Huie Partner Testifies Regarding Proposed Amendment to Civil Rules
On January 27th, 2026, Huie partner, John Isaac Southerland, participated in a virtual hearing regarding proposed amendments to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 45, which governs non-party subpoenas. John Isaac testified before the Federal Civil Rules Committee and his commentary included reference to those made by others, including Lawyers for Civil Justice. John Isaac’s testimony focused on his position that the Rule needs to provide stronger protection to non-parties who are served with a subpoena by requiring the requesting party to reimburse a non-party for reasonable costs and expenses of complying with requests for documents and information, and that this reimbursement should occur prior to the non-party’s duty to comply. John Isaac also testified that the Rule needs to provide greater clarity about a non-party’s duty to log privileged or protected information and personally identifiable information (“PII”) of individuals unrelated to the litigation in that a non-party should be allowed to provide categorical log of this information, rather than a more burdensome line by line or document by document log.
This is the second time in his career that John Isaac had to opportunity to testify before the Federal Rules Committee. He previously testified to the Committee regarding proposed amendments to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6). A link to John Isaac’s comment to the Committee along with a link to the comment provided by Lawyers for Civil Justice are available below.