E.D. Tex. P. R. 2-5 — Relationship to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure

High confidence· verified September 26, 2026Local Rules

Summary

E.D. Tex. P. R. 2-5 — Relationship to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure: the court's own rule, verbatim from UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS LOCAL RULES (as of February 9, 2026), official PDF, sha-custodied. Court-level requirement: applies in every case before the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas alongside the federal rules and any judge-specific procedures.

Requirement

Except as provided in this paragraph or as otherwise ordered, it shall not be a legitimate ground for objecting to an opposing party’s discovery request (e.g., interrogatory, document request, request for admission, deposition question) or declining to provide information otherwise required to be disclosed pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(a)(1) that the discovery request or disclosure requirement is premature in light of, or otherwise conflicts with, these Patent Rules. A party may object, however, to responding to the following categories of discovery requests (or decline to provide information in its initial disclosures under Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(a)(1)) on the ground that they are premature in light of the timetable provided in the Patent Rules: (a) Requests seeking to elicit a party’s claim construction position; (b) Requests seeking to elicit from the patent claimant a comparison of the asserted claims and the accused apparatus, product, device, process, method, act, or other instrumentality; (c) Requests seeking to elicit from an accused infringer a comparison of the asserted claims and the prior art; and (d) Requests seeking to elicit from an accused infringer the identification of any opinions of counsel, and related documents, that it intends to rely upon as a defense to an allegation of willful infringement. Where a party properly objects to a discovery request (or declines to provide information in its initial disclosures under Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(a)(1)) as set forth above, that party shall provide the requested information on the date on which it is required to provide the requested information to an opposing party under these Patent Rules, unless there exists another legitimate ground for objection.

Source of truth

Except as provided in this paragraph or as otherwise ordered, it shall not be a legitimate ground for objecting to an opposing party’s discovery request (e.g., interrogatory, document request, request for admission, deposition question) or declining to provide information otherwi

Official source: E.D. Tex. — Rules & Orders (U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Texas)
Source health: Healthy · checked October 4, 2026
Effective date: February 9, 2026
Last verified: September 26, 2026benchpath-appfed-rules-2026-09-25

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