Extract from Doug Austin’s article “The Federal Court System CARES Whether Virtual Court Proceedings Here to Stay”
I love getting a comment from a reader about a blog post I’ve written! I love it even more when the reader provides information that I didn’t know previously. And when it’s from none other than the Hon. Andrew Peck (ret.), it’s even better!
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about how courts began using Zoom to conduct proceedings virtually once the COVID-19 pandemic began, including hearings, depositions (many of which have been virtual already for years), and even trials. A lot of them, in fact.
One state – my home state of Texas – announced five months ago, that its approximately 2,000 judges had conducted one million virtual hearings since March 2020! As part of my conclusion, I stated that “virtual court proceedings appear to be here to stay for the foreseeable future – at least for many types of court proceedings”.
The Pandemic and How the CARES Act Impact on Federal Courts
The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act) was a $2.2 trillion economic stimulus bill passed by the 116th U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Trump on March 27, 2020, in response to the economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic in the US. Unprecedented in size and scope, the legislation was the largest economic stimulus package in US history, amounting to 10% of total U.S. gross domestic product.
