Stanford Law School v. Greta Van Sustern

One of my late grandmother's favorite sayings was, "You're making a mountain out of a molehill," and that's the exact phrase it seems Greta Van Sustern could've used to describe Stanford Law School's insistence on a retraction or correction regarding a story involving one of its accepted students.

Van Sustern had reported a story from Palestra.net about a man who had traveled specifically to Ohio, a swing state in the upcoming Presidential election, to register to vote; he later claimed he didn't know the "technical definition of residence" and didn't realize he was doing anything wrong.

The controversy began when Van Sustern, based on the information she had, referred to this man as a Stanford Law student. In reality, he has been accepted to Stanford Law but hasn't begun studies, and this was a distinction Stanford Law School wanted Van Sustern to make clear. Watch this video for Van Sustern's assessment of this request:

I have to agree with Van Sustern here. It seems that Stanford would be much better served to just let this thing drop rather than continue calling attention to the story. And this is an excellent lesson for future lawyers to learn: choose your battles wisely, especially when they're fought in public.

Note: Who knew? This is already Van Sustern's second appearance here on the Law School blog. Read about her claim that law school grading is a "fraud" here.