without a license,” he said.

For others, the thought of committing yet more time for the test presents more than financial anxiety. Becky Hoffman, 38, said she decided to pursue becoming a lawyer in part to give her three young children a better life, and sacrificed spending time with them over the past three and half years during law school.

She wrote over 45 essays and took over 1,600 multiple choice questions to prepare in the weeks leading up to the exam.

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After the second day of testing ran late on Wednesday because of glitches, Ms. Hoffman stepped outside the testing site where her wife and children were waiting to take her home.

“I tried my hardest to just be brave and tell them that it’s over, and mommy is done, and I’m so happy to be able to spend more time with you,” she said. “And I don’t know if that’s true or not.”

Shawn Hubler contributed reporting.

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Three more people charged with damaging Reflecting Pool after Trump’s multimillion-dollar restoration | CNN Politics

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Three more people charged with damaging Reflecting Pool after Trump’s multimillion-dollar restoration | CNN Politics

Three more people have been criminally charged with destruction of property at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

Officers say they detained Cameron Thiers, Sophie Dennison-Gibby and Justin Carreno one Saturday afternoon in June and described in court documents witnessing them peeling and removing pieces of blue paint from the Reflecting Pool.

One officer “witnessed Carreno reach down into the reflecting pool and pull up a piece of the blue paint,” according to the court documents.

The officer who detained Dennison-Gibby “found 1 additional piece of the reflecting pool liner” in her purse, the documents said.

All three incidents were recorded on the officers’ body worn cameras, they said in the court documents.

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Several “partnering law enforcement agencies assigned to the Reflecting Pool” working with US Park Police were involved in detaining the two men and one woman — including officers from Texas, Oklahoma, Montana and California.

One of the officers said in court documents that Thiers “admitted to removing a piece of blue sealant from the Reflecting Pool and still had it in his hand when I made contact with him.”

The three defendants were arraigned in court Wednesday and pleaded not guilty to the misdemeanor charges of destruction of property with a value less than $1,000. The judge ordered them to stay away from the Reflecting Pool.

Lawyers for Thiers and Dennison-Gibby declined to comment. CNN has reached out to Carreno’s attorney.

If found guilty of destruction of property, the defendants could be fined up to $1,000 and face a maximum of 180 days behind bars.

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The New York Times first reported that three additional people had been charged with damaging the Reflecting Pool.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed that vandals caused major damage to the pool by gashing the lining after his administration spent more than $14 million on renovations, though he has not provided evidence to support that claim. The officers who charged Carreno, Thiers and Dennison-Gibby did not accuse them of gashing the lining.

Former Olympic canoeist David Hearn was indicted by a grand jury in Washington, DC, last week for allegedly damaging the Reflecting Pool. Hearn — unlike Carreno, Thiers and Dennison-Gibby – was charged with destruction of property with a value of more than $1,000 which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison, if convicted. He is set to be arraigned in court Thursday.

Crews began draining the Reflecting Pool over the weekend to make repairs, according to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, for the second time in three months.

The move comes after weeks of problems – algae blooms, green-hued water, a chipping bottom and the administration’s allegations of vandalism – that have plagued the iconic landmark, making its woes the subject of national interest.

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Supreme Court financial disclosures reveal how their books add to their income

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Supreme Court financial disclosures reveal how their books add to their income

Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett speaks at the Reagan Library on Sept. 9, 2025, in Simi Valley, Calif. Barrett discussed and signed copies of her new book, Listening to the Law: Reflections on the Court and Constitution.

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Even as the Supreme Court was handing down one legal thunderbolt after another last week, the justices were quietly releasing their annual financial reports. Justice Samuel Alito was the only sitting justice to request an extension, which he has done for 15 years. The disclosures do not give a complete account of the justices’ total income and wealth, but they give insights into their concertgoing, guest professorships and even their involvement in youth sports.

In addition to their salaries, much of the justices’ reported income came from their book deals. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson led the pack earning more than $1.1 million last year for a total of roughly $4 million since her memoir, Lovely One, was published in 2024.

Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Neil Gorsuch, Amy Coney Barrett and retired Justice Anthony Kennedy also reported income from published books. Earnings from their books ranged from $849,000 for Barrett, to $300,000 for Gorsuch and $88,000 for Sotomayor, whose books include her 2013 autobiography and five children’s books. Justice Clarence Thomas, who previously earned $1.5 million for his 2007 memoir, listed no publisher payments last year, and Justice Brett Kavanaugh, one of 13 co-authors of a 2016 legal treatise, also received no payments last year. Kavanaugh is said to be working on a memoir but he listed no payments for the anticipated book. Alito does have a book coming out in the fall, but with his financial report still outstanding, there is no data on how much he was paid for the work in 2025.

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The only two sitting justices who have not written books are Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Elena Kagan.

Many justices also earned income from teaching at law schools. Roberts reported income from New England Law, located in Boston, and Gorsuch reported teaching income from George Mason University in Virginia. Thomas taught classes at Catholic University in Washington, D.C., and Barrett and Kavanaugh taught at Notre Dame Law School. Barrett graduated from the school and began teaching there 23 years ago; Kavanaugh has family connections to Notre Dame.

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Manhattan Building’s Columns Buckled Beneath New Addition, Images Show

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Manhattan Building’s Columns Buckled Beneath New Addition, Images Show

At least two structural columns buckled and failed in a 37-story office tower in Midtown Manhattan on Tuesday, prompting evacuations of nearby streets and buildings. While city officials asserted that the tower was in no danger of collapsing completely, outside engineers said further failures in the structure could not be ruled out.

A pair of columns that failed completely were part of the tower’s existing structure. A New York Times review of images and videos from inside the building has found that several floors were added atop these columns.

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City officials said in a news conference on Tuesday that the building was continuing to move, while they simultaneously assured the city that the building would not suffer “total collapse.” “The way this building is constructed, it’s a steel-frame building,” John Esposito, a chief in the Fire Department in New York, said at the afternoon news conference. “So, it would not be a total collapse. It would be more of a localized collapse.” Still, he said, “that remains our concern, that it’s moved.”

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Engineers said that the movement itself was cause for concern. In a properly designed steel building, they said, loads should redistribute quickly to surviving structural supports if columns failed.

Joe DiPompeo, a former president of the Structural Engineering Institute at the American Society of Civil Engineers, said that if the structure had been overloaded, he would expect any movement “to happen very quickly,” rather than gradually.

“Generally when a column buckles, it’s a sudden failure,” Mr. DiPompeo said. He said that a full collapse remained unlikely given the redundancies built into the building codes.

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Engineers often refer to the most dangerous possibility as a progressive collapse, a process in which structures near the initial failure become overstressed and also fail, potentially bringing down the building if the sequence continues. While unlikely, it cannot be ruled out, Mr. DiPompeo said.

Footage recorded from inside the building shows at least two structural columns appear to have failed completely, Mr. DiPompeo said. Other nonstructural, interior walls — or at least the metal “studs” that were in place to hold them up — also appear to have deformed.

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“The only way that really happens is if the floor above them dropped. It looks like the floor above could have dropped a foot or two, which is obviously not a good situation,” Mr. DiPompeo said.

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Image from @fernando40tiktok.commarc via Storyful

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The 37-story building is in the process of being converted from office space into residential units. Four new floors and a large vertical portion were added onto the existing building in recent months. The vertical portion consists of a stack of over a dozen new floors cantilevered out over the existing building below.

Engineers said that there was nothing inherently wrong with adding residential floors or the cantilevered section above the columns that failed, as long as the original structure and the modifications had properly accounted for the added weight and wind loads.

“The cantilever alone doesn’t change anything,” Mr. DiPompeo said, but it does put additional load on the columns underneath — a factor that should have been reflected in the design.

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Nathan Berman, managing principal and founder of MetroLoft, the developer overseeing the conversion, said on Tuesday that “this incident is nothing more than a typical construction mishap.”

He said two columns near the northwest corner of the tower had bent under the weight of additions to the building above, most likely because those columns had not been properly reinforced, though he said an investigation would determine the cause. The rest of the columns, he said, “picked up the weight.” He estimated the affected floors above the failed columns had sagged by a maximum of four inches.

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Mr. Berman said that he expected the problems to be fixed and the project to be completed with, at most, a slight delay.

On Tuesday evening, installation of temporary shoring was set to begin shortly, in order to help stabilize the 20th and 21st floors of the building.

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