19-811 Stagg, P.C. v. U.S. Dept. of State 1 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 2 FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT 3 4 August Term, 2019 5 6 (Argued: March 4, 2020 Decided: December 28, 2020) 7 8 Docket No. 19-811 9 10 ____________________________________ 11 12 STAGG, P.C., 13 14 Plaintiff-Appellant, 15 16 v. 17 18 U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE; DIRECTORATE OF DEFENSE TRADE 19 CONTROLS; MICHAEL POMPEO, in his official capacity only as Secretary of 20 State, 21 22 Defendant-Appellees. * 23 24 _____________________________________ 25 26 Before: 27 28 LEVAL, HALL, and LYNCH, Circuit Judges. 29 30 Plaintiff Stagg, P.C. appeals from the judgment of the United States 31 District Court for the Southern District of New York (Katherine Polk Failla, J.) 32 granting summary judgment to Defendants, the Department and Secretary of 33 State (and one of its subdivisions), on Plaintiff’s challenge to the 34 constitutionality of a speech licensing requirement imposed by the 35 International Traffic in Arms Regulations (“ITAR”), 22 C.F.R. §§ 120.1–130.17. 36 The district court concluded, inter alia, that the ITAR’s licensing requirement 37 unambiguously did not apply to the categories of speech that Plaintiff’s 38 complaint asserted an intention to undertake, with the consequence that the * The Clerk of Court is directed to amend the caption as set forth above. 1 question whether the provision would be unconstitutional in some 2 applications is moot, because none of those provisions applies to what Stagg 3 alleges it intends to do. We agree that Plaintiff’s intended conduct is not 4 subject to the ITAR’s licensing requirement and further conclude that that 5 finding renders Stagg’s constitutional challenges moot. We therefore 6 VACATE the judgment of the district court and direct that the action be 7 DISMISSED. 8 9 LAWRENCE D. ROSENBERG (Christopher 10 B. Stagg, Stagg, P.C., New York, NY, on 11 the brief), Jones Day, Washington, DC, 12 for Plaintiff-Appellant. 13 14 DOMINIKA TARCZYNSKA, Assistant 15 United States Attorney (Benjamin H. 16 Torrance, Assistant United States 17 Attorney, on the brief), for Audrey 18 Strauss, Acting United States Attorney 19 for the Southern District of New York, 20 New York, NY, for Defendant-Appellees. 21 22 LEVAL, Circuit Judge: 23 Plaintiff Stagg, P.C. (“Stagg”) appeals from the judgment of the United 24 States District Court for the Southern District of New York (Katherine Polk 25 Failla, J.) granting summary judgment to Defendants, the United States 26 Department of State (“DOS”), the Secretary of State, and the Directorate of 27 Defense Trade Controls, (“DDTC”). 1 The complaint seeks, inter alia, 1A glossary of acronyms employed in this opinion is as follows: Arms Export Control Act (“AECA”), Directorate of Defense Trade Controls (“DDTC”), 2 1 declaratory judgment that DOS’s International Traffic in Arms Regulations 2 (“ITAR”), 22 C.F.R. §§ 120.1–130.17, impose an unconstitutional prior restraint 3 on Plaintiff’s intended speech and are unconstitutionally vague. 4 Under the ITAR and their governing statute, the Arms Export Control 5 Act (“AECA”), 22 U.S.C. § 2751 et seq., a party seeking ...
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