pFace recognition technology in the hands of police is dangerous. Police departments across the country frequently use the technology to try to identify images of unknown suspects by comparing them to large photo databases, but it often fails to generate a correct match. And numerous a href=https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/12/19/federal-study-confirms-racial-bias-many-facial-recognition-systems-casts-doubt-their-expanding-use/studies/a have shown that face recognition technology misidentifies Black people and other people of color at higher rates than white people. To date, there have been at least seven wrongful arrests we know of in the United States due to police reliance on incorrect face recognition results — and those are just the known cases. In nearly every one of those instances, a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/24/technology/facial-recognition-arrest.htmlthe/a a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/31/technology/facial-recognition-false-arrests.htmlperson/a a href=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/11/20/does-a-i-lead-police-to-ignore-contradictory-evidence/wrongfully/a a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/06/business/facial-recognition-false-arrest.htmlarrested/a a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/29/technology/facial-recognition-misidentify-jail.htmlwas/a a href=https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2020/07/10/facial-recognition-detroit-michael-oliver-robert-williams/5392166002/Black/a./p pSupporters of police using face recognition technology often portray these failures as unfortunate mistakes that are unlikely to recur. Yet, they keep coming. Last year, six Detroit police officers showed up at the doorstep of an a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/06/business/facial-recognition-false-arrest.htmleight-months pregnant woman/a and wrongfully arrested her in front of her children for a carjacking that she could not plausibly have committed. A month later, the prosecutor dismissed the case against her./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/i-did-nothing-wrong-i-was-arrested-anyway target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=2800 height=1400 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed.jpg class=attachment-4x3_full size-4x3_full alt=Robert Williams and his daughter, Rosie Williams decoding=async fetchpriority=high srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed.jpg 2800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-768x384.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-1536x768.jpg 1536w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-2048x1024.jpg 2048w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-400x200.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-600x300.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-800x400.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-1000x500.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-1200x600.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-1400x700.jpg 1400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Robert-Williams-Full-Bleed-1600x800.jpg 1600w sizes=(max-width: 2800px) 100vw, 2800px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/i-did-nothing-wrong-i-was-arrested-anyway target=_blank I Did Nothing Wrong. I Was Arrested Anyway. /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/i-did-nothing-wrong-i-was-arrested-anyway target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletOver a year after a police face recognition tool matched me to a crime I did not commit, my family still feels the impact. We must stop this.../p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/i-did-nothing-wrong-i-was-arrested-anyway target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pPolice departments should be doing everything in their power to avoid wrongful arrests, which can turn people’s lives upside down and result in loss of work, inability to care for children, and other harmful consequences. So, what’s behind these repeated failures? As the ACLU explained in a a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13erecent submission/a to the federal government, there are multiple ways in which police use of face recognition technology goes wrong. Perhaps most glaring is that the most widely adopted police policy designed to avoid false arrests in this context emsimply does not work/em. Records from the wrongful arrest cases demonstrate why./p pIt has become standard practice among police departments and companies making this technology to warn officers that a result from a face recognition search does not constitute a positive identification of a suspect, and that additional investigation is necessary to develop the probable cause needed to obtain an arrest warrant. For example, the International Association of Chiefs of Police a href=https://www.theiacp.org/sites/default/files/2019-10/IJIS_IACP%20WP_LEITTF_Facial%20Recognition%20UseCasesRpt_20190322.pdfcautions/a that a face recognition search result is “a strong clue, and nothing more, which must then be corroborated against other facts and investigative findings before a person can be determined to be the subject whose identity is being sought.” The Detroit Police Department’s face recognition technology a href=https://detroitmi.gov/sites/detroitmi.localhost/files/2020-10/307.5%20Facial%20Recognition.pdfpolicy/a adopted in September 2019 similarly states that a face recognition search result is only an “an investigative lead and IS NOT TO BE CONSIDERED A POSITIVE IDENTIFICATION OF ANY SUBJECT. Any possible connection or involvement of any subject to the investigation must be determined through further investigation and investigative resources.”/p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13e target=_blank tabindex=-1 /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13e target=_blank ACLU Comment re: Request for Comment on Law Enforcement Agencies' Use of Facial Recognition Technology, Other Technologies Using Biometric Information, and Predictive Algorithms (Exec. Order 14074, Section 13(e)) /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13e target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tablet/p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13e target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pPolice departments across the country, from a href=https://lacris.org/LACRIS Facial Recognition Policy v_2019.pdfLos Angeles County/a to the a href=https://www.in.gov/iifc/files/Indiana_Intelligence_Fusion_Center_Face_Recognition_Policy.pdfIndiana State Police/a, to the U.S. a href=https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/2023-09/23_0913_mgmt_026-11-use-face-recognition-face-capture-technologies.pdfDepartment of Homeland Security/a, provide similar warnings. However ubiquitous, these warnings have failed to prevent harm./p pWe’ve seen police treat the face recognition result as a positive identification, ignoring or not understanding the warnings that face recognition technology is simply not reliable enough to provide a positive identification./p pIn Louisiana, for example, police relied solely on an incorrect face recognition search result from Clearview AI as purported probable cause for an arrest warrant. The officers did this even though the law enforcement agency signed a contract with the face recognition company acknowledging officers “must conduct further research in order to verify identities or other data generated by the [Clearview] system.” That overreliance led to a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/31/technology/facial-recognition-false-arrests.htmlRandal Quran Reid/a, a Georgia resident who had never even been to Louisiana, being wrongfully arrested for a crime he couldn’t have committed and held for nearly a week in jail./p pIn an a href=https://www.courierpress.com/story/news/local/2023/10/19/evansville-police-using-clearview-ai-facial-recognition-to-make-arrests/70963350007/Indiana investigation/a, police similarly obtained an arrest warrant based only upon an assertion that the detective “viewed the footage and utilized the Clearview AI software to positively identify the female suspect.” No additional confirmatory investigation was conducted./p pBut even when police do conduct additional investigative steps, those steps often emexacerbate and compound/em the unreliability of face recognition searches. This is a particular problem when police move directly from a facial recognition result to a witness identification procedure, such as a photographic lineup./p pFace recognition technology is designed to generate a list of faces that are emsimilar/em to the suspect’s image, but often will not actually be a match. When police think they have a match, they frequently ask a witness who saw the suspect to view a photo lineup consisting of the image derived from the face recognition search, plus five “filler” photos of other people. Photo lineups have long been known to carry a high risk of misidentification. The addition of face recognition-generated images only makes it worse. Because the face recognition-generated image is likely to appear more similar to the suspect than the filler photos, there is a a href=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/11/20/does-a-i-lead-police-to-ignore-contradictory-evidence/heightened chance/a that a witness will a href=https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4101826mistakenly choose/a that image out of the lineup, even though it is not a true match./p pThis problem has contributed to known cases of wrongful arrests, including the arrests of a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/06/business/facial-recognition-false-arrest.htmlPorcha Woodruff/a, a href=https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2020/07/10/facial-recognition-detroit-michael-oliver-robert-williams/5392166002/Michael Oliver/a, and a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/24/technology/facial-recognition-arrest.htmlRobert Williams/a by Detroit police (the ACLU represents Mr. Williams in a a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/i-did-nothing-wrong-i-was-arrested-anywaywrongful arrest lawsuit/a). In these cases, police obtained an arrest warrant based solely on the combination of a false match from face recognition technology; and a false identification from a witness viewing a photo lineup that was constructed around the face recognition lead and five filler photos. Each of the witnesses chose the face recognition-derived false match, instead of deciding that the suspect did not, in fact, appear in the lineup./p pA lawsuit filed earlier this year in Texas alleges that a similar series of failures led to the wrongful arrest of a href=https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/jan/22/sunglass-hut-facial-recognition-wrongful-arrest-lawsuit?ref=upstract.comHarvey Eugene Murphy Jr./a by Houston police. And in New Jersey, police wrongfully arrested a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/29/technology/facial-recognition-misidentify-jail.htmlNijeer Parks/a in 2019 after face recognition technology incorrectly flagged him as a likely match to a shoplifting suspect. An officer who had seen the suspect (before he fled) viewed the face recognition result, and said he thought it matched his memory of the suspect’s face./p pAfter the Detroit Police Department’s third wrongful arrest from face recognition technology became public last year, Detroit’s chief of police a href=https://www.facebook.com/CityofDetroit/videos/287218473992047acknowledged/a the problem of erroneous face recognition results tainting subsequent witness identifications. He explained that by moving straight from face recognition result to lineup, “it is possible to taint the photo lineup by presenting a person who looks most like the suspect” but is not in fact the suspect. The Department’s policy, merely telling police that they should conduct “further investigation,” had not stopped police from engaging in this bad practice./p pBecause police have repeatedly proved unable or unwilling to follow face recognition searches with adequate independent investigation, police access to the technology must be strictly curtailed — and the best way to do this is through strong a href=https://www.aclu.org/sites/default/files/field_document/02.16.2021_coalition_letter_requesting_federal_moratorium_on_facial_recognition.pdfbans/a. More than 20 jurisdictions across the country, from Boston, to Pittsburgh, to San Francisco, have done just that, barring police from using this dangerous technology./p pBoilerplate warnings have proven ineffective. Whether these warnings fail because of human a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/09/technology/facial-recognition-software.htmlcognitive bias/a toward trusting computer outputs, poor police training, incentives to quickly close cases, implicit racism, lack of consequences, the fallibility of witness identifications, or other factors, we don’t know. But if the experience of known wrongful arrests teaches us anything, it is that such warnings are woefully inadequate to protect against abuse./p

pThe Supreme Court recently heard oral arguments in iIdaho v. United States and Moyle v. United States/i, which will determine whether politicians can put doctors in jail for treating pregnant patients experiencing medical emergencies. The ultimate decision in the case — which is expected by the summer — could have severe consequences on the health and lives of people across the country facing emergency pregnancy complications. Here’s what you need to know:/p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardThis case is about politicians trying to block emergency care for pregnant patients./h2 /div pAnti-abortion politicians brought this case all the way up to the Supreme Court to deny pregnant people access to emergency abortion care that is necessary to prevent severe and potentially life-altering health consequences, and even death. A federal law, the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act or EMTALA, has long guaranteed that, in an emergency, patients can get the care they need — including abortion care — regardless of where they live. This is not a Democrat or Republican issue: Every administration from President Reagan to President Biden has recognized that EMTALA requires emergency abortion care. The Supreme Court#8217;s decision to overturn iRoe v. Wade/i did not diminish these longstanding federal protections, which override state laws that would prohibit such care, but now, extreme politicians are doing everything in their power to prevent someone experiencing emergency pregnancy complications from getting care in emergency rooms./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardThis case could have a severe impact on emergency care across the country, and these devastating effects are already playing out in Idaho. /h2 /div pWhile it considers the case, the Supreme Court has already allowed Idaho politicians to block emergency care for pregnant people using the state’s abortion ban which has no exception for health, and the impact is already reverberating across the state. For example, St. Luke’s Health System, the largest health system in Idaho, which sees hundreds of thousands of emergency department visits each year, reports that they are now transferring pregnant patients with medical emergencies out of state to get the care they need, but even that delay can also increase the unacceptable risks patients face. Not surprisingly, doctors do not want to practice in a state where they are criminalized for providing the emergency care their patients need: Since Idaho’s extreme abortion ban took effect, more than 20 percent of obstetricians in Idaho have left the state, according to a a href=https://www.idahocsh.org/idaho-physician-wellbeing-action-collaborativereport/a published by the Idaho Coalition for Safe Healthcare./p pIf the Supreme Court sides with Idaho in this case, these devastating effects on patients and doctors alike could spread to other states with extreme abortion bans, such as Arizona, and would give anti-abortion politicians around the country the green light to try to prohibit this essential, even life-saving, emergency care./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardThis case is about doctors and hospitals that want to provide care, but politicians want to stop them from treating patients. /h2 /div pThe issues in this case are about hospitals and physicians who want to fulfill their oath and provide care to patients experiencing medical emergencies, but politicians want to enforce Idaho’s abortion ban up until the moment that a pregnant person’s life is at imminent risk. “Can I continue to replace her blood loss fast enough? How many organ systems must be failing? Can a patient be hours away from death before I intervene, or does it have to be minutes?”/p div class=wp-audio mb-8 div class=wp-audio__content span class=wp-audio__episode-title is-hidden-tablet is-hidden-desktop is-size-5 is-size-6-mobile In Alabama, Embryos Are People and It Won't Stop There /span div class=wp-audio__metadata columns div class=column span class=wp-audio__episode-title is-hidden-mobile is-size-5 is-size-6-mobileIn Alabama, Embryos Are People and It Won't Stop There/span p class=wp-audio__episode-description line-clamp-3 is-size-6 is-hidden-mobile On February 16, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos are children under state law, meaning the embryo has rights consistent with a person living in the United States. While this marks the first time a frozen embryo has been granted ... /p p class=wp-audio__episode-description line-clamp-5 is-size-7 is-hidden-tablet is-hidden-desktop On February 16, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos are children under state law, meaning the embryo has rights consistent with a person living in the United States. While this marks the first time a frozen embryo has been granted ... /p /div div class=wp-audio__thumbnail-wrapper column img class=wp-audio__thumbnail src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/themes/aclu-wp/img/at-liberty_500x500.jpg alt=Cover artwork for / /div /div /div div class=wp-audio__links is-flex is-align-items-center pl-none pl-4-tablet div class=wp-audio__links-episode is-size-7 has-text-grey has-text-weight-bold p-4 a href=https://www.aclu.org/podcast/in-alabama-embryos-are-people-and-it-wont-stop-there class=visit-link p-none mb-none no-underline column span class=visit-link__textVisit this episode/spanspan class=icon caret is-dark right / /a /div /div /div pThese are some of the questions our client Dr. Caitlin Gustafson shared that some Idaho providers are now forced to consider when a patient comes in with an emergency pregnancy complication in a recent a href=https://time.com/6968774/idaho-abortion-doctors-essay/op-ed/a on the case. Politics shouldn’t matter when you’re trying to treat a patient whose condition is rapidly deteriorating before your very eyes, but that’s the exact dystopia politicians are trying to force on all of us./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardThe extremists behind this case won’t stop with abortion. /h2 /div pOverturning iRoe v. Wade/i was just the beginning. Anti-abortion politicians are using every tool at their disposal in their campaign to ban abortion nationwide, and they won’t stop there. They are also pushing a legal strategy to give rights to embryos and fetuses that would override the rights of the pregnant person. We saw what happened in Alabama when the state supreme court granted rights to embryos, which forced IVF clinics across the state to temporarily shut down services. To be clear: There isn’t a serious argument to use EMTALA to grant legal rights to embryos, but that may not stop justices from considering whether to follow the lead of the anti-abortion movement and issue another devastating blow to people’s power to make personal medical decisions during pregnancy./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardWe have the power to fight back, and we will win!/h2 /div pAnti-abortion politicians and the groups supporting them are trying to use the courts to further their agenda because the policies they’re pushing are deeply unpopular. Every time abortion is on the ballot, voters send a clear message that they want reproductive freedom to be protected. That’s why the anti-abortion movement has turned to the courts to carry out their agenda, and the scary thing is they might just be successful./p pWhile there is already federal law to protect access to emergency care, the way anti-abortion politicians are trying to manipulate their state’s ban to deny people emergency care shows why we need to put an end to state bans once and for all. We need Congress to pass federal protections for abortion rights that will end extreme bans in states and protect access to care nationwide./p

pRight now, efforts to censor college protestors, to ban diverse materials in schools and to silence students and staff threaten our right to free speech in schools. People are having their voices silenced, their right to learn challenged, and their access to information restricted. But how can we navigate these complex issues with the next generation?/p pWe at the ACLU created a series of comic stories with illustrative journalist Eda Uzunlar to empower students and educators, spark vital conversations about their rights, and ensure all voices are heard and clear, both in the classroom and beyond. Our first installment illustrates the story of Anthony Crawford who is a public school teacher and part of a a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/bert-v-oconnorlawsuit challenging HB 1775/a, Oklahoma’s classroom censorship law./p pIn this Qamp;A, we sat down with Eda to discuss why comics are the perfect medium to tackle these issues and connect with young people in a way that resonates far more effectively than traditional media can./p pbLet’s start with your journey as an illustrative journalist, comic creator, and audio enthusiast. What inspired you to use this kind of medium for your work?/b/p pI#8217;ve been making comics since childhood. Like most kids, I doodled, and eventually, my doodles turned into my first comic. It was about a character called Spaceman – creative, I know – an astronaut stranded on the moon. He was this sardonic, really sarcastic, figure. It was a simple concept. He became this kind of vessel for expressing myself as a young person, particularly growing up in South Dakota with my family being both Muslim and immigrants from Turkey. Expressing these issues in a way that people who were very different from me would understand was crucial to me./p div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--full-bleed figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=2800 height=1400 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A preview of Eda Uzunlar#039;s comic featuring teacher and activist Anothy Crawford. decoding=async srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three.jpg 2800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-768x384.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-1536x768.jpg 1536w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-2048x1024.jpg 2048w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-400x200.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-600x300.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-800x400.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-1000x500.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-1200x600.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-1400x700.jpg 1400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-three-1600x800.jpg 1600w sizes=(max-width: 2800px) 100vw, 2800px / /figure /div pI realized that comics are a way to discuss complex stories without oversimplifying them. But I never imagined it would become a career. Similarly, my entry into journalism was unexpected. Someone introduced me to FM radio in my teens. Within a year, community radio became this amazing space for me where I hosted a show discussing anything, from civil disobedience to whether or not respect is implied or earned – things I thought people from any background could weigh in on. And I don’t know why they gave a 16-year-old the ability to take live calls, but I got to talk to so many people in my community that way. It felt like a continuation of my comics — anonymous conversations driven by passion rather than preconceived notions based on appearances./p pSo I took those experiences and turned them into what I do now. I try to help people tell their stories – no matter how complex – in an accessible way, so others can gain understanding of perspectives they might not have known about before./p pbIt#8217;s so great how you#8217;ve integrated your childhood passion for comics with your later pursuits in journalism and radio. You mentioned that comics offer a unique way to discuss complex issues without oversimplifying them. How do you navigate that balance between accessibility and depth when creating your comic content?/b/p pIt#8217;s all about breaking down big ideas into something digestible and engaging. When stories like these are presented in a visual format, it helps the audience both process and retain what they’re taking in. This especially applies to younger people. They#8217;re the ones making use of social media and watching YouTube to learn about the world around them. Traditional newspapers? Not so much for them. And when we#8217;re talking about accessibility, it#8217;s a big deal. There#8217;s a direct correlation between marginalized groups and limited access to media literacy. Traditional long-form journalism often fails to reach these communities./p div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--full-bleed figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=2800 height=1400 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A preview of Eda Uzunlar#039;s comic featuring teacher and activist Anothy Crawford. decoding=async srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b.jpg 2800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-768x384.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-1536x768.jpg 1536w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-2048x1024.jpg 2048w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-400x200.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-600x300.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-800x400.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-1000x500.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-1200x600.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-1400x700.jpg 1400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/crt-3-b-1600x800.jpg 1600w sizes=(max-width: 2800px) 100vw, 2800px / /figure /div pTake, for instance, the whole debate around critical race theory (CRT) in Oklahoma. A long-winded article might not reach the people who need to hear about it most. But with comics, we#8217;re able to package up those complex ideas into something that will catch your eye and is easy to grasp. It#8217;s like delivering a message directly to their social media feed. By making these reported stories visually engaging and using everyday language, we#8217;re making sure that everyone gets a chance to join the conversation, especially those who might feel left out by traditional media channels, especially the ones with a paywall./p pbLet’s talk about this first comic you worked on about Anthony Crawford, an Oklahoma teacher who is part of a lawsuit challenging a classroom censorship bill. How did your approach to brainstorming and initial sketches contribute to capturing his story, particularly in conveying the depth of Black history and the importance of including both student and teacher perspectives?/b/p pThere#8217;s a process where you try very hard not to limit yourself at the beginning. That#8217;s where you do quick sketches of one panel ten times, trying anything that might be cool to represent the idea. For example, for the panel about Black history being filled with wisdom, not just difficulty, there are a thousand ways to approach it. That could be represented literally with historical figures, or the opposite, which is what I did – a tree. A really big, grand tree. On its own, it could mean anything. But with the context and few words in the panel, it suggests a huge heritage and lineage. Trees are generational, lasting hundreds or even thousands of years. I had about five ideas, and then I saw how the tree looked. The detail and grandeur of this single image helped convey the depth to which Anthony described the importance of Black history in America, aligning with the voice he gave it throughout the piece. That#8217;s another thing – I went back and said, #8220;Listen, there#8217;s just a tree in this panel, but it’s based on how you talked about what Black history feels like to you.#8221; Like history existed before we were here and after we#8217;re gone, just like a tree. And he was like, #8220;That#8217;s perfect.#8221;/p video controls source src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/TREENAME_TIMELAPSE.mp4 type=video/mp4 / Sorry, your browser doesn't support embedded videos. /video div class=wp-audio div class=wp-audio__content div class=wp-audio__metadata h3 class=wp-audio__episode-titleEda on Adding Figures in Black History to An Illustration/h3 /div audio controls controlslist= source src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/treenames.mp3 type=audio/mpeg Your browser does not support the audio element. /audio /div div class=wp-audio__links a class=wp-audio__download-link href=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/treenames.mp3 target=_blankDownload audio/a /div /div pWith critical race theory and book bans, everyone loses. The teacher, the student, the whole community is affected when our right to learn and right to free speech are stifled. So we really wanted to get both the student and teacher perspectives. Anthony opened his own story as a teenage version of himself in the early 2000s, enraged because he wasn’t being taught his own community’s history, discussing his experience as a student, which served as an ideal starting point for the piece. Eventually, he transitions into the current day, where he’s facing the same problem – only now, he’s the teacher. And there’s this vague law in Oklahoma that makes it hard for him to teach that same history, and the history of other oppressed communities in America. This shift illustrates the cyclical nature of issues like CRT and book bans in Oklahoma, highlighting how such restrictions on free speech persist over time. The initial depiction of Anthony as an unhappy student parallels the final panel where he faces his own students, who are motivated to learn because they can actually see themselves in their histories./p pbFrom Anthony’s perspective as a teacher, the issue of critical race theory getting banned is represented as one that educators like him are worried about. How did you make sure that struggle spoke to the younger audience as well? /b/p pWhen students face dilemmas like seeing banned books in their libraries and the removal of celebrated authors of color from their curriculum, it can shake their confidence in their education and understanding of history. That’s the first part of the comic, and allows young people to make connections with the younger version of Anthony. Then, the narrative zeroes in on the educator perspective. Anthony champions diverse perspectives in his classroom. Through his actions, the comic reveals Anthony’s motivations for teaching, emphasizing his dedication to his students and his younger self. That’s where I wanted students to connect to the teacher side of the comic – so they know that if their right to an inclusive education is stifled, even if none of their own teachers have taken steps to continue teaching about America’s diverse history, there are educators out there who care and are making a difference. My hope is that by seeing someone who was once in their shoes assert his First Amendment rights, current students feel empowered to do the same for themselves./p video controls source src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/AC_TIMELAPSE.mp4 type=video/mp4 / Sorry, your browser doesn't support embedded videos. /video div class=wp-audio div class=wp-audio__content div class=wp-audio__metadata h3 class=wp-audio__episode-titleEda on Drawing Anthony /h3 /div audio controls controlslist= source src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/anthonydrawing.wav type=audio/mpeg Your browser does not support the audio element. /audio /div div class=wp-audio__links a class=wp-audio__download-link href=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/anthonydrawing.wav target=_blankDownload audio/a /div /div pIn fact, I have seen my comics be used as a connection between students and teachers. I put out a comic about juvenile justice, and about a year later, a teacher from Wyoming reached out to me on Facebook and shared that one of their students shared my comic with them. Next thing you know, they#8217;re teaching it in their classes, sparking discussions on juvenile justice, and showing students how to navigate tough situations. It#8217;s pretty amazing, right? Shows how comics can really make a difference in the real world by influencing education and promoting meaningful dialogue./p

pDear College and University Presidents:/p pWe write in response to the recent protests that have spread across our nation’s university and college campuses, and the disturbing arrests that have followed. We understand that as leaders of your campus communities, it can be extraordinarily difficult to navigate the pressures you face from politicians, donors, and faculty and students alike. You also have legal obligations to combat discrimination and a responsibility to maintain order. But as you fashion responses to the activism of your students (and faculty and staff), it is essential that you not sacrifice principles of academic freedom and free speech that are core to the educational mission of your respected institution./p pThe ACLU a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/the-streets-belong-to-the-people-always-have-always-willhelped/a establish the right to protest as a central pillar of the First Amendment. We have defended those principles for more than a century. The a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/united-states-bill-rights-first-10-amendments-constitutionFirst Amendment/a compels public universities and colleges to respect free speech rights. And while the Constitution does not apply directly to private institutions, academic freedom and free inquiry require that similar principles guide private universities. We approach this moment with appreciation for the challenges you confront. In the spirit of offering constructive solutions for a way forward, we offer five basic guardrails to ensure freedom of speech and academic freedom while protecting against discriminatory harassment and disruptive conduct./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardSchools must not single out particular viewpoints for censorship, discipline, or disproportionate punishment/h2 /div piFirst/i, university administrators must not single out particular viewpoints — however offensive they may be to some members of the community — for censorship, discipline, or disproportionate punishment. Viewpoint neutrality is essential. Harassment directed at individuals because of their race, ethnicity, or religion is not, of course, permissible. But general calls for a Palestinian state “from the river to the sea,” or defenses of Israel’s assault on Gaza, even if many listeners find these messages deeply offensive, cannot be prohibited or punished by a university that respects free speech principles./p pThese protections extend to both students and faculty, and to speech that supports either side of the conflict. Outside the classroom, including on social media, students and professors must be free to express even the most controversial political opinions without fear of discipline or censure. Inside the classroom, speech can be and always has been subject to more restrictive rules to ensure civil dialogue and a robust learning environment. But such rules have no place in a public forum like a campus green. Preserving physical safety on campuses is paramount; but “safety” from ideas or views that one finds offensive is anathema to the very enterprise of the university./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardSchools must protect students from discriminatory harassment and violence/h2 /div piSecond/i, both public and private universities are bound by civil rights laws that guarantee all students equal access to education, including Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. This means that schools can, and indeed must, protect students from discriminatory harassment on the basis of race or national origin, which has been a href=https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/sharedancestry.htmlinterpreted/a to include discrimination on the basis of “shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics,” or “citizenship or residency in a country with a dominant religion or distinct religious identity.”/p pSo, while offensive and even racist speech is constitutionally protected, shouting an epithet at a particular student or pinning an offensive sign to their dorm room door can constitute impermissible harassment, not free speech. Antisemitic or anti-Palestinian speech targeted at individuals because of their ethnicity or national origin constitutes invidious discrimination, and cannot be tolerated. Physically intimidating students by blocking their movements or pursuing them aggressively is unprotected iconduct/i, not protected ispeech/i. It should go without saying that violence is never an acceptable protest tactic./p pSpeech that is inot/i targeted at an individual or individuals because of their ethnicity or national origin but merely expresses impassioned views about Israel or Palestine is not discrimination and should be protected. The only exception for such untargeted speech is where it is so severe or pervasive that it denies students equal access to an education — an extremely demanding standard that has almost never been met by pure speech. One can criticize Israel’s actions, even in vituperative terms, without being antisemitic. And by the same token, one can support Israel’s actions in Gaza and condemn Hamas without being anti-Muslim. Administrators must resist the tendency to equate criticism with discrimination. Speech condoning violence can be condemned, to be sure. But it cannot be the basis for punishment, without more./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardSchools can announce and enforce reasonable content-neutral protest policies but they must leave ample room for students to express themselves/h2 /div piThird/i, universities can announce and enforce reasonable time, place, or manner restrictions on protest activity to ensure that essential college functions can continue. Such restrictions must be content neutral, meaning that they do not depend on the substance of what is being communicated, but rather where, when, or how it is being communicated. Protests can be limited to certain areas of campus and certain times of the day, for example. These policies must, however, leave ample room for students to speak to and to be heard by other members of the community. And the rules must not only be content neutral on their face; they must also be applied in a content-neutral manner. If a university has routinely tolerated violations of its rules, and suddenly enforces them harshly in a specific context, singling out particular views for punishment, the fact that the policy is formally neutral on its face does not make viewpoint-based enforcement permissible./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardSchools must recognize that armed police on campus can endanger students and are a measure of last resort/h2 /div piFourth/i, when enforcement of content-neutral rules may be warranted, college administrators should involve police only as a last resort, after all other efforts have been exhausted. Inviting armed police into a campus protest environment, even a volatile one, can create unacceptable risks for all students and staff. University officials must also be cognizant of the history of law enforcement using inappropriate and excessive force on communities of color, including Black, Brown, and immigrant students. Moreover, arresting peaceful protestors is also likely to escalate, not calm, the tensions on campus — as events of the past week have made abundantly clear./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardSchools must resist the pressures placed on them by politicians seeking to exploit campus tensions/h2 /div piFinally/i, campus leaders must resist the pressures placed on them by politicians seeking to exploit campus tensions to advance their own notoriety or partisan agendas. Recent congressional hearings have featured disgraceful attacks by members of Congress on academic freedom and freedom of speech. Universities must stand up to such intimidation, and defend the principles of academic freedom so essential to their integrity and mission./p pThe Supreme Court has forcefully a href=https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/408/169/rejected/a the premise that, “because of the acknowledged need for order, First Amendment protections should apply with less force on college campuses than in the community at large.”/p p“Quite to the contrary,” the court stated, “the vigilant protection of constitutional freedoms is nowhere more vital than in the community of American schools.” In keeping with these values, we urge you to resist the temptation to silence students or faculty members because powerful voices deem their views offensive. Instead, we urge you to defend the university’s core mission of encouraging debate, fostering dissent, and preparing the future leaders of our pluralistic society to tolerate even profound differences of opinion./p

pIn 2023, Kansas enacted a law attempting to define “transgender” out of existence by restricting the definition of a “woman” to the biological function of producing ova. Not only does this definition negate the experiences of trans women and girls, but it also excludes entire categories of women who are not transgender, such as post-menopausal women, women experiencing reproductive challenges, and intersex women./p pDespite being passed under the dubious title “Women’s Bill of Rights,” this law has not been used to create any new protections for women, nor improve support for women’s initiatives or resources. Instead, the law has been used to incite fear among transgender Kansans and limit their ability to live freely in our state./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/kansas-v-harper target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=700 height=350 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/lgbtq-issue-image.jpg class=attachment-4x3_full size-4x3_full alt=LGBTQ issue image decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/lgbtq-issue-image.jpg 700w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/lgbtq-issue-image-400x200.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/lgbtq-issue-image-600x300.jpg 600w sizes=(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/kansas-v-harper target=_blank Kansas v. Harper /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/kansas-v-harper target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletFive transgender Kansans are challenging an effort by Kansas Attorney General Kobach to require the state to issue driver’s licenses with a.../p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/kansas-v-harper target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pKansas Attorney General Kris Kobach has claimed the new law restricts trans Kansans from updating the gender marker on their state IDs. For years, Kansas had allowed transgender residents and those born here to change the gender marker on their driver’s licenses and birth certificates. Despite having these affirming policies without any identified administrative, public safety, or other concerns, the attorney general took to the courts to pressure state agencies into removing these policies./p pIn response, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment announced a policy change banning trans Kansans from updating the gender marker on their birth certificates. The Kansas Department of Revenue, which issues driver’s licenses, declined to change its policy — prompting Kobach to sue KDOR to force a policy change in ia href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/kansas-v-harperKansas v. Harper/a./i/p pThe a href=https://www.aclukansas.org/enACLU of Kansas/a, along with ACLU’s LGBTQ amp; HIV Project and local partners, intervened in that lawsuit on behalf of five transgender Kansans to assert their right to a driver’s license that does not forcibly out them. Unfortunately, three days after the suit was filed and prior to our intervention, the judge issued a temporary order blocking trans Kansans from changing their license’s gender marker. The order, which remains in force, also requires a previously changed gender marker to revert back to the inaccurate marker when the license expires or is amended in the future./p pThis means trans people are not currently able to access accurate and affirming state identity documents in Kansas. Having an ID that reflects a trans person’s lived identity is crucial to their safety, privacy, and bodily autonomy. The research shows that lack of access to an affirming ID harms trans people, making them vulnerable to forced outing and increasing their chances of experiencing discrimination, harassment, and violence./p pThe ACLU of Kansas is going to keep fighting in iKansas v. Harper /ias long as necessary. But we also understand that trans people cannot wait months (or years) for a ruling from the courts affirming their basic constitutional rights. They must use their IDs in daily life for countless reasons, from picking up mail to purchasing items at the store. That’s why we began to partner with local LGBTQ advocates to uplift an alternative option for trans Kansans — gender-affirming ifederal/i IDs, like passport cards and passport booklets./p pTrans people can self-attest their gender when applying for a federal ID, meaning they do not need a state ID that verifies their selected gender. For trans Kansans, this means they can still obtain a federal ID that reflects the gender they live as. The ACLU of Kansas and our community partners are thrilled that despite legislative and political attacks on trans Kansans, we are still able to support our community and reduce the harm flowing from anti-trans policies in our state./p pThe ACLU of Kansas has hosted numerous Know Your Rights events and Federal ID Clinics to provide resources and reassurance to trans Kansans. People who come to these events have been relieved and overwhelmed by the community support they experience. In the face of discriminatory laws trying to erase their existence, trans Kansans are coming together to share information and support each other. The power of community persists./p pIn the wake of nationwide anti-trans legislation and rhetoric over the past few years, events where trans Kansans can come together are even more important. In a rural state like Kansas where people can feel isolated, these events are not only an opportunity for people to access the assistance they need, but they also allow folks to connect and share in their pain and in their joy. One mother I met at a virtual event was ecstatic to know she could get her child a gender-affirming federal ID before they started college. She feared that her child would not be able to enroll for college with the correct name and gender marker because of the new anti-trans law./p pDespite efforts by anti-trans extremists to try to deny our humanity, to isolate us, trans Kansans are not going anywhere. Thousands of trans people call Kansas home, and we will remain. We will continue to define our own lives, support each other, and build power. These laws may have produced a wide unknown but the power of our community is deeply rooted./p

pAI is nearly impossible for us to escape these days. a href=https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalinabryant/2024/03/14/how-ai-is-reshaping-social-media-platforms-and-5-tips-for-success/Social media/a companies, a href=https://www.wired.com/story/student-papers-generative-ai-turnitin/schools/a, a href=https://www.npr.org/2022/05/12/1098601458/artificial-intelligence-job-discrimination-disabilitiesworkplaces/a, and even a href=https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2024/04/dating-apps-are-starting-crack/678022/dating apps/a are all trying to harness AI to remake their services and platforms, and AI can impact our lives in ways large and small. While many of these efforts are just getting underway — and often raise significant civil rights issues — you might be surprised to learn that America’s most prolific spy agency has for years been one of AI’s biggest adopters./p pThe National Security Agency (NSA) is the self-described a href=https://www.nsa.gov/leader/a among U.S. intelligence agencies racing to develop and deploy AI. It’s also the agency that sweeps up vast quantities of our phone calls, text messages, and internet communications as it conducts a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/national-security/five-things-to-know-about-nsa-mass-surveillance-and-the-coming-fight-in-congressmass surveillance/a around the world. In recent years, AI has transformed many of the NSA’s daily operations: the agency uses AI tools to help a href=https://perma.cc/97GE-4ULZgather/a information on foreign governments, a href=https://fedtechmagazine.com/article/2022/10/intelligence-community-developing-new-uses-ai-perfconaugment/a human language processing, a href=https://www.wsj.com/articles/ai-helps-u-s-intelligence-track-hackers-targeting-critical-infrastructure-944553facomb/a through networks for cybersecurity threats, and even monitor its own analysts as they do their jobs./p pUnfortunately, that’s about all we know. As the NSA a href=https://perma.cc/97GE-4ULZintegrates/a AI into some of its most profound decisions, it’s left us in the dark about how it uses AI and what safeguards, if any, are in place to protect everyday Americans and others around the globe whose privacy hangs in the balance./p pThat’s why we’re suing to find out what the NSA is hiding. Today, the ACLU filed a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/nsa-ai-foia-complainta lawsuit/a under the Freedom of Information Act to compel the release of recently completed studies, roadmaps, and reports that explain how the NSA is using AI and what impact it is having on people’s civil rights and civil liberties. Indeed, although much of the NSA’s surveillance is aimed at people overseas, those activities increasingly the sensitive communications and data of people in the United States as well./p pBehind closed doors, the NSA has been studying the effects of AI on its operations for several years. A year-and-a-half ago, the Inspectors General at the Department of Defense and the NSA issued a a href=https://perma.cc/A4L3-EC4Kjoint report/a examining how the NSA has integrated AI into its operations. NSA officials have also publicly lauded the completion of a href=https://perma.cc/F4ZT-PNTBstudies/a, a href=https://perma.cc/EQB4-XDVCroadmaps/a, and a href=https://perma.cc/SXP8-4APAcongressionally-mandated plans/a on the agency’s use of novel technologies like generative AI in its surveillance activities. But despite transparency pledges, none of those documents have been released to the public, not even in redacted form./p pThe government’s secrecy flies in the face of its own public commitments to transparency when it comes to AI. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which oversees the NSA and more than a dozen other intelligence agencies, has touted transparency as a core principle in its a href=https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/AI_Ethics_Framework_for_the_Intelligence_Community_10.pdfArtificial Intelligence Ethics Framework for the Intelligence Community/a. And a href=https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-promoting-use-trustworthy-artificial-intelligence-federal-government/#:~:text=Certain%20agencies%20have%20already%20adopted,National%20Intelligence's%20Principles%20of%20Artificialadministrations/a a href=https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2023/10/30/executive-order-on-the-safe-secure-and-trustworthy-development-and-use-of-artificial-intelligence/from both parties/a have reiterated that AI must be used in a manner that builds public confidence while also advancing principles of equity and justice. By failing to disclose the kinds of critical information sought in our lawsuit, the government is failing its own ethical standards: it is rapidly deploying powerful AI systems without public accountability or oversight./p pThe government’s lack of transparency is especially concerning given the dangers that AI systems pose for people’s civil rights and civil liberties. As we’ve already seen in areas like a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/how-face-recognition-fuels-racist-systems-of-policing-and-immigration-and-why-congress-must-act-nowlaw enforcement/a and a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/racial-justice/how-artificial-intelligence-might-prevent-you-from-getting-hiredemployment/a, using algorithmic systems to gather and analyze intelligence can compound privacy intrusions and perpetuate discrimination. AI systems may amplify biases already embedded in training data or rely on flawed algorithms, and they may have higher error rates when applied to people of color and marginalized communities. For example, built-in bias or flawed intelligence algorithms may lead to additional surveillance and investigation of individuals, exposing their lives to wide-ranging government scrutiny. In the most extreme cases, bad tips could be passed along to agencies like Department of Homeland Security or the FBI, leading to immigration consequences or even wrongful arrests./p pAI tools have the potential to expand the NSA’s surveillance dragnet more than ever before, expose private facts about our lives through vast data-mining activities, and automate decisions that once relied on human expertise and judgment. These are dangerous, powerful tools, as the NSA’s own ethical principles recognize. The public deserves to know how the government is using them./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/national-security/the-government-is-racing-to-deploy-ai-but-at-what-cost-to-our-freedom target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/0c811044641e2e113a33ba4134743c76.jpg class=attachment-4x3_full size-4x3_full alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/0c811044641e2e113a33ba4134743c76.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/0c811044641e2e113a33ba4134743c76-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/0c811044641e2e113a33ba4134743c76-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/0c811044641e2e113a33ba4134743c76-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/0c811044641e2e113a33ba4134743c76-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/0c811044641e2e113a33ba4134743c76-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/national-security/the-government-is-racing-to-deploy-ai-but-at-what-cost-to-our-freedom target=_blank The Government is Racing to Deploy AI, But at What Cost to Our Freedom? /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/national-security/the-government-is-racing-to-deploy-ai-but-at-what-cost-to-our-freedom target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletOur FOIA request seeks to uncover information about what types of AI tools intelligence agencies are deploying, what rules constrain their use, and.../p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/national-security/the-government-is-racing-to-deploy-ai-but-at-what-cost-to-our-freedom target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div

pThe Supreme Court recently declined to hear a case, a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/doe-v-mckessoniMckesson v. Doe/i/a, that could have affirmed that the First Amendment protects protest organizers from being held liable for illegal actions committed by others present that organizers did not direct or intend. The high court’s decision to not hear the case at this time left in place an opinion by the Fifth Circuit, which covers Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas, that said a protest organizer could be liable for the independent, violent actions of others based on nothing more than a showing of negligence./p pAcross the country, many people have expressed concern about how the Supreme Court’s decision not to review, or hear, the case at this stage could impact the right to protest. The ACLU, which asked the court to take up the case, breaks down what the court’s denial of review means./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardWhat Happened in Mckesson v. Doe?/h2 /div pThe case, a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/doe-v-mckesson#press-releasesiMckesson v. Doe/i/a, was brought by a police officer against a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/deray-mckesson-on-the-threat-to-protesters-rightsDeRay Mckesson/a, a prominent civil rights activist. The officer claims that Mckesson should be liable for personal injuries he suffered after an unknown individual — not Mckesson — threw a “rock-like” object at the officer during a 2016 protest of the killing of Alton Sterling by Baton Rouge, Louisiana police./p pThe officer does not claim that Mckesson encouraged or even knew about the rock-throwing. Rather than sue the rock-thrower, however, the officer is suing Mckesson on the theory that he allegedly organized the protest and in turn had a duty to protect every person there. In doing so, the argument goes, he “should have known” an assault could occur./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/doe-v-mckesson#press-releases target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1600 height=1066 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358.jpg class=attachment-4x3_full size-4x3_full alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358.jpg 1600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358-400x267.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358-600x400.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358-800x533.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358-1000x666.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358-1200x800.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/97fe74bcd4689ea5205a3761b37ff358-1400x933.jpg 1400w sizes=(max-width: 1600px) 100vw, 1600px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/doe-v-mckesson#press-releases target=_blank Mckesson v. Doe /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/doe-v-mckesson#press-releases target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletCan a protest leader be held legally responsible for injuries inflicted by an unidentified person’s violent act at the protest?/p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/doe-v-mckesson#press-releases target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pThe idea is that a protest organizer can be held responsible for what a stranger present at the protest does to someone else, not because the organizer asked or meant for them to do it, but merely because it was foreseeable that they might. If this theory of “negligent protest” were accepted, it would become far more risky to organize a protest. The ACLU has argued that this standard of liability violates the First Amendment in part because it would pose an unconstitutional burden on our right to protest./p pDespite this, and after several years of procedural back-and-forth between courts, the Fifth Circuit ruled in 2023 that the negligence claim against McKesson did not violate the First Amendment. Instead, the Fifth Circuit held that a protest organizer could be liable for the independent, violent actions of others based on nothing more than a showing of negligence./p pRecognizing how this decision squarely violates First Amendment fundamentals, the ACLU and co-counsel filed a a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/doe-v-mckesson?document=plaintiff-applicant-brief-certified-question#press-releasespetition for certiorari/a, asking the Supreme Court to overturn the Fifth Circuit’s obviously wrong ruling. Unfortunately, the court a href=https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-373_8njq.pdfdenied our petition/a./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardWhat Does the Supreme Court’s Denial of Review Mean for Our Right to Protest?/h2 /div pWhile the Supreme Court does not generally explain why it declines to hear a case — and it can do so for any number of reasons — Justice Sonia Sotomayor a href=https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-373_8njq.pdfwrote a statement/a accompanying the denial that might explain the reason in this case: the Supreme Court has already settled this question, so the law is not in need of further clarification./p pIn her statement, Justice Sotomayor explains that, in 2023, shortly after the Fifth Circuit’s decision, the Supreme Court issued an opinion in a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/counterman-v-coloradoiCounterman v. Colorado/i/ai, /iwhere it confirmed that negligence is never a sufficient basis for imposing liability on political expression and association. In fact, in iCounterman/i, the court made it explicitly clear that, when it comes to drawing the line between unprotected incitement and the kinds of “strong protests against the government and prevailing social order” that lie at the heart of the First Amendment, a showing of intent is required. That’s a much higher standard than negligence, which asks only whether someone who didn’t know what impact their speech would have ishould /ihave known the possible effect. Intent, in contrast, requires that the speaker knew about, wanted, and aimed for the resulting harm./p pJustice Sotomayor concluded her statement by emphasizing that while the Fifth Circuit did not have the benefit of the Supreme Court’s recent decision in iCounterman /iwhen it issued its opinion, the lower courts in this case (and in general) now do, and are expected to fairly apply that decision in future proceedings./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardHas Our Right to Protest Changed? /h2 /div pSome people have suggested that the Supreme Court’s decision not to hear this case means that our right to protest has been effectively abolished in three U.S. states. That’s not accurate./p pWhile it is true that the Fifth Circuit’s erroneous decision has not been vacated, and technically could be invoked against protest organizers in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas, it is important to understand two things./p pFirst, separate from the First Amendment problem, there’s the question of whether a “negligent protest” claim even exists under a state’s civil law. In iMckesson/i, the Louisiana Supreme Court said yes, but the high courts in Texas and Mississippi haven’t said the same. That means, the theory of “negligent protest” in iMckesson /iis specific to Louisiana state law./p pSecond, when it comes to the First Amendment, the Supreme Court has made it explicitly clear in many other cases that negligence is too low a threshold for imposing liability on one person for another person’s violence or other illegal acts at a protest./p pTo take just one example, in 1982, the court held that while the Constitution does not protect violence, it does limit the government’s ability to place responsibility for that violence onto peaceful protest leaders who did not direct or intend it. That seminal civil rights case, iNAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co./i, has been cited repeatedly to ensure robust speech protections, including to a href=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-kentucky-lawsuit/trump-wins-dismissal-of-inciting-to-riot-lawsuit-over-2016-rally-idUSKCN1LR22Bdismiss a lawsuit/a against then-candidate Donald Trump for violent acts committed by others at a campaign rally and to a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/south-dakota-governor-caves-on-attempted-efforts-to-silence-pipeline-protesters/challenge/a efforts to stifle Keystone XL pipeline protests. As Justice Sotomayor’s statement highlighted, the court recently reaffirmed these rules in iCounterman/i./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/south-dakota-governor-caves-on-attempted-efforts-to-silence-pipeline-protesters target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/7218730dbc6777f6d6b6043a99ade53a.jpg class=attachment-4x3_full size-4x3_full alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/7218730dbc6777f6d6b6043a99ade53a.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/7218730dbc6777f6d6b6043a99ade53a-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/7218730dbc6777f6d6b6043a99ade53a-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/7218730dbc6777f6d6b6043a99ade53a-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/7218730dbc6777f6d6b6043a99ade53a-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/7218730dbc6777f6d6b6043a99ade53a-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/south-dakota-governor-caves-on-attempted-efforts-to-silence-pipeline-protesters target=_blank South Dakota Governor Caves on Attempted Efforts to Silence Pipeline Protesters /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/south-dakota-governor-caves-on-attempted-efforts-to-silence-pipeline-protesters target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletThe state's quick retreat should serve as a lesson for other legislatures: if you criminalize protest, we will sue./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/south-dakota-governor-caves-on-attempted-efforts-to-silence-pipeline-protesters target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pHowever, since the Supreme Court did not officially reverse the Fifth Circuit’s decision, it is possible that a court in Louisiana may decide to apply the Fifth Circuit’s logic. Say, for example, that a small crowd of people act violently at a protest in Louisiana and the protest organizer — who had no connection to the violence — is subsequently sued for negligence. The lower court should heed Justice Sotomayor#8217;s statement, correctly apply iCounterman/i, and dismiss this claim for violating the First Amendment. But it is possible that a lower court would still apply the Fifth Circuit’s decision, issued prior to iCounterman. /iIf that were to happen, the ACLU is interested in fighting alongside the organizer to ensure that the correct rule ultimately applies, and that the Fifth Circuit’s clearly erroneous decision does not govern anywhere./p pSince our founding, efforts to silence dissent have emerged in moments of mass protest, like what we find ourselves in today. However, the Supreme Court has consistently upheld our right to protest and our right to be responsible only for our own actions. Today, the ACLU urges the lower courts to continue protecting our rights, and to deny the Fifth Circuit’s deeply misguided theory from gaining any traction. No one should be afraid to express dissent, to advocate for change, or to support causes they believe in./p pa href=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCR7yfxnwWAPlay the video/a/p img width=1334 height=708 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-22-at-5.08.05-PM.png class=attachment-16x9_1400 size-16x9_1400 alt=A photo of activist DeRay Mckesson. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-22-at-5.08.05-PM.png 1334w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-22-at-5.08.05-PM-768x408.png 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-22-at-5.08.05-PM-400x212.png 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-22-at-5.08.05-PM-600x318.png 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-22-at-5.08.05-PM-800x425.png 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-22-at-5.08.05-PM-1000x531.png 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-22-at-5.08.05-PM-1200x637.png 1200w sizes=(max-width: 1334px) 100vw, 1334px /

pToday, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission released its a href=https://www.federalregister.gov/public-inspection/2024-07527/implementation-of-the-pregnant-workers-fairness-actfinal regulations/a implementing the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. The landmark statute mandating “reasonable accommodation” of workers’ pregnancy-related needs went into effect last summer, but the regulations explain the PWFA’s protections in more detail, providing additional guidance to workers, employers, and the courts so that the full force of the law is given effect./p pThat’s great news for workers like:/p ul lia href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/kimberlie-michelle-durham-v-ruralmetro-corporationMichelle Durham/a, an Alabama Emergency Medical Technician forced onto unpaid leave during pregnancy because her employer refused to honor her doctor’s directive that she not lift heavy stretchers and patients;/li lia href=https://www.aclu.org/news/womens-rights/att-mobility-fired-me-being-pregnant#:~:text=AT%26T%20Mobility's%20so%2Dcalled%20%E2%80%9Cno,Disabilities%20Act%2C%20and%20the%20FMLA.Katia Hills/a, a retail worker from Indiana fired for absenteeism due to severe “morning sickness” and doctor’s visits; and/li lia href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/panattoni-v-village-frankfortJennifer Panattoni/a, a police officer from Illinois forced to take leave without pay when she was denied temporary reassignment to a desk job./li /ul pMichelle, Katia, and Jennifer aren’t alone; millions of people, especially Black and Brown women at greatest risk of maternal morbidity and mortality, labor in strenuous jobs that could be dangerous during pregnancy – like health care, retail, and law enforcement – yet are routinely denied the temporary modifications they need to stay healthy. One study estimated that 250,000 people annually don’t get the accommodations they need, putting them at risk for miscarriage and other poor health outcomes on the one hand, and job loss on the other./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardSo what did Congress intend the PWFA to accomplish?/h2 /div pAs the first federal statute enacted in 45 years to protect on-the-job rights of pregnant workers, Congress passed the PWFA to fill a significant gap in existing law when it comes to accommodations – those temporary on-the-job modifications that a person may need to maintain their health or the health of their pregnancy. These changes can be minor – such as a slightly later start time to account for “morning sickness” or more frequent breaks for workers who spend long shifts on their feet – or more significant, such as suspension of risky duties, like repeated heavy lifting or exposure to toxins./p pAlthough workers with disabilities have been entitled to such changes for more than 30 years under the Americans with Disabilities Act, pregnant workers have lacked similarly explicit protections. The PWFA eliminates the Hobson’s Choice faced by pregnant workers – i.e., continue working under unsafe conditions or leave the job altogether – by requiring employers to accommodate workers with limitations caused by “pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions” unless doing so would impose an “undue hardship” on the employer’s business. Given the statute’s obvious benefits to workers and their families alike, it’s no wonder that the PWFA was enacted with exceptionally broad bipartisan cooperation that is virtually unheard of in today’s Congress, and with supporters as diverse as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and the American Civil Liberties Union, my employer./p pWhen the EEOC issued a draft version of its PWFA regulations last August, a small but noisy group raised the alarm that the agency had gone rogue. Why? The EEOC specifically stated that “pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions” includes abortion, so that time off for abortion care – like time off for other doctor’s visits and medical procedures – is a “reasonable accommodation” required by the new statute. Critics contended that such a requirement improperly forces employers to somehow participate in their employees’ abortion decisions, which they claimed is unfair to employers that object to abortion on religious grounds./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/womens-rights/the-historic-new-law-protecting-fairness-for-pregnant-workers target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/5ddb12929c46917407ae0ce9e9c04f02.jpg class=attachment-4x3_full size-4x3_full alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/5ddb12929c46917407ae0ce9e9c04f02.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/5ddb12929c46917407ae0ce9e9c04f02-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/5ddb12929c46917407ae0ce9e9c04f02-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/5ddb12929c46917407ae0ce9e9c04f02-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/5ddb12929c46917407ae0ce9e9c04f02-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/5ddb12929c46917407ae0ce9e9c04f02-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/womens-rights/the-historic-new-law-protecting-fairness-for-pregnant-workers target=_blank The Historic New Law Protecting Fairness for Pregnant Workers /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/womens-rights/the-historic-new-law-protecting-fairness-for-pregnant-workers target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletAfter a decade of advocacy, the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act is going into effect. /p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/womens-rights/the-historic-new-law-protecting-fairness-for-pregnant-workers target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pSuch objections are likely to reemerge now that the EEOC’s final regulations are out, because abortion remains among the list of reasons entitling workers to reasonable accommodation. But while the EEOC’s noisy critics paint the agency as radical, it is they who push a fringe view – one that disregards nearly half a century of legal history. In 1978, Congress passed the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, a law protecting workers from discrimination based on “pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions.” At the time, Congress made clear that it considered abortion to fall within that definition – meaning that firing or refusing to hire someone because they have had an abortion is unlawful discrimination. In 1979, the EEOC issued guidelines consistent with that interpretation and reaffirmed those directives in 2015, while in the four and a half decades since the PDA’s passage, numerous courts have reached the same conclusion: discrimination based on abortion is discrimination based on “pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions.” The phrase also has been interpreted by judges to cover a wide range of pre- and post-partum reproductive needs, including the use of contraceptives, infertility treatment, and lactation. At the same time, the PDA makes clear that employers are not required to cover abortion in their health plans, and subsequent court cases have not disturbed that provision. When Congress copied and pasted “pregnancy, childbirth, and related medical conditions” from the PDA into the PWFA, all of that interpretive precedent came with it. The EEOC’s new regulations simply implement the law Congress actually passed./p pWhen it comes to the rights of religious employers, abortion opponents also get an “F” in history. While such entities long have enjoyed certain narrow exemptions from our discrimination laws – and the PWFA does nothing to disturb such precedent – courts repeatedly have refused to grant religious employers wholesale immunity from these statutes. Indeed, Congress irejected /ian amendment that would have exempted religious employers from the PWFA’s reach altogether. The EEOC regulations rightly also refuse to rubber-stamp discrimination in the name of religion, instead providing careful, case-by-case consideration to instances where a religious employer objects to an employee’s need for accommodation under the PWFA, if any happen to arise./p pSadly, since 2022’s ruling in a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/reproductive-freedom/a-year-without-roeiDobbs/i iv. Jackson Women’s Health Organization/i/a overturning iRoe v. Wade/i, the time off of work that is necessary to get an abortion has increased exponentially. At last count, more than 20 states have either banned or severely restricted abortion. As a result, a sizable share of the U.S. population – millions of people – are now faced with the prospect of traveling hundreds of miles to even access this critically important healthcare. To name just one example, in Texas, where a near-total ban is in place, the average one-way trip for abortion has ballooned a href=https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2798215by more than eight hours/a – an increase of a full./p pThe PWFA is historic, but not because it applies to abortion. Employers already are prohibited from taking adverse action against workers who have abortions. The PWFA simply bars them from punishing people for taking time away from the job to obtain abortion care – or any other reproductive health care. No one should have to risk their paycheck to get the medical care they need – and thanks to the PWFA, they don’t./p pemThis a class=Hyperlink SCXW187589113 BCX0 href=https://msmagazine.com/2024/04/15/pregnant-workers-fairness-act-women-abortion/ target=_blank rel=noreferrer noopenerpiece /awas first published in a class=Hyperlink SCXW187589113 BCX0 href=https://msmagazine.com/ target=_blank rel=noreferrer noopenerMs. Magazine/a on 4/15/24/em/p

pEvery year, thousands of asylum seekers from diverse corners of the world seek refuge in the United States. Many — like Indigenous people from Latin America and Africa — are fleeing persecution based on the languages they speak and their cultural, ethnic, and racial backgrounds. Their ability to access the asylum system has life-or-death consequences. Yet our government cuts off access to asylum and other fundamental rights based on language barriers alone./p pThe federal government has a responsibility to ensure people with limited English proficiency (LEP) can reasonably access its services. Failure to do so discriminates by excluding LEP people from federal programs. This infringes on LEP individuals’ constitutional due process and equal protection rights, as well as well-established language rights enshrined in federal law. Nevertheless, the government routinely denies asylum seekers critical language access throughout the asylum process./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/petition-for-rulemaking-interpreters-for-affirmative-asylum-interviews target=_blank tabindex=-1 /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/petition-for-rulemaking-interpreters-for-affirmative-asylum-interviews target=_blank Petition for Rulemaking: Interpreters for Affirmative Asylum Interviews /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/petition-for-rulemaking-interpreters-for-affirmative-asylum-interviews target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tablet/p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/petition-for-rulemaking-interpreters-for-affirmative-asylum-interviews target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markLanguage Barriers Cut Off Access to Asylum, Cause Prolonged Detention, and Lead to Wrongful Deportations/h2 /div pStarting even outside the United States, anyone seeking asylum at the border generally must use the CBPOne app to obtain an elusive appointment. Beyond well-documented problems with accessibility, appointment shortages, racist facial recognition bugs, and other technical issues, the app is only available in English, Spanish, or Haitian Creole, with limited Russian and Portuguese features. Thousands of asylum seekers who speak other languages are a href=https://castro.house.gov/imo/media/doc/03212024lettertodhsenglish.pdfleft out/a, with dangerous a href=https://humanrightsfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Asylum-Ban-Harms-Factsheet-formatted.pdfconsequences/a for those stranded in waiting./p pLanguage access problems continue once LEP individuals finally enter the United States for asylum screening. The government a href=https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/memos/Language-Access-in-Credible-Fear-Screenings.pdfadmits/a that it struggles to provide interpreters for certain languages, especially rare or Indigenous languages, during screening interviews. As a result, asylum seekers often feel pressured to undergo interviews — which determine whether they can even pursue an asylum claim — in a more common language, even if they don’t speak it proficiently enough to communicate sensitive details of their claim./p pThose who finally get an opportunity to apply for asylum must complete their application — a complicated legal document — entirely in English. For LEP asylum seekers in government detention facilities without translation or interpretation services, that’s a href=https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BS-N6hRly4e4am4iGwoeUYw0CpJgJHrd/view?usp=sharingimpossible/a. Appallingly, immigration judges have a href=https://thegrio.com/2024/03/20/congress-asks-biden-harris-admin-to-address-discrimination-against-black-mauritanians-at-border/#:~:text=Politics-,Congress%20asks%20Biden%2DHarris%20admin%20to%20address%20discrimination%20against%20Black,practices%20that%ordered/a LEP asylum seekers to be returned to the countries they fled, simply because they could not fill out their asylum application in English, even when no language services were available. Moreover, immigration courts can’t find adequate interpreters for a href=https://clarke.house.gov/clarke-leads-letter-to-dhs-and-ice-urging-release-of-detained-mauritanian-asylum-seekers-and-justice-for-rare-language-speakers/certain languages/a, leading to unnecessary and prolonged detention. Often, people are faced with an impossible choice: proceed in languages they don’t fully understand (and risk being denied protection) or give up. Effectively, the government blocks LEP people from presenting their asylum claims merely because of the language they speak — not because they lack a meritorious claim./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markThe Government Already Has Interpreters Available. Yet It Still Requires Affirmative Asylum Seekers to Find Their Own./h2 /div pAffirmative asylum interviews are another glaring example of the government’s discrimination against LEP asylum seekers. Affirmative asylum interviews are a critical step in the asylum process — they are the only opportunity for someone to sit down with an asylum officer and explain their fear of persecution outside of the removal process. But for decades, the government has required LEP applicants to provide their own interpreters during these interviews. This puts a substantial logistical and financial burden on LEP asylum seekers, many of whom have limited financial means, and imposes an even greater burden on those who speak rare languages with only a handful of interpreters available across the country. LEP applicants who can’t find interpreters face delays or, worse, referral to removal proceedings./p pFinancial constraints force many applicants to use friends or family members to interpret. Serious ethical and practical concerns follow. Applicants may hesitate to share the full scope of their trauma or asylum claim with loved ones; untrained interpreters may lack an understanding of professional norms of confidentiality and conduct for interpretation or may struggle to accurately translate technical legal terminology. Inaccurate interpretation prevents applicants from fully presenting their claims, and can cause erroneous credibility findings./p pThe interpreter requirement is also inefficient and illogical. The government already contracts professional interpreters who monitor the quality of applicant-provided interpreters during interviews. That’s right: the government already pays for interpreters to participate in these interviews. It has a href=https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/09/23/2020-21073/asylum-interview-interpreter-requirement-modification-due-to-covid-19stated/a on a href=https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2022/03/16/2022-05636/asylum-interview-interpreter-requirement-modification-due-to-covid-19multiple/a a href=https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2023/03/17/2023-05572/asylum-interview-interpreter-requirement-modification-due-to-covid-19occasions/a that these contract monitors can provide more efficient interpretation at no additional cost. But asylum officers regularly reschedule interviews when applicants fail to bring an interpreter, even though the government’s interpreter is already present./p pDuring the COVID-19 pandemic, the government temporarily permitted applicants to use contract monitors as interpreters during asylum interviews. But the government recently and abruptly a href=https://www.uscis.gov/newsroom/alerts/affirmative-asylum-applicants-must-provide-interpreters-starting-sept-13ended/a this policy without explanation, once again requiring applicants to bring their own interpreters. Now, more than ever, the government faces an unprecedented backlog of affirmative asylum cases with an outdated, inefficient, and discriminatory interpreter rule./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markThe Government Should Abandon Its Outdated and Discriminatory Rule/h2 /div pThe ACLU is fighting back. Along with 52 organizations from across the country, a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/petition-for-rulemaking-interpreters-for-affirmative-asylum-interviewswe are petitioning/a the government to abandon its illogical and discriminatory rule requiring applicants to bring their own interpreters. Our ask is simple and common sense: change the regulation and permit asylum applicants to use the government-funded interpreters already present during asylum interviews at the applicant’s discretion. This will ensure that LEP asylum seekers have a meaningful opportunity to present their asylum claims and make one small but significant step toward bridging the gaps in language access in our asylum system./p

pFor decades, the ACLU has fought against the war on drugs. The criminalization of cannabis has led to far too many unjust incarcerations, which waste critical resources and billions of dollars. a href=https://www.aclu.org/publications/tale-two-countries-racially-targeted-arrests-era-marijuana-reformAccording to numbers from our 2020 report/a, it also disproportionately affects Black Americans, who continue to be almost four times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than a white person, despite equal reported use rates./p figure class=wp-image mb-8 a href=https://www.aclu.org/publications/tale-two-countries-racially-targeted-arrests-era-marijuana-reform img width=1364 height=958 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-15-at-2.35.23-PM.png class=attachment-original size-original alt=A map showing racial disparities in marijuana possession arrests. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-15-at-2.35.23-PM.png 1364w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-15-at-2.35.23-PM-768x539.png 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-15-at-2.35.23-PM-400x281.png 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-15-at-2.35.23-PM-600x421.png 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-15-at-2.35.23-PM-800x562.png 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-15-at-2.35.23-PM-1000x702.png 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Screen-Shot-2024-04-15-at-2.35.23-PM-1200x843.png 1200w sizes=(max-width: 1364px) 100vw, 1364px / /a figcaption class=wp-image__caption is-caption mt-3pa href=https://graphics.aclu.org/marijuana-arrest-report/Explore more in our interactive data visualizer/a/p /figcaption /figure pWe’re fighting for not only the legalization of marijuana, but also for the repair of decades of past damage. Even as marijuana becomes legal or decriminalized in more states, rampant racial disparities still remain and thousands of people are still behind bars for innocuous cannabis charges. A more just system isn’t possible until all people incarcerated for marijuana are released and criminal records for these offenses are expunged./p pThis is why we celebrate 4/20 every year: to bring renewed attention to the fight for cannabis justice. With our new dope tees, trays, blankets and posters, we invite people to join in a href=https://www.aclu.org/issues/criminal-law-reform/drug-law-reform/marijuana-law-reformour fight to legalize marijuana/a and repair the harms of the war on drugs. This year’s products take on a retro aesthetic to honor everything 4/20. They feature groovy waves, earth tones, interesting facts and — everyone’s favorite mascot Torchy./p pCheck out the list of merch below, and be sure to a href=https://shop.aclu.org/return to our shop/a regularly during April, and tune in on our social media channels–we’ll be celebrating 4/20 all month long with exclusive deals!/p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markA Super Soft, Conversation-Starting Tee/h2 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h3 id= class=wp-heading-h3 with-standardPrice: $30/h3 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--standard figure class=wp-image mb-8 a href=https://shop.aclu.org/legalize-repair-tee/ img width=1280 height=1280 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A picture of the Legalize and Repair Tee from the ACLU store. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611.jpg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611-150x150.jpg 150w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611-768x768.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611-400x400.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611-600x600.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611-800x800.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611-1000x1000.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611-1200x1200.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Tee__23611-300x300.jpg 300w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /a /figure /div pFrom the gym to the farmer’s market, you’ll want to wear this ultra soft, 100% cotton tee everywhere. The perfect conversation starter, we even included an important message on the bottom./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markDope Decorative Art for Your Space/h2 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h3 id= class=wp-heading-h3 with-standardPrice: $12/h3 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--standard figure class=wp-image mb-8 a href=https://shop.aclu.org/legalize-and-repair-poster-11x14/ img width=1280 height=1280 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A picture of the Legalize and Repair Poster from the ACLU store. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648.jpg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648-150x150.jpg 150w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648-768x768.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648-400x400.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648-600x600.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648-800x800.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648-1000x1000.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648-1200x1200.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Poster__48648-300x300.jpg 300w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /a /figure /div pThinking about a Spring decor refresh? Look no further! Our 11”x14” Legalize and Repair Poster is the perfect size and perfect conversation starter./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markA Handy Tray Calling for Cannabis Justice/h2 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h3 id= class=wp-heading-h3 with-standardPrice: $20/h3 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--standard figure class=wp-image mb-8 a href=https://shop.aclu.org/legalize-repair-tray/ img width=1280 height=1280 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A picture of the Legalize and Repair Tray from the ACLU store. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468.jpg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468-150x150.jpg 150w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468-768x768.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468-400x400.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468-600x600.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468-800x800.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468-1000x1000.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468-1200x1200.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Tray__16468-300x300.jpg 300w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /a /figure /div pThe travel friendly Legalize and Repair tray has endless uses: from a jewelry catchall to a flat work surface for your hobbies./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markA Grinder Perfect for Your Own Personal Blend/h2 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h3 id= class=wp-heading-h3 with-markPrice: $25/h3 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--standard figure class=wp-image mb-8 a href=https://shop.aclu.org/legalize-repair-grinder/ img width=1280 height=1280 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A picture of the Legalize and Repair Grinder from the ACLU store. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065.jpg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065-150x150.jpg 150w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065-768x768.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065-400x400.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065-600x600.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065-800x800.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065-1000x1000.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065-1200x1200.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Grinder__47065-300x300.jpg 300w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /a /figure /div pOur aluminum grinder is sturdy enough to grind even the dankest of herbs and spices. Cinnamon and nutmeg have met their match in our 4-piece grinder./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markSnuggle Up With Your Favorite ACLU Mascot/h2 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h3 id= class=wp-heading-h3 with-standardPrice: $115/h3 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--standard figure class=wp-image mb-8 a href=https://shop.aclu.org/torchy-woven-blanket/ img width=1280 height=1280 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A picture of the Torchy Woven Blanket from the ACLU store. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092.jpg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092-150x150.jpg 150w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092-768x768.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092-400x400.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092-600x600.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092-800x800.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092-1000x1000.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092-1200x1200.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Torchy_Blanket__18092-300x300.jpg 300w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /a /figure /div pPicnics will never be the same once the Torchy Woven Blanket is in your life. This blanket can also double as a tapestry for your home. Made of a thick, woven fabric, each blanket is custom made just for you./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markA Cozy Crewneck Featuring Torchy in Action /h2 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h3 id= class=wp-heading-h3 with-standardPrice: $66/h3 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--standard figure class=wp-image mb-8 a href=https://shop.aclu.org/legalize-repair-crewneck/ img width=1280 height=1280 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A picture of the Legalize And Repair Crewneck from the ACLU store. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977.jpg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977-150x150.jpg 150w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977-768x768.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977-400x400.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977-600x600.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977-800x800.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977-1000x1000.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977-1200x1200.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/ACLU_420_Crewneck__36977-300x300.jpg 300w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /a /figure /div pWith a unisex fit and an unbelievably comfy feel, the Legalize and Repair Crewneck is the perfect wardrobe addition. Pro tip: dress it up with a layered turtleneck./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markA Retro Lunchbox for the Munchies/h2 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h3 id= class=wp-heading-h3 with-standardPrice: $28/h3 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--standard figure class=wp-image mb-8 a href=https://shop.aclu.org/legalize-repair-lunchbox/ img width=1280 height=1280 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A picture of the Legalize And Repair Lunchbox from the ACLU store. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231.jpg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231-150x150.jpg 150w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231-768x768.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231-400x400.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231-600x600.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231-800x800.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231-1000x1000.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231-1200x1200.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Lunchbox__06231-300x300.jpg 300w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /a /figure /div pKeep your munchies close in our retro-style lunchbox featuring Torchy like you’ve never seen Torchy before. Feeling adventurous? Attach a bag strap to the handles and wear it as a crossbody bag (it’s called fashion)./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markA Small Matchbox With a Blazing Message/h2 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h3 id= class=wp-heading-h3 with-standardPrice: $4.20/h3 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--standard figure class=wp-image mb-8 a href=https://shop.aclu.org/legalize-and-repair-matchbox/ img width=1280 height=1280 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A picture of the Legalize And Repair Matchbox from the ACLU store. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810.jpg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810-150x150.jpg 150w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810-768x768.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810-400x400.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810-600x600.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810-800x800.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810-1000x1000.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810-1200x1200.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Legalize_and_Repair_Matches__04810-300x300.jpg 300w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /a /figure /div pSpark up a conversation with our limited edition Torchy matches. Perfect for the candle connoisseur in your life (be sure to shop bright and early on 4/20–these matches will be free for the first 420 orders!)/p pnbsp;/p

My job is to sue prisons, and I love my work. My colleagues and I work to ensure the basic human dignity to people our society has locked up. But it is, more often than not, extraordinarily frustrating. Our clients, the human beings locked away in our criminal justice system, live in dire conditions. They are warehoused. Their medical and mental health needs are ignored. They are subjected to extreme physical violence. Just seeing and hearing about it is painful. And change comes all too slowly.

At the ACLU, we take heart from the little victories. Just before we go to a prison to see our clients, the bathrooms in their housing units are finally cleaned, the people in the prisons are finally given coats for when they go outside, and they are finally sent out for the medical visit that was ordered months or years ago. Unfortunately, the systemic changes to ensure people’s most basic needs are met take much longer, and are often met with resistance from prison personnel and administrations that do not believe their job is to meet those basic needs.

This year has been different. Back in June 2022, following a decade of litigation, U.S. District Judge Roslyn Silver found in Jensen v. Thornell that conditions in solitary confinement in the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry (ADCRR) violated the constitutional prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. One year ago this week, she issued a sweeping injunction ordering ADCRR to bring the conditions of solitary confinement into compliance with the U.S. Constitution and basic standards of human decency.

Over the past year, ADCRR has made a great deal of progress, including preventing many vulnerable people from being subjected to the devastating effects that accompany solitary confinement. The department has also dramatically lowered the number of people in extremely long-term isolation, and has – to our knowledge – complied with the court’s order prohibiting any child under 18 from being placed in solitary confinement for any length of time.

Additionally, at the time of the order, there were 1,071 people housed in “maximum custody,” ADCRR’s euphemism for long-term solitary confinement. According to ADCRR, at least 200 people had been in maximum custody for a year or more, and six people had been in for over a decade. Today, there are just over 200 people in maximum custody – a reduction of more than 80 percent. Half the people who had been held in maximum custody for over a decade are no longer in solitary confinement.

The reduction in the solitary confinement population was so great that one facility, Arizona’s original “supermax” facility, was closed entirely in November 2023. This supermax facility had a reported capacity of 2,440 people, most of whom were held in solitary confinement.

There have also been significant improvements in conditions. People held in solitary confinement now receive three meals a day most days, whereas previously they received only two. In solitary confinement units where an electronic system has been installed to track movements, incarcerated people report that there is no longer a problem of being left in the shower for hours on end, as used to happen with some regularity. People are offered cleaning supplies and the housing units are treated by exterminators.

While the improvements – particularly the removal of people from long-term solitary confinement – are laudable, much remains to be done. The court ordered that one vulnerable group – people with serious mental illness – be kept out of solitary confinement altogether. There are housing units for people with serious mental illness, which ADCRR claims are not solitary confinement units. But the people inside report that they are locked in their cells more hours per day than people in the housing units ADCRR considers solitary confinement. Similarly, there is a prison in which people with dementia are held and are rarely let out of their cells, let alone allowed to go outside. There are still three people who have been in solitary confinement for over a decade. And many people remain in solitary confinement because either they themselves or ADCRR have decided that ADCRR cannot keep them safe in general population.

The proverbial low-hanging fruit has been harvested. The hard work of further reducing – and ultimately eliminating – solitary confinement in Arizona remains. It appears the ADCRR administration has the will to take on this difficult labor in pursuit of human dignity. This spring, one year into implementation of the Jensen injunction, I have hope.

The CIA is so known for its unabashed secrecy that, when it joined Twitter in 2014, its first tweet was: “We can neither confirm nor deny that this is our first tweet.” This non-response response is known as a “Glomar,” and while the intelligence community likes to poke fun at how often they invoke it, this inane phrase has allowed the CIA to skirt meaningful transparency and accountability for decades.

In 1966, over the Johnson administration’s opposition, Congress enacted the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), giving all of us the right to ask the government for documents and have the government respond, as it believed such access was a prerequisite to a functioning democracy. Soon after FOIA was passed, a Soviet nuclear submarine went missing somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, and the CIA took an early opportunity to undermine this new law.

The Soviet Union and the United States raced to locate the missing sub and extract the intelligence likely inside. But first, the U.S. needed to build a ship that could actually extract the sub once it was found — and the government wanted no one to know about it. The CIA contracted this mission out to Howard Hughes, a billionaire with little concern for government transparency, who told the media that the purpose of the ship (named the Hughes Glomar Explorer) was to extract manganese nodules from the ocean floor. Six years later, in 1974, the extraction began. Unfortunately for the U.S., the extracted sub broke into pieces and what the government most wanted was lost: the ship’s code machine and two nuclear missiles. Details of this secret, bungled extraction started to leak, inaccuracies and half-truths swirled, and people rushed to file FOIA requests hoping to answer the many outstanding questions.

Worried about the geopolitical consequences, and obsessed with controlling information about its activities, the CIA came up with a novel way to keep the mission secret without telling an all-out lie. The agency decided it would refuse to confirm or deny whether records about the Glomar Explorer’s mission existed, despite the mounting public evidence that they did. And so the “Glomar response” was born. And, in the case of the Glomar Explorer, it worked: Historians claim many documents remain hidden to this day.

Unfortunately, in the decades since the submarine debacle, and especially in the post-9/11 era, we’ve repeatedly seen the CIA use the Glomar response to evade responsibility. They have used it to claim they could not say whether they had information about the government’s use of drones to carry out lethal strikes overseas, and when asked about legal justifications for the verified extrajudicial killing of three U.S. citizens. They’ve even used it to side-step questions about whether they’ve spied on Congress.

We’re even seeing state agencies attempt to use the CIA’s non-response to circumvent local public records requests. For example, in 2017, the New York Civil Liberties Union filed a public records request seeking documents regarding the NYPD’s monitoring of protesters’ social media activity and cell phones. The NYPD initially responded with a blanket statement that it could “neither confirm nor deny” whether such records existed, saying that even revealing the existence of records could harm national security. A New York court rejected this argument and ordered the NYPD to respond to the request in full.

And the CIA’s penchant for secrecy continues to expand, with the agency using Glomar to obstruct attempts to obtain records that would publicly shine a light on the agency’s failures and abuse, even when that abuse is well documented by the CIA itself and other sources.

Take, for instance, the CIA’s torture program. After the 9/11 attacks, the agency abducted dozens of Muslim men and boys, held them incommunicado, brutally tortured them, and denied the due process in sites around the globe. Once the program was exposed, 14 of the government’s “high-value detainees” were taken to the U.S. military prison at Guantánamo Bay, and detained at a notorious facility known as “Camp VII.” Attorney James G. Connell III, who represents Ammar al Baluchi, one of the men subjected to the CIA torture program and sent to Camp VII, filed a FOIA request with the CIA seeking information about the agency’s “operational control” over the facility. That “operational control” is hardly a secret: it was highlighted in the Senate Torture Report and in CIA and military commissions documents. But instead of processing Mr. Connell’s request, the agency issued what it called a “partial” Glomar response, producing three records, withholding a fourth in its entirety, and refusing to confirm or deny whether any other responsive records exist.

Given the extensive public record about the CIA’s connection to Camp VII, its refusal to acknowledge that it has responsive records both violates the law and defies common sense. That’s why we’re representing Mr. Connell in his appeal in federal court. To uphold its response, the CIA must demonstrate that it is logical or plausible that it has no responsive records in light of the entire record. That’s simply not possible here. We know this because there is an overwhelming amount of public evidence about Camp VII — from the Senate Torture Report, to court documents from the Guantánamo proceedings, to other documents the CIA itself released — that has left no doubt of CIA involvement. And yet, the CIA continues to avoid its legal obligations under FOIA through gaslighting and Glomar.

Connell v. CIA offers a real chance to not only break the CIA’s bad habit of using Glomar to evade transparency and accountability, but also issue a warning to other government agencies that hope to follow in the CIA’s footsteps by leaning into excessive secrecy.

Cities all across the United States have been increasingly passing laws that punish people who are forced to sleep outside each night due a lack of available shelter and extreme housing shortages. The Supreme Court will soon decide if doing so violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, in a case that arose out of southern Oregon and is arguably the most significant case on homelessness in decades. The ACLU’s Scout Katovich explains how the case made its way to the highest court in the U.S. and breaks down the stakes – both for the hundreds of thousands of people who are unhoused on any given night and for critical constitutional protections.

Katie Hoeppner: Can you tell us how this lawsuit came about and how it got to the Supreme Court?

Scout Katovich: Sure. The case comes out of Grants Pass, Oregon, which, like many cities in America, is facing a shortage of affordable housing that has led to increased homelessness. In 2019, there were at least 600 unhoused people in the city. The city’s response was to pass a set of laws making it illegal to sleep in public anywhere, at any time. The city called some of these laws “camping bans,” but they weren’t really about banning tents or what we usually think of as camping. Instead, they prohibited sleeping outside while using anything that could be considered “bedding,” even just a thin blanket to keep from freezing at night, or a rolled up t-shirt used as a pillow.

The punishment for this “crime” was hundreds of dollars in fines, which could quickly escalate to a sentence of 30-days in jail. Grants Pass started fining and arresting unhoused people under these laws, even though the city had zero accessible shelters for adults. So, every night, hundreds of people had no choice but to sleep outside and break these laws. In essence, they were being punished for the unavoidable human need to sleep.

A group of unhoused residents of Grants Pass challenged the enforcement of these laws and a federal court ruled in their favor, holding that the city’s enforcement of these “anti-sleeping” and “anti-camping” laws against unhoused residents with no access to shelter violated the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments. On appeal, the Ninth Circuit agreed with the lower court. Now that decision is being reviewed by the Supreme Court, and the justices will hear oral arguments in the case on April 22.

KH: A lot of cities across the country have similar bans. Can you tell us how the Supreme Court’s ruling could affect the large number of people all over the country who don’t have any choice but to sleep outside at night?

SK: That’s exactly right – we’ve seen a troubling uptick in these kinds of unconstitutional sleeping and camping bans all across the U.S. One study found that over half of the 187 cities it surveyed have laws restricting sleeping in public and almost three-fourths have laws restricting camping. The Supreme Court decision in Grants Pass will determine whether cities can use laws like this to punish unhoused people with no access to shelter, just for sleeping outside with rudimentary protections from the elements. This ruling could affect a huge number of people. With over 600,000 unhoused people and a shortfall of at least 200,000 shelter beds nationwide, hundreds of thousands of people have no choice but to sleep in public every night.

If the Supreme Court rules for Grants Pass, cities could be empowered to treat all of those people as “criminals.”

KH: The stakes are clearly enormous. What is the ACLU’s involvement in this case?

SK: Absolutely, this is a really important case, both for unhoused people and for the constitutional principles at issue. We felt strongly that the ACLU should weigh in at the Supreme Court, in part because it’s part of our mission to protect constitutional rights, including the Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishments. But we’re also deeply invested in protecting the rights of unhoused people and, in fact, the ACLU and its affiliates have brought lawsuits similar to the one before the Supreme Court, challenging enforcement of sleeping and camping bans in cities across the country, including Albuquerque, Honolulu, Phoenix, San Francisco, and Boulder. In this Supreme Court case, the ACLU and 19 of its affiliates submitted a “friend of the court” brief urging the Supreme Court to uphold the Ninth Circuit’s ruling that punishing unhoused people without access to shelter for sleeping in public violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments.

KH: Can you explain why the Eighth Amendment is such an important focus of the brief and lawsuit?

SK: Yes, our brief explains that the Eighth Amendment’s original meaning and more than a century of Supreme Court cases make clear that the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause bars governments from punishing people in ways that are disproportionate to the crime. It may sound a little wonky, but it boils down to the idea that the Constitution places some checks on how the government can punish crime. Punishment must be appropriate to the seriousness of the crime and should only be as severe as is necessary to promote legitimate goals of our criminal legal system, like rehabilitation and deterrence. Applying these well-established principles to the Grants Pass case, any punishment for the “crime” of sleeping in public when you have no other choice is unconstitutionally excessive.

KH: Can you say how the Grants Pass case fits within the ACLU’s other work, for those who may not immediately think of homelessness as an ACLU issue?

SK: Well, first and foremost, the ACLU is committed to protecting the civil rights and liberties of all, and especially the most marginalized members of our society, which certainly includes unhoused people. And our society’s approach to homelessness has made it a criminal justice issue and an equality issue. When cities like Grants Pass choose to respond to homelessness with police and jails, it fuels mass incarceration, keeping people in an endless cycle of poverty, incarceration, and institutionalization. Rather than confront the decades of policy failures that have led to a dearth of safe and affordable housing, and access to healthcare, and other services, politicians and government officials blame individuals for our society’s failings and use criminal punishment to try to push people out of sight.

And that’s where the ACLU comes in. We can’t stand by and let governments choose ineffective “solutions” that trample on the rights and dignity of our neighbors. This is also an ACLU issue because homelessness intersects with many marginalized identities, compounding discrimination and the disproportionate harms that our criminal legal system inflicts on marginalized communities.

KH: That’s a really important point about compounding discrimination…

SK: Yes, people with disabilities, LGBTQ people, and people of color, especially Black and indigenous people, are far more likely to experience homelessness because of systemic inequality and discrimination. Their overrepresentation in both the criminal legal system and among the unhoused creates a vicious feedback loop – unhoused people have an increased risk of arrest and incarceration and, in turn, a jail or prison stay often leaves people without housing and employment, keeping them in homelessness. The ACLU has long been invested in ending mass incarceration and addressing inequities in the criminal legal system, and it’s clear that our society’s approach to homelessness is exacerbating both.

KH: You mentioned that elected officials “choose” the punitive approach. And I think that’s important to underline, because they often act as though their hands are tied. Can you say more about what elected leaders could actually do to meaningfully address homelessness?

SK: There’s so much they could be doing. But first, I just want to emphasize that the punitive approaches they are taking only make the situation worse. Criminal legal system involvement and homelessness are part of a vicious cycle. Arrests, citations, and jail or prison time don’t solve homelessness, they exacerbate it. These carceral approaches also cost taxpayers a lot of money. In 2015, Los Angeles spent $50 million policing anti-homeless laws and, in Seattle, enforcing just one of its “quality of life” laws cost the city $2.3 million over just five years. So we really need to call on elected officials to stop passing these laws and adopting policies that take this misguided approach. Instead, cities and states need to focus on policies that actually address the root causes of homelessness.

KH: I wish more elected leaders would show this courage. What specifically would address those root causes?

SK: First and foremost, they need to focus on investing in safe, affordable housing. The link between homelessness and unaffordable housing could not be clearer: the areas with the most unsheltered homelessness are also the most expensive housing markets. Addressing this is a long-term commitment, but it will pay off. There’s a lot of research demonstrating that providing permanent, affordable housing, coupled with accessible services, successfully ends chronic homelessness and also reduces arrests and incarceration. We also need to increase access to wrap-around supportive services, and voluntary mental health and substance use treatment, and adopt non-law enforcement responses to situations stemming from mental health issues and poverty. There’s strong evidence that these non-carceral approaches are cost-effective, reduce contact with the criminal legal system, and increase chances of obtaining housing and employment.

KH: Is there anything else you think people should know?

SK: Yes, I think it’s really important to underscore that homelessness is not a nuisance, it’s a symptom of our collective failure to invest in our communities. It’s uncomfortable for sheltered people to have to confront this failure, but the answer to that discomfort is not to temporarily push people out of sight through criminal punishments. Addressing homelessness in humane and effective ways helps everyone. So many of us are just one bad circumstance away from losing our homes.

Housing costs have skyrocketed while wages have not kept pace. We are also facing extreme housing shortages. As a result, there’s nowhere in the country where a person working a full-time minimum-wage job can afford even a modest two-bedroom apartment. So protecting unhoused people’s rights and adopting effective approaches to reducing and preventing homelessness is something we should all be invested in.

State legislation can have an immense impact on your civil rights, for better or for worse. And even though state lawmakers are tasked with determining which bills get turned into laws, you hold a lot of power to make these decisions because you elect candidates into office. Take this quiz to learn about lawmaking at the state level, and how you can play a part in this process at the ballot box.

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Across the country, our affiliates are challenging discriminatory policies and practices that disproportionately affect women, and particularly women of color. From housing discrimination in Illinois, to inhumane treatment of incarcerated pregnant individuals in North Carolina, and discriminatory dress codes in Texas schools, the ACLU and its affiliates are at the forefront of legal and advocacy efforts that promote gender equality and justice for all.

Here are three ways our affiliates are stepping up:

The ACLU of Illinois recently joined with national and local advocates, including the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project, to challenge the “No-Evictions” policies of two large landlords — Hunter Properties and Oak Park Apartments — in Cook County, Illinois. These policies automatically reject rental housing applicants who have had any prior connection to an eviction case. The effect is to shut out families from housing opportunities, even when the eviction case was dismissed or filed years ago. Such policies have a discriminatory effect on Black renters, and especially Black women. Analysis of data from the Cook County Sheriff’s Office found that Black women accounted for approximately 33 percent of those served with an eviction case or evicted, despite making up just 22 percent of all renters in Cook County. Black renters in general faced nearly triple the likelihood of experiencing an eviction case than non-Black renters.

The lawsuit filed against Hunter Properties, and the civil rights complaint filed with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development against Oak Park Apartments, argue their respective “No-Evictions” policies have a disparate impact on Black renters, especially Black women renters, that violate the 1968 Fair Housing Act. The complaint against Oak Park Apartments also asserts that its policy perpetuates and reinforces residential segregation in violation of the Fair Housing Act. The two filings are among the first in the nation to challenge landlords’ eviction screening policies as discriminatory.

In 2021, the North Carolina General Assembly finally passed a statewide law banning correctional officers, sheriffs, and other prison staff from shackling incarcerated people during critical periods of their pregnancy and postpartum journey. The law, HB 608, also known as Dignity for Women Who are Incarcerated, came after years of advocacy by the ACLU of North Carolina and several other partner organizations, including Planned Parenthood South Atlantic and SisterSong.

A pivotal factor in the bill’s passage was an OB-GYN’s moving account of delivering a baby to a shackled woman in custody. Labor and childbirth are already intense and vulnerable experiences, and the use of restraints can exacerbate the physical and emotional pain of the mother. This story deeply resonated, even with resistant sheriffs, ultimately propelling the legislation forward.

Despite the passage of this legislation, challenges persist. Recent revelations suggest some North Carolina prisons and jails have not been in compliance with the law. Undeterred, the ACLU of North Carolina is initiating a comprehensive awareness and compliance campaign, and will be filing public record requests with the jails in all 100 counties in North Carolina, coordinating legal education seminars for the criminal defense bar and developing content on the importance of reproductive justice and the need to uphold the rights of incarcerated individuals. With these efforts, the ACLU-NC aims to ensure adherence to the law and foster a deeper appreciation for upholding the dignity of pregnant people in prison and jails.

More than half of Texas public K-12 school districts still have discriminatory dress codes and grooming policies. The ACLU of Texas has uncovered alarming disparities in school dress codes, revealing a trend of discrimination against students based on gender, race and ethnicity, LGBTQ identity, religion, disability, and socioeconomic background. The ACLU of Texas recently published a new report that reviews policies from 97 percent of Texas school districts and highlights pervasive inequalities within them.

Some of the survey’s major findings include:

• More than 80 percent of districts enforce vague and subjective hair standards, which could lead to disproportionately penalizing Black students.
• 53 percent of districts uphold dress codes rooted in outdated gender norms, such as boys-only hair length policies and girls-only sleeve length policies.
• More than 80 percent of districts prohibit head coverings without explicitly noting or explaining the religious exemptions mandated by law, harming students of diverse faith backgrounds.
• Nearly 80 percent of districts penalize students for wearing worn or improperly sized clothing, disproportionately impacting economically disadvantaged students.

In light of these disparities, the ACLU of Texas is taking action to challenge discriminatory dress codes and foster inclusive classroom environments. They’re sending the report to every district in the state to equip students, families, educators, and policymakers with knowledge that can help identify the harms of — and solutions to — discriminatory dress code policies. The report provides advocacy tools for community members and a roadmap for school districts, outlining recommendations like removing discriminatory dress code language, establishing fair enforcement practices, and providing clear and specific dress code guidelines. The ACLU of Texas is actively working in the courts and communities to push for more inclusive dress codes.

If you’ve faced or witnessed dress code discrimination, you can share your experience to continue this advocacy.

No student should ever be punished for being who they are. Instead of discriminating against young people, we should be preparing them for their futures.

State legislation is crucially connected to our civil liberties, and can either expand our rights or chip away at them. These bills touch nearly every aspect of our lives. From Roe v. Wade and the Dobbs case that overturned the right to an abortion, to Loving v. Virginia, which struck down laws banning interracial marriage, and Obergefell v. Hodges, which recognized marriage equality across the country — many Supreme Court cases that address all of our civil rights come from laws that were passed in state legislatures.

With an increasingly conservative Supreme Court and federal court system, as well as a Congress whose members are constantly in gridlock, state legislatures offer a more accessible way to enact meaningful change. State lawmakers are easier to contact regarding policies that should be passed, and also frequently go on to run for federal office, or become governors. What’s more, state actions can lead to national impact if many similar policies are passed around the country, signaling national trends.

With many state legislative sessions currently underway, learn more about this important political process, how it affects your rights, and how to get involved.

Each state has its own legislative body in which lawmakers work together to pass policies — just like Congress does at the federal level. Every state except for Nebraska has a legislature composed of two chambers, or a ​​bicameral legislature — which must work together to get a majority of favorable votes and pass bills in both chambers. While the exact names and powers of these entities depend on the specific states, once a bill is passed, it will be sent to the governor to be signed into law or may face a veto.

Most state legislatures are made up of lawmakers who meet to pass laws during legislative sessions each year. If circumstances arise that require lawmakers to address legislation outside of these regular sessions, a special session can be called. There are also several states with full-time legislatures whose lawmakers meet year-round. Lawmakers often engage in this work part time, and are often not adequately paid.

The length and timing of state legislative sessions differ from state to state. Some legislatures are in session for many months, while others only take a few. The sessions that aren’t full time usually take place in the first half of the year, traditionally beginning in January.

The laws that are passed during state legislative sessions run the gamut and can affect a number of constituents’ rights, including reproductive freedom, voting protections, access to gender-affirming care, and others. But this influence goes both ways. Presumably, the prospective laws should reflect the majority opinions of individuals in the state, with lawmakers acting as advocates for these interests. Many bills and policies that make it to state legislatures are promoted by advocacy organizations or interest groups who work with lawmakers to get them passed. The ACLU is among these entities, and is the only organization focusing on civil rights and civil liberties that has an office with staff in every state, working with local policymakers.

There are many decisions happening in states around the country that put our rights in the balance. Without the federal protections from Roe v. Wade, many lawmakers are attacking abortion rights at the state level. There has also been a surge of state laws introduced that block trans youth from receiving gender-affirming care, censor student free speech, and suppress people’s voting powers.

But the ACLU will never stop fighting for your rights. We have taken on countless state-level legal battles to protect people’s liberties — and have seen many victories along the way.

The ACLU always encourages our community to play a hands-on role in the fight for our freedoms. Across the country, we implement strategies that empower voters around the country to stay informed about local races and elect candidates whose interests align with theirs. We’re also mapping state-level attacks on LGBTQ rights so you can keep track of your own area’s legislation — and fight back accordingly.

Supporters can get in touch with the ACLU affiliate offices in their state to learn about local issues they are taking action on. Many affiliate websites offer primers on state legislatures. Our grassroots effort People Power also allows volunteers to engage with state-level actions in their area.

To learn about your state’s legislature, identify the lawmakers who represent you and what their stances are on the issues you care about most. State lawmakers and governors will usually highlight the issues they care about, and the legislative work they’ve done, wherever they are able. With most state legislative sessions underway right now, you can also keep track of policies that are being voted on. This will let you know your legislature’s priorities and if your lawmakers are fulfilling their campaign promises to constituents. Remember, the key players involved in the legislative process are voted into office by you. You have the power in numbers to elect or replace representatives based on whether they are advocating for your interests.

For more than 100 years the American Civil Liberties Union has defended the right to free speech – no matter the speaker, and regardless of whether we agree with their views.

The defense and protection of free speech and expression span many forms and issues at the ACLU. In the last year alone, it has included efforts to actively oppose book bans; represent educators fighting classroom censorship aimed at suppressing important race perspectives; defend protesters responding to police shootings or overseas wars; protect the ability of Indigenous students to wear tribal regalia at their graduation ceremonies; and fight against retaliatory arrests for protected speech.

While the faces of the free speech movement continue to change, the significance of defending free speech remains unchanged. This work lies at the heart of the ACLU’s core principles and values.

On March 18, the ACLU appeared before the U.S. Supreme Court to argue another free speech case of great significance. In this case, the ACLU represented the National Rifle Association (NRA) against government overreach and censorship. Some may have wondered why the ACLU was representing the NRA, since the ACLU clearly opposes the NRA on gun control and the role of firearms in society. In fact, we abhor many of the group’s goals, strategies, and tactics. So, the reality that we have joined forces, notwithstanding those disagreements, reflects the importance of the First Amendment principles at stake in this case.

The ACLU made the decision to represent the NRA in this case because we are deeply concerned that if regulators can threaten the NRA for their political views in New York state, they can come after the ACLU and allied organizations in places where our agendas are unpopular.

If reelected, President Trump has already promised to use the power of the government to go after his political adversaries. In a second Trump administration, opposition from the ACLU and its allied organizations will be top of mind for political leaders who may seek to go after their rivals the way New York targeted the NRA. The principal issue at stake in this case is one in which the ACLU deeply believes: preventing government blacklists of advocacy groups. Indeed, the timing couldn’t be better for drawing a bright line that would help bind a future Trump administration and other government officials who misuse their power.

In this case, the ACLU argues that Maria Vullo, New York’s former chief financial regulator, threatened to use her regulatory power over banks and insurance companies to coerce them into denying basic financial services to the NRA and, in Vullo’s own words, “other gun promotion” groups. The ACLU argues that coercing private parties to blacklist the NRA because of its advocacy violates the First Amendment, just as punishing the group directly for its “gun promotion” views would. And if New York can do this to the NRA, Texas or Florida could use the same tactics against groups advocating immigrants’ rights or the right to abortion.

The NRA has a right, like all other advocacy organizations, to pursue their mission free from reprisals by government officials who disagree with its political viewpoint. The government should not be able to evade the Constitution by doing indirectly what it plainly cannot do directly. History has, consistently, underscored the importance of this protection.

Nevertheless, we’ve faced criticism of our representation of the NRA on the theory that even if the NRA wins in this Supreme Court case, officials will still try to stifle the speech of people on the left, and courts will side with them. These critics are correct in one sense — those in power have an unfortunate tendency to try to stifle the speech of those with whom they disagree, and we will certainly continue to bring new cases to stop them. But the critics are wrong about the impact of the precedents we win, especially at the Supreme Court. People of every ideological stripe benefit with every decision vindicating the right to freedom of speech.

When we defend clients with positions with which we disagree, or even abhor, it’s because we are defending values crucial to the work of civil rights advocates in the past and present. These values include doctrines that protect our rights — at the local, state, and federal level — to join economic boycotts, hold protests, and publicly dissent. In fact, a significant amount of the ACLU’s modern day First Amendment advocacy work is predicated on principles stemming from landmark civil rights legal victories of the 1960s and 70s.

Take one of our most controversial cases, which is also one of the most important cases in the entire First Amendment canon — our defense of the Ku Klux Klan. In 1969, Klan member Clarence Brandenburg addressed a rally held in Ohio where he called for “revenge” against the government and Black individuals. He was convicted of violating the state’s Criminal Syndicalism law, which prohibited speech that “advocate[d] … the duty, necessity, or propriety of crime, sabotage, or unlawful methods of terrorism as a means of accomplishing industrial or political reform.”

The ACLU represented Brandenburg at the Supreme Court, which reversed his conviction. The court ruled that Brandenburg’s speech was protected by the First Amendment, and that the government can make it a crime to advocate illegal conduct only “where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.”

Brandenburg’s speech was reprehensible. But in preserving his First Amendment rights, the ACLU helped establish critical protection for all dissidents’ and activists’ speech. Before Brandenburg, governments had regularly charged their critics with advocating illegal activity. The Brandenburg precedent has been used to defend all kinds of political speech; indeed, today the ACLU is applying the decision in a Supreme Court case defending civil rights activist DeRay Mckesson, who took part in a Black Lives Matter protest in Louisiana.

Simply put, the right to speak freely applies to everyone. Otherwise, any elected official would be able to decide whose speech is acceptable, “safe,” or politically palatable. That is why we defend speech we hate. It’s why in 1978 the ACLU represented a neo-Nazi group that sought to demonstrate in Skokie, a Chicago suburb with a substantial Jewish population, including many survivors of the Holocaust. Notwithstanding the odious views of the protesters, we believed that once government officials are empowered to block demonstrations because they disagree with their message, the right to protest would be illusory. The Supreme Court agreed, and that decision ensures that city, state, and federal officials cannot suppress protests because they disapprove of their message.

The power to censor the neo-Nazis would have opened the door to censoring any protester, including civil rights activists or anti-war protesters. The ACLU’s position in this case was famously controversial and Aryeh Neier, the ACLU’s executive director in the 70s and a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany, withstood withering criticism. But it was the right thing to do.

The ACLU knew in the past, as we recognize now, that if the First Amendment protected only popular ideas, it would serve little purpose. If we do not take a principled stand on behalf of those with whom we disagree, we weaken our case the next time we defend those fighting for the values we share. At our core, the ACLU believes that rights and liberties are universal and “indivisible” – meaning they attach to all people, not just our friends.

Our mandate to advance all rights and liberties for all people was forged more than 100 years ago when we combatted political repression against dissidents, immigrants, workers, and other so-called radicals. Over the years the ACLU has defended the free speech rights of countless individuals and groups with which we disagree. We defended their speech rights — despite our disagreements — because we believe in free speech, and because we realize that once you chip away at one person’s rights, everyone’s rights are at risk.

Defending speech we hate is admittedly a controversial part of our mandate. Some of our allies and supporters don’t always agree with this stance. In fact, there are even some ACLU staff, leaders, and volunteers who believe that defending speech we hate does more harm than good. Some believe we shouldn’t use our limited resources defending individuals and causes with whom we disagree. Reasonable people can — and always will — disagree on the ACLU’s stance, including our own staff. Yet this is what we have done for over a century and, as the ACLU’s executive director, I respectfully believe it’s the right thing to do — for free speech and for the ACLU.

Ours is an organization that increasingly reflects all of America. We celebrate our growing diversity, just as we embrace the dissent and debate that attend it. Our commitment to free speech extends to dissent within our ranks. Dissent and debate are healthy for society — and for a civil liberties organization. This principle has long been the lifeblood of the ACLU. And it is that commitment that underlies our defense of the NRA’s free speech rights at the Supreme Court.

As a Black transgender woman and a former sex worker, it’s not unusual for me to face harassment and profiling from police. Regardless of whether we’re engaged in sex work or not, police frequently target transgender women like myself for searches and arrest, using anything from condoms to cash as “proof” we were engaged in sex work. For those who actually do engage in sex work, the criminalization of that livelihood raises the stakes of police encounters, and laws that criminalize our HIV status even more so.

In 2010, I was arrested in Memphis, Tennessee, and charged under the state’s aggravated prostitution statute, a law that raises sex work from a misdemeanor to a felony strictly on the basis of my HIV diagnosis. The law, passed in a wave of fear and panic following the height of the AIDS epidemic in 1991, doesn’t require transmission of HIV, or even an act that could possibly transmit HIV, for prosecution. It applies to everyone living with HIV, regardless of whether they are taking precautions to ensure there is no possibility of transmission or if they have disclosed their status. It targets someone like me solely on the basis of my HIV status – a protected disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act – even though there are lots of ways people living with HIV can have safe sex.

Most alarmingly, the law requires me, and anyone else convicted under it, to register a “violent sex offender” for the rest of my life, even though I have committed no such violent act and only engaged in consensual sexual activity between adults. This unfair registration requirement has denied me housing opportunities, leading me to be homeless for more than a year, with no access to shelters or support programs. It shut down job opportunities and has made it difficult to maintain a living. In fact, just 23 percent of people charged under Tennessee’s law are employed in traditional wage work after their conviction.

Even though my conviction had nothing to do with children, I cannot legally be alone with my nephew, whom I love. I’m afraid to have children of my own for fear of how my registration would impact them and my ability to parent them. This needless shame and embarrassment has been made worse by the public status of my registration, giving strangers the ability to harass, or even blackmail, me.

When I first pleaded guilty to my charges, I was not informed of any of the specifics about registration. I was not informed my registration would be for the rest of my life – despite the fact that I haven’t hurt a living soul. Tennessee’s law is a relic from a time before treatments such as antiretroviral therapy (ART) and pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), which can reduce viral loads to undetectable levels, blocking the possibility of transmission of HIV. I had no idea such a law was even still on the books.Many other states have repealed their HIV criminalization laws because of opposition by advocates and medical experts alike.Studies consistently show the laws don’t work to reduce HIV transmission, but rather interfere with people’s willingness to get tested, which is the most effective way to reduce transmission.

In October 2023, the ACLU, the ACLU of Tennessee, and the Transgender Law Center filed a lawsuit to challenge Tennessee’s aggravated prostitution law on the basis that it discriminates against people living with HIV, like me, in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act. I joined this lawsuit because this law has had such a detrimental impact on me and my life. No one should be forced to endure what I have endured.

A 2023 Texas law allowing public schools to hire chaplains, or accept them as volunteers, to provide student support services has inspired more states to consider copycat legislation. In March 2024, the Florida Legislature passed a school chaplain bill, which now awaits the governor’s signature. Similar bills have been introduced in 13 other states: Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, and Utah.

Most of the proposed legislation authorizing school chaplains would allow chaplains to take on sensitive and critical responsibilities, such as counseling students, without the same qualifications as school counselors or other student support staff.

The ACLU, along with faith groups and other civil rights organizations, has vigorously opposed these efforts. Allowing chaplains in public schools violates students’ and families’ right to religious freedom. And, because chaplains are typically not trained or certified to provide educational or counseling services to youth, students are likely to receive inadequate mental health support that, in some cases, may be harmful.

Allowing public schools to establish paid or voluntary positions for chaplains will inevitably lead to evangelizing and religious coercion of students. This violates the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause, which, along with the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment, safeguards the constitutional right to religious liberty. Courts have repeatedly ruled that it is unconstitutional for public schools to invite religious leaders to engage in religious activities with students or to promote religious doctrine to them.

Chaplains are trained to provide spiritual guidance. They do not have the experience necessary to ensure that they adhere to public schools’ educational mandates and avoid veering into impermissible religious counseling and promotion of religion. In fact, many of the bills proposed across the country specifically state that school chaplains do not need the same qualifications or certifications as school counselors or staff who provide other support services for students. Exempting chaplains from the same professional requirements as other school staff makes clear that installing them in public schools is not about helping students, but is yet another effort to subject children to unconstitutional government sponsored religious indoctrination.

Authorizing untrained and uncertified chaplains to engage in the same duties as school counselors will result in inadequate mental health support for students. In some cases, chaplains may provide inappropriate responses or interventions that could gravely harm students, including those experiencing mental health crises, LGBTQ students, and other vulnerable individuals. When a student seeks mental health care at school, that care should be provided by a qualified professional.

School chaplain bills usurp the role of religious communities. Chaplains themselves have opposed these bills, arguing that they would “misuse the authority of chaplains of any religion” and “cause division among student bodies” that include students of myriad faiths as well as non-religious students.

These bills also undermine the fundamental promise of our public education system: Public schools must serve all students equally. The ACLU, together with faith groups, civil rights organizations, and chaplains nationwide, is pushing back against these unconstitutional efforts to impose religion on public school students. To ensure that our public schools remain safe and welcoming for everyone, state lawmakers and school boards must do the same.

Can a bakery that objects to marriage equality refuse to sell a cake to a gay couple for their wedding? This question, or some variant thereof, has occupied courts even before marriages for same-sex couples were legally recognized. In June 2023, in 303 Creative v. Elenis, the Supreme Court addressed this question in a case asking whether a wedding website design business could refuse to design websites for weddings of same-sex couples. The court ruled for the business. But properly understood, the decision does not license discrimination; it merely recognizes that where a business will not provide a particular product or service to anyone, it has the right to refuse it to a gay couple. That exception should not apply to most applications of anti-discrimination laws, which require only equal treatment, and do not require businesses to provide any particular service or product. As I explain in more detail in this Yale Law Journal article and as we argue in this model brief, 303 Creative does not create a First Amendment right to discriminate.

Under Colorado’s public accommodations law, businesses that choose to serve the public at large cannot turn people away because of their race, sex, religion, sexual orientation or other protected characteristics. 303 Creative claimed that because its service is expressive and its owner objects to same-sex marriage, it can’t be required to provide website design services for same-sex weddings.

In a 6-3 decision, the court ruled for the business, concluding that Colorado’s application of its public accommodations law violated the designer’s First Amendment rights. In our view, the decision was wrong. We submitted a friend-of-the-court brief arguing that the Constitution did not give the business a right to refuse to comply with Colorado’s anti-discrimination law. But it’s important to understand the limits of the decision.

The case was brought by 303 Creative, a website design business, and its owner, Lorie Smith. Smith argued that Colorado’s law violated her First Amendment rights by compelling her, if she opened a wedding website design business, to serve both gay and heterosexual couples seeking to marry. The business had never actually designed a wedding website. Still, Smith brought the case before doing so, arguing that she was deterred from pursuing the business out of fear that Colorado’s public accommodations law would require her to create websites celebrating marriages that she opposed.

Because the case was brought before any actual application of the law, it was unclear what the designer would or wouldn’t do, or how the law would apply to her. As a result, the court’s opinions treat the case as if it presented two very different questions.

According to the majority opinion, the case involved a business owner unwilling to design for anyone a website whose content contravened her beliefs by expressly celebrating marriages of same-sex couples. It did not involve a business that refused services to customers based on their sexual orientation. Rather, Smith objected to the content of the message the state was compelling, not the identity of the customers. And equally significantly, the majority viewed Colorado’s purpose in applying its public accommodations law in such circumstances—where the business did not object to the identity of the customers but to the message requested—to be in suppressing disfavored ideas about marriage and compelling expression of the state’s favored viewpoint. In this particular application, the majority concluded, the business objected only to the message, and the state sought to enforce the law to compel a message–not to prohibit discriminatory sales on the basis of identity.

The dissenting opinions saw the case entirely differently. It viewed it as involving a website designer who objected to making any wedding website for a same-sex couple, regardless of its content. In its view, 303 Creative would refuse to make a website for a same-sex couple even if the website was identical to that of a different-sex couple. In its view, then, the designer sought a right to discriminate not based on the content of any particular message, but based on the customer’s sexual orientation. It correctly argued that the law has long been settled that the First Amendment does not permit businesses, even those whose services are expressive, to discriminate based on identity.

In essence, the majority and the dissent decided different cases. Indeed, when the dissent accused the majority of permitting businesses to discriminate on the basis of identity, the majority strongly rejected that conclusion, saying “We do no such thing.”

One way of understanding the difference is to imagine two paradigm cases. A t-shirt manufacturer that objects to making a t-shirt that says “Support Gay Marriage” has the right to refuse to make that t-shirt for a gay customer where his objection is to the message, not the identity of the customer. If the t-shirt manufacturer would not make a shirt with those words for anyone, it need not make one for a particular customer because they are gay. But at the same time, the t-shirt manufacturer could not refuse to sell a shirt saying “Love Marriage” to a customer because he was gay or sought to wear it to celebrate his marriage. If the business sells such shirts to others, it has to sell it to all. Nor could the t-shirt designer put up a sign saying “We Don’t Serve Gays.” In short, the decision permits a denial of service based on the message requested, but not based on who the product is for.

Understood in this light, the decision should have minimal impact on the enforcement of public accommodations and anti-discrimination laws. It recognizes a right to refuse service only where a business objects to expressing a particular message for anyone, not where it objects to serving certain customers because of their identity.

Because that is not the situation in the vast majority of instances in which antidiscrimination laws are applied, the decision leaves standing what the court previously described as the “general rule”—namely, that religious and philosophical objections “do not allow business owners and other actors in the economy and in society to deny protected persons equal access to goods and services under a neutral and generally applicable public accommodations law.”

In short, the decision in 303 Creative does not mean that a caterer, florist, or baker can refuse to provide food, flowers, or a cake for a wedding merely because the participants are of the same sex and the vendor objects to the implicit message providing those services sends. Instead, it is only when a public accommodations law compels speech that a business owner objects to providing for anyone—and does so in order to excise disfavored ideas, that it violates the First Amendment.

pTechnology is a necessity of modern life. People of all ages rely on it for everything from accessing information and connecting with others, to paying for goods, using transportation, getting work done, and speaking out about issues of the day. Without adequate privacy protections, technology can be co-opted to surveil us online and intrude on our private lives–not only by the government, but also by businesses–with grave consequences for our rights./p pThere is sometimes a misconception that shielding our personal information from this kind of misuse will violate the First Amendment rights of corporations who stand to profit from collecting, analyzing, and sharing that information. But we don’t have to sacrifice robust privacy protection to uphold anyone’s right to free speech. In fact, when done right, strong privacy protections reinforce speech rights. They create spaces where people have the confidence to exercise their First Amendment rights to candidly communicate with friends, seek out advice and community, indulge curiosity, and anonymously speak or access information./p pAt the same time, simply calling something a “privacy law” doesn’t make it so. Take the California Age Appropriate Design Code Act (CAADCA), a law currently under review by the Ninth Circuit in iNetChoice v. Bonta/i. As the ACLU and the ACLU of Northern California argued in a a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/netchoice-llc-v-bonta?document=Amici-Curiae-Brief-of-the-ACLU-%26-ACLU-of-Northern-Californiafriend-of-the-court brief/a, this law improperly included content restrictions on online speech and is unconstitutional. Laws can and should be crafted to protect both privacy and free speech rights. It is critical that legislatures and courts get the balance right when it comes to a law that implicates our ability to control our personal information and to speak and access content online./p pConsumer privacy matters. With disturbing frequency, businesses use technology to siphon hordes of personal information from us – learning things about our health, our family situation, our financial status, our location, our age, and even our beliefs. Not only can they paint intimate portraits of our lives but, armed with this information, they can raise or lower prices depending on our demographics, make discriminatory predictions about a href=https://www.wired.com/story/argentina-algorithms-pregnancy-prediction/health outcomes/a, improperly deny a href=https://www.hud.gov/sites/dfiles/Main/documents/HUD_v_Facebook.pdfhousing/a or a href=https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/12/tech/facebook-job-ads-gender-discrimination-asequals-intl-cmd/index.htmljobs/a, a href=https://www.propublica.org/article/health-insurers-are-vacuuming-up-details-about-you-and-it-could-raise-your-rateshike insurance rates/a, and flood people of color and low-income people with a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/08/opinion/fair-lending-and-accountability.htmlads for predatory loans/a./p pAll this nefarious behavior holds serious consequences for our financial stability, our health, our quality of life, and our civil rights, including our First Amendment rights. Better consumer privacy gives advocates, activists, whistleblowers, dissidents, authors, artists, and others the confidence to speak out. Only when people are free from the fear that what they’re doing online is being monitored and shared can they feel free to enjoy the full extent of their rights to read, investigate, discuss, and be inspired by whatever they want./p pYet in recent years, tech companies have argued that consumer privacy protections limit their i /iFirst Amendment rights to collect, use, and share people’s personal information. These arguments are often faulty. Just because someone buys a product or signs up for a service, that doesn’t give the company providing that good or service the First Amendment right to share or use the personal information they collect from that person however they want./p pTo the contrary, laws that require data minimization and high privacy settings by default are good policy and can easily pass First Amendment muster. Arguments to the contrary not only misunderstand the First Amendment; they’d actually weaken its protections./p pLaws that suppress protected speech in order to stop children from accessing certain types of content generally often hurt speech and privacy rights for all. That’s why First Amendment challenges to laws a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/arkansas-wants-to-unconstitutionally-card-people-before-they-use-social-mediathat limit what we can see online/a typically succeed. The Supreme Court has made it clear time and again that the government cannot regulate speech solely to stop children from seeing ideas or images that a legislative body believes to be unsuitable. Nor can it limit adults’ access to speech in the name of shielding children from certain content./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/arkansas-wants-to-unconstitutionally-card-people-before-they-use-social-media target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/493ead8cd079d73577ec75d5436e8b10.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/493ead8cd079d73577ec75d5436e8b10.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/493ead8cd079d73577ec75d5436e8b10-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/493ead8cd079d73577ec75d5436e8b10-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/493ead8cd079d73577ec75d5436e8b10-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/493ead8cd079d73577ec75d5436e8b10-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/493ead8cd079d73577ec75d5436e8b10-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/arkansas-wants-to-unconstitutionally-card-people-before-they-use-social-media target=_blank Arkansas Wants to Unconstitutionally “Card” People Before They Use Social Media /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/arkansas-wants-to-unconstitutionally-card-people-before-they-use-social-media target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletThe state’s Social Media Safety Act stifles freedom of expression online and violates the First Amendment./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/arkansas-wants-to-unconstitutionally-card-people-before-they-use-social-media target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pThe CAADCA is unconstitutional for these reasons, despite the legislature’s understandable concerns about the privacy, wellbeing, and safety of children. The law was drafted so broadly that it actually would have hurt children. It could have prevented young people and adults from accessing things like online mental health resources; support communities related to school shootings and suicide prevention; and reporting about war, the climate crisis, and gun violence. It also could interfere with students#8217; attempts to express political or religious speech, or provide and receive personal messages about deaths in the family, rejection from a college, or a breakup. Paradoxically, the law exposes everyone’s information to greater privacy concerns by encouraging companies to gather and analyze user data for age estimation purposes./p pWhile we believe that the CAADCA burdens free speech and should be struck down, it is important that the court not issue a ruling that forecloses a path that other privacy laws could take to protect privacy without violating the First Amendment. We need privacy and free speech, too, especially in the digital age./p

pAs a child in New Jersey, I grew up hearing stories of my mother’s flight attendant days in South Korea. A few stuck out to me even at a young age – such as hearing she needed to maintain a certain weight to get into the flight attendant program and that she had to quit her job once she got married. I couldn’t understand why my mother had to quit her dream job, the job that allowed her to travel to Hawaii and Paris, the two places she had always wanted to go since she was little, just because she got married. My mother also told me how women either lied about being married to keep their jobs or were pressured to quit by their superiors if they were public about their marital status or were pregnant. Although airlines across the world have since rolled back official policies restricting marital status and pregnancy for flight attendants in response to federal civil rights laws, many still perpetuate gender discrimination through dress code restrictions and limitations on lactating./p pUnfortunately, what my mother faced as a female flight attendant was common across the globe. The role of women in the airline industry has long been limited to societal constructs of what it means to be “feminine.” Women flight attendants have been hypersexualized through revealing uniforms and advertisements, such as an a href=https://www.jezebel.com/how-flight-attendants-organized-against-their-bosses-to-1830282960infamous ad campaign/a run by a now discontinued airline in which a flight attendant states, “I’m Cheryl; Fly me.” To maintain this public perception of flight attendants as sexually and romantically available, airlines imposed informal and formal restrictions on the height, weight, and age of flight attendants as public imaging and marketing tools. In the 1950s, airlines began to institute mandatory retirement ages for flight attendants, 35 and older, to further reinforce their image of a desirable woman. Flight attendants were fired for getting married or becoming pregnant until the 1970’s./p pNowadays, we see this sexualization in current “female” flight attendant uniform policies – skirt, high heels, tight clothing, low-cut blouses – which are indicative of the longstanding stereotypes of what it means to be a “woman” in the airline industry. Restrictive uniform and grooming policies that reinforce stereotypical categories of “male” or “female” harm people of all genders, particularly women and nonbinary people. This was the case in a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/wetherell-v-alaska-airlinesiWetherell v. Alaska Airlines/i/a, in which a a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/lgbtq-rights/gendered-dress-codes-hurt-everyone-especially-non-binary-people-like-menonbinary flight attendant/a was required to adhere to an inflexible uniform policy that forced them to conform to rigid gender stereotypes. In May 2023, the ACLU, the ACLU of Washington, and the Washington State Attorney General’s Office secured a a href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/groundbreaking-consent-decree-requires-alaska-airlines-to-change-discriminatory-gendered-uniform-policyconsent decree/a against Alaska Airlines, requiring the removal of all gendered restrictions from its uniform policy for flight attendants and additional training on gender identity and gender expression./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/wetherell-v-alaska-airlines target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=700 height=350 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/8edf82b64b3db092af443732c95ebc3d.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/8edf82b64b3db092af443732c95ebc3d.jpg 700w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/8edf82b64b3db092af443732c95ebc3d-400x200.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/8edf82b64b3db092af443732c95ebc3d-600x300.jpg 600w sizes=(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/wetherell-v-alaska-airlines target=_blank Wetherell v. Alaska Airlines /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/wetherell-v-alaska-airlines target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletThe ACLU and partners represented Justin Wetherell, a flight-attendant and flight-attendant instructor based in Seattle./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/wetherell-v-alaska-airlines target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pDress code restrictions aren’t the only gender discrimination issue that airlines need to work on. New parents in the airline industry need to be able to pump breast milk aboard aircraft during noncritical flight phases. Lactation accommodations are now the norm in many places thanks to landmark legislation including the Providing Urgent Maternal Protections (PUMP) for Nursing Mothers Act of 2022. The PUMP Act guarantees the right to pump at work and provides federal labor protection for new parents in most industries who want to pump milk during their workday without fear of being fired by their employer. But the PUMP Act excluded flight crews, and as a result, airlines have dragged their feet at implementing basic accommodations, forcing their employees to delay pumping due to their flight schedules, resulting in pain, discomfort, and infections, or to stop breastfeeding earlier than they intended./p pWe have fought to ensure pregnant flight attendants have the right to pump at work. In partnership with the ACLU of Colorado and other organizations, we secured two settlements agreements on behalf of Frontier a href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/settlement-reached-frontier-airlines-pregnancy-and-lactation-discrimination-lawsuitflight attendants/a and a href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/pilots-reach-settlement-with-frontier-airlines-over-lactation-and-pregnancy-policiespilots/a who had previously been denied pregnancy and breastfeeding accommodations by Frontier. As a result of the settlement, Frontier made important policy changes addressing pregnancy and lactation accommodations on the ground and during flights, including a policy change allowing flight crew to pump breast milk while in the air./p pNow that Frontier is leading the way, other airlines should follow suit. That’s why we a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/letter-to-airlines-breastfeeding-accommodations-for-flight-crewsent a letter/a to 28 airlines urging them to adopt policies expressly permitting flight crews to pump breast milk aboard an aircraft./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/letter-to-airlines-breastfeeding-accommodations-for-flight-crew target=_blank tabindex=-1 /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/letter-to-airlines-breastfeeding-accommodations-for-flight-crew target=_blank Letter to Airlines: Breastfeeding Accommodations for Flight Crew /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/letter-to-airlines-breastfeeding-accommodations-for-flight-crew target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pFor those airlines that don’t follow in Frontier’s footsteps, we need the AIR PUMP Act to expand PUMP’s critical protection to flight crews, making clear that all airlines must provide employees who are lactating with the basic accommodations they need, such as pumping during non-critical phases of the flight. But in the meanwhile, we’re very glad to know that there’s currently a bipartisan effort, in both the House and Senate, to require the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Authority to give written guidance to air carriers so that flight crew members will be able to pump without being penalized./p pNo working mother should be forced to choose between their job or nursing their child. We applaud Congress for passing the a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/pump-nursing-mothers-act-explainerPUMP for Nursing Mothers Act,/a and now it’s time to finish the job and stand by working parents in the airline industry./p

pSince the Supreme Court struck down longstanding affirmative action admissions policies this past summer in iSFFA v. Harvard/UNC/i, institutions from a variety of sectors have grappled with how to stay true to their commitments to equal opportunity in light of the court’s ruling. But this week, the Supreme Court did something noteworthy: it refused to hear a challenge to a high school admissions policy designed to eliminate unfair barriers for students of color. In doing so, the justices sent a signal that institutions can continue to find innovative ways to ensure equal opportunity for all within the parameters of their relatively narrow decision on affirmative action./p pThe admissions policy at issue in iCoalition for TJ v. Fairfax County School Board, /iis just that — a thoughtful approach to ensuring that highly qualified students from all backgrounds have a fair shot at getting into Thomas Jefferson High School (TJ), the top public high school in Virginia. Recognizing the importance of a diverse student body, TJ removed arbitrary and unfair barriers to eligible Black, Latine and lower-income students of all races and ethnicities. Instead of relying only on standardized tests, which can exclude well-qualified candidates of color, the new process considers a broad range of factors, including performance on a problem-solving essay. The school also adopted a percentage plan that guarantees seats to the most competitive candidates from all eligible middle schools — not just select “feeder” schools in wealthy neighborhoods. By declining to take up the case, the Supreme Court has effectively let this policy stand./p pAnd earlier this month, the court reinforced that its decision in iSFFA/i was a narrow one, allowing West Point and the U.S. Naval Academy to continue their race-based affirmative action programs, while challenges proceed in the lower courts. Although the court did not explore the constitutionality of these programs, by declining to hear these challenges, it is leaving the door open for institutions to design creative solutions for expanding opportunity and fostering diversity./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/racial-justice/moving-beyond-the-supreme-courts-affirmative-action-rulings target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/5b9568cda96c187ab07088cee177a66e.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/5b9568cda96c187ab07088cee177a66e.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/5b9568cda96c187ab07088cee177a66e-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/5b9568cda96c187ab07088cee177a66e-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/5b9568cda96c187ab07088cee177a66e-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/5b9568cda96c187ab07088cee177a66e-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/5b9568cda96c187ab07088cee177a66e-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/racial-justice/moving-beyond-the-supreme-courts-affirmative-action-rulings target=_blank Moving Beyond the Supreme Court’s Affirmative Action Rulings /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/racial-justice/moving-beyond-the-supreme-courts-affirmative-action-rulings target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletThe work to ensure educational opportunities for people of color continues, despite the court’s decision./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/racial-justice/moving-beyond-the-supreme-courts-affirmative-action-rulings target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pThis mission is more critical now than ever. Discrimination and deep-seated racial inequities that so many educational institutions, businesses, and other entities are working to address remain critical challenges. Since the 1990s, public education in the U.S. has grown a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/amici-curiae-of-the-aclu-aclu-va-in-coalition-for-t-j-v-fairfax-county-school-boardsignificantly imore /i/asegregated by race. Black and Brown students are more likely to attend schools that are doubly segregated: racially isolated and with fewer resources but higher needs. In the employment sector, Black workers face persistent gaps in promotion, pay, and a href=https://www.cnbc.com/2024/02/15/racial-wage-gap-starts-as-early-as-16-heres-why.htmlopportunity/a. The a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/28/business/economy/black-workers-racial-pay-gap.htmlBlack-white wage gap/a was larger in a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/28/business/economy/black-workers-racial-pay-gap.html2020 than it was in 1970./a Black, Latina, and Native women make less than 65 cents for every dollar earned by a white man, a differential that adds up to a href=https://nwlc.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/EPD-2021-v1.pdfnearly a million dollars lost/a over the course of a woman’s career./p pThis reality was not lost on the Supreme Court. Even in its decision to strike down Harvard and UNC’s affirmative action policies, the court reaffirmed that the pursuit of diversity is a “a href=https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/20-1199_hgdj.pdfcommendable goals/a”. In his concurrence, Justice Brett Kavanaugh stressed that schools “can, of course, act to undo the effects of past discrimination in many permissible ways.”/p pThat said, under the new legal landscape we face, opening the doors of opportunity will require careful construction, clarity of conviction, and steadfast commitment in the face of a well-resourced movement against progress. In designing programs to foster principles of fairness and equality, institutions need to be mindful that courts will pay more exacting scrutiny to programs that consider an individual’s race. Further, institutions need to be prepared to face highly organized attacks, including “warning” letters and legal challenges blatantly distorting the state of the law. These attacks have created a culture of fear and legal uncertainty specifically intended to coerce institutions into abandoning their commitments to equal opportunity — in some cases, successfully./p pWe cannot let this happen. Proactive efforts to ensure full and equal opportunity are more, not less, urgent in light of the Supreme Court’s decision. Institutions should examine their admissions, scholarship and fellowship programs, as well as recruitment and hiring practices, to ensure that they expand pipelines of opportunity for all. Schools, businesses, and others must not shy away from their DEI efforts, offices, and trainings, but instead should double down on the many lawful and effective approaches that remain. Schools and workplaces should take steps to foster a climate in which people of all races and ethnicities belong and can meet their full potential. And institutions must still comply with anti-discrimination laws, including those that prohibit unnecessary barriers to opportunity for people based on race or ethnicity. As the values of diversity and equal opportunity are themselves under attack, we must continue to push even harder for progress. It is not only the right thing to do, but what the law both permits and requires./p

pMany polls suggest if the presidential election were held today, Donald Trump could return to the White House. Fears of irreparable threats to our democracy and freedoms are neither abstract nor hyperbolic./p pWe must believe Trump when he reveals his authoritarian plans for a second term and take these threats seriously. He has made clear he intends to deploy the military to crush protests; activate state national guards to deport millions of immigrants; build on his legacy of gutting reproductive freedoms by implementing a nationwide abortion ban; create a police state in which anyone who he views as an “enemy” is surveilled and our law enforcement are further empowered to use lethal force; and undermine the integrity of our elections./p pTerrifying as these threats are, despair and resignation are not a strategy. We and our allies are prepared to fight back, informed by our experiences in his first term./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markA Nimble Legal Strategy to Combat Every New Threat and Prevent Harm/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1110 height=740 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-attorney-speaking-in-front-of-scotus-b.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=ACLU attorney speaking in front of the Supreme Court. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-attorney-speaking-in-front-of-scotus-b.jpg 1110w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-attorney-speaking-in-front-of-scotus-b-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-attorney-speaking-in-front-of-scotus-b-400x267.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-attorney-speaking-in-front-of-scotus-b-600x400.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-attorney-speaking-in-front-of-scotus-b-800x533.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-attorney-speaking-in-front-of-scotus-b-1000x667.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1110px) 100vw, 1110px / figcaption class=wp-image__caption is-caption mt-3pACLU Legal Director David Cole speaking in front of the Supreme Court building. The ACLU filed 434 legal actions against the Trump administration during his presidential term./p /figcaption span class=wp-image__credit is-creditpMolly Kaplan/ACLU/p /span /figure pThe ACLU filed 434 legal actions against the Trump administration, and hundreds of other lawsuits were filed by sister organizations, state attorneys general and even private citizens./p pWe turned to the courts during Trump’s first week in office when we, with the International Refugee Assistance Project and other partners, filed the first lawsuit challenging Trump’s Muslim ban. We got our first win the day after Trump’s executive order was signed. As the administration pivoted to “perfect” its unconstitutional ban, we fought every subsequent version. Along with our allies, we defeated the first two iterations of the ban, and ramped up pressure for President Biden to revoke the third and final ban on day one of his presidency./p pWe employed a similar strategy when the administration started forcibly separating families at the southern border. Initially, we only wanted to reunite one mother and her daughter, but subsequently learned that the government had codified this horrific practice into standard policy. We quickly expanded our suit and did everything possible to have the full extent of this tragedy revealed to the public. We, Kids in Need of Defense, the Women’s Refugee Commission and Justice in Motion mobilized thousands of people to march in opposition. Under significant, sustained public and legal pressure, the administration finally reversed their family separation policy, with our lawsuit helping reunite approximately 3,200 families./p pLitigation remains a powerful tool even in the face of Trump’s 245 judicial appointments. Much to his chagrin, many of his appointees proved willing to buck his agenda as Trump-appointed judges stood up nearly en masse for the rule of law and civil liberties in response to attempts to overturn the 2020 election results. Trump appointees also ruled against the administration’s anti-immigrant policies around Title 42 and the third-country transit ban./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markOrganizing Communities in the Streets/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1110 height=740 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-protestors-with-we-the-ppeople-signs-b.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=ACLU Supporters carrying signs with the ACLU logo readingquot; We The People.quot; decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-protestors-with-we-the-ppeople-signs-b.jpg 1110w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-protestors-with-we-the-ppeople-signs-b-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-protestors-with-we-the-ppeople-signs-b-400x267.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-protestors-with-we-the-ppeople-signs-b-600x400.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-protestors-with-we-the-ppeople-signs-b-800x533.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/aclu-protestors-with-we-the-ppeople-signs-b-1000x667.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1110px) 100vw, 1110px / figcaption class=wp-image__caption is-caption mt-3pProtestors rally in support of trans rights at the Indiana Statehouse./p /figcaption span class=wp-image__credit is-creditpAJ Mast/ACLU/p /span /figure pShould Trump return to the White House, advocacy organizations will need to come together like never before. No single organization will be able to stop the power of the federal government at Trump’s disposal. If he unleashes a deportation force to remove 13 million immigrants or deploys the National Guard to crack down on demonstrations, we and our partners will be in court daily challenging these unconstitutional and immoral policies. But that’s not enough./p pEven more so than the first, the second resistance will be one of the people, not just lawyers. We will activate our 6.5 million supporters and our 54 affiliates in every state and territory. In partnership with grassroots organizations, labor unions, religious congregations and community leaders, we will exercise our First Amendment rights to mobilize the people in the streets, lobby in their statehouses, and advocate for local leaders to resist. General strikes, economic boycotts, and worker walk-outs will be critical tools to demonstrate that Americans will not sit idly by while a constitutional crisis is perpetrated./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-markFighting Back in Congress, State Legislatures, and on the Ballot/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1110 height=740 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/us-congress-at-capitol-building-b.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=Congress in a joint meeting at the Capitol Building. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/us-congress-at-capitol-building-b.jpg 1110w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/us-congress-at-capitol-building-b-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/us-congress-at-capitol-building-b-400x267.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/us-congress-at-capitol-building-b-600x400.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/us-congress-at-capitol-building-b-800x533.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/us-congress-at-capitol-building-b-1000x667.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1110px) 100vw, 1110px / figcaption class=wp-image__caption is-caption mt-3pCongressional members seated for a speech at the US Capitol building./p /figcaption span class=wp-image__credit is-creditpBonnie Cash/UPI/Shutterstock/p /span /figure pIn a second Trump administration, the public must force Congress to serve as a co-equal branch of government, not the lap-dog of the executive branch. We have to hold Congress accountable to do its job—keeping the pressure on through calls, lobbying, and grassroots visits, reminding them they work for us./p pBut fixing a broken Congress can’t just come from the Democratic Party. With the future of our democracy at stake, we need a bipartisan commitment to govern. We’ve seen glimmers of it. If a group of bipartisan Senators found common ground to reform the antiquated Electoral Count Act—which would now prevent Donald Trump, or any president, from pressuring their vice president to refuse certifying election results—surely they can agree to update the two-centuries old Insurrection Act and ensure its not abused by President Trump to shut down legitimate forms of dissent and debate./p pAs we ramp up the pressure on our representatives, the ballot box is where the people will get the final say. The Supreme Court’s emDobbs/em decision overturning emRoe v. Wade—/emall thanks to a new Trump majority on the bench—illustrated the extent to which states are our last line of defense to bring forth the will of the people on issues such as abortion. And wherever reproductive freedom has been on the ballot since, we’ve won. Since Dobbs, we spent more than $23 million in key elections to protect abortion rights. This year, that playing field has significantly expanded: there are abortion ballot measures under consideration in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Missouri, Maryland, New York, Montana, Nebraska, and Nevada./p pAdmittedly, ballot initiatives won’t be enough if Trump enacts a nationwide ban that restricts abortion services everywhere. But direct democracy efforts, through state constitutional amendments and local elections, will send strong signals that a power grab by the federal government will not be tolerated, and help make a case on states’ rights and federalism that might convince even conservative judges to limit these power grabs./p pTrump and his allies have spent the last four years plotting his return and revenge. They will be more organized, deliberate, and aggressive. But if Trump does return to the Oval Office, the first “resistance” will look tame by comparison. Trump’s anti-liberty and fundamentally anti-American policies will assuredly be met with the full firepower of the ACLU, the might of our allies, and the commitment of the American people./p

pAmerican communities are being confronted by a lot of new police technology these days, a lot of which involves surveillance or otherwise raises the question: “Are we as a community comfortable with our police deploying this new technology?” A critical question when addressing such concerns is: “Does it even work, and if so, how well?” It’s hard for communities, their political leaders, and their police departments to know what to buy if they don’t know what works and to what degree./p pOne thing I’ve learned from following new law enforcement technology for over 20 years is that there is an awful lot of snake oil out there. When a new capability arrives on the scene—whether it’s a href=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/publications/drawing_blank.pdfface recognition/a, a href=https://www.aclu.org/blog/privacy-technology/surveillance-technologies/experts-say-emotion-recognition-lacks-scientific/emotion recognition/a, a href=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/publications/061819-robot_surveillance.pdfvideo analytics/a, or “a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/chicago-police-heat-list-renews-old-fears-aboutbig data/a” pattern analysis—some companies will rush to promote the technology long before it is good enough for deployment, which sometimes a href=https://www.aclu.org/blog/privacy-technology/surveillance-technologies/experts-say-emotion-recognition-lacks-scientific/never happens/a. That may be even more true today in the age of artificial intelligence. “AI” is a term that often amounts to no more than trendy marketing jargon./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/six-questions-to-ask-before-accepting-a-surveillance-technology target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a573aa109804db74bfef11f8a6f475e7.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a573aa109804db74bfef11f8a6f475e7.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a573aa109804db74bfef11f8a6f475e7-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a573aa109804db74bfef11f8a6f475e7-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a573aa109804db74bfef11f8a6f475e7-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a573aa109804db74bfef11f8a6f475e7-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a573aa109804db74bfef11f8a6f475e7-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/six-questions-to-ask-before-accepting-a-surveillance-technology target=_blank Six Questions to Ask Before Accepting a Surveillance Technology /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/six-questions-to-ask-before-accepting-a-surveillance-technology target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletCommunity members, policymakers, and political leaders can make better decisions about new technology by asking these questions./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/six-questions-to-ask-before-accepting-a-surveillance-technology target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pGiven all this, communities and city councils should not adopt new technology that has not been subject to testing and evaluation by an independent, disinterested party. That’s true for all types of technology, but doubly so for technologies that have the potential to change the balance of power between the government and the governed, like surveillance equipment. After all, there’s no reason to get a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/six-questions-to-ask-before-accepting-a-surveillance-technologywrapped up in big debates/a about privacy, security, and government power if the tech doesn’t even work./p pOne example of a company refusing to allow independent review of its product is the license plate recognition company Flock, which is pushing those surveillance devices into many American communities and tying them into a centralized national network. (We wrote more about this company in a 2022 a href=https://www.aclu.org/publications/fast-growing-company-flock-building-new-ai-driven-mass-surveillance-systemwhite paper/a.) Flock has steadfastly refused to allow the a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/are-gun-detectors-the-answer-to-mass-shootingsindependent/a security technology reporting and testing outlet a href=https://ipvm.com/IPVM/a to obtain one of its license plate readers for testing, though IPVM has tested all of Flock’s major competitors. That doesn’t stop Flock from a href=https://ipvm.com/reports/flock-lpr-city-sued?code=lfgsdfasd543453boasting/a that “Flock Safety technology is best-in-class, consistently performing above other vendors.” Claims like these are puzzling and laughable when the company doesn’t appear to have enough confidence in its product to let IPVM test it./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/experts-say-emotion-recognition-lacks-scientific target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1160 height=768 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/f0cab632e1da8a25e9a54ba8019ef74e.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/f0cab632e1da8a25e9a54ba8019ef74e.jpg 1160w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/f0cab632e1da8a25e9a54ba8019ef74e-768x508.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/f0cab632e1da8a25e9a54ba8019ef74e-400x265.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/f0cab632e1da8a25e9a54ba8019ef74e-600x397.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/f0cab632e1da8a25e9a54ba8019ef74e-800x530.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/f0cab632e1da8a25e9a54ba8019ef74e-1000x662.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1160px) 100vw, 1160px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/experts-say-emotion-recognition-lacks-scientific target=_blank Experts Say 'Emotion Recognition' Lacks Scientific Foundation /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/experts-say-emotion-recognition-lacks-scientific target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tablet/p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/experts-say-emotion-recognition-lacks-scientific target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pCommunities considering installing Flock cameras should take note. That is especially the case when errors by Flock and other companies’ license plate readers can lead to innocent drivers finding themselves with their a href=https://ipvm.com/reports/flock-lpr-city-sued?code=lfgsdfasd543453hands behind their heads/a, facing jittery police pointing guns at them. Such errors can also expose police departments and cities to lawsuits./p pEven worse is when a company pretends that its product has been subject to independent review when it hasn’t. The metal detector company Evolv, which sells — wait for it — emAI/em metal detectors, submitted its technology to testing by a supposedly independent lab operated by the University of Southern Mississippi, and publicly touted the results of the tests. But a href=https://ipvm.com/reports/bbc-evolvIPVM/a and the a href=https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-63476769BBC/a reported that the lab, the National Center for Spectator Sports Safety and Security (a href=https://ncs4.usm.edu/NCS4/a), had colluded with Evolv to manipulate the report and hide negative findings about the effectiveness of the company’s product. Like Flock, Evolv refuses to allow IPVM to obtain one of its units for testing. (We wrote about Evolv and its product a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/are-gun-detectors-the-answer-to-mass-shootingshere/a.)/p pOne of the reasons these companies can prevent a tough, independent reviewer such as IPVM from obtaining their equipment is their subscription and/or cloud-based architecture. “Most companies in the industry still operate on the more traditional model of having open systems,” IPVM Government Research Director Conor Healy told me. “But there’s a rise in demand for cloud-based surveillance, where people can store things in cloud, access them on their phone, see the cameras. Cloud-based surveillance by definition involves central control by the company that’s providing the cloud services.” Cloud-based architectures can a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/civil-liberties/major-hack-of-camera-company-offers-four-key-lessons-on-surveillanceworsen the privacy risks/a created by a surveillance system. Another consequence of their centralized control is increasing the ability of a company to control who can carry out an independent review./p pWe’re living in an era where a lot of new technology is emerging, with many companies trying to be the first to put them on the market. As Healy told me, “We see a lot of claims of AI, all the time. At this point, almost every product I see out there that gets launched has some component of AI.” But like other technologies before them, these products often come in highly immature, premature, inaccurate, or outright deceptive forms, relying little more than on the use of “AI” as a buzzword./p pIt’s vital for independent reviewers to contribute to our ongoing local and national conversations about new surveillance and other police technologies. It’s unclear why a company that has faith in its product would attempt to block independent review, which is all the more reason why buyers should know this about those companies./p

pMore than 60 years ago the Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment bars the government from coercing private entities to punish speech that the government disfavors. Just as the government can’t directly punish or censor speech it disagrees with, it cannot do so indirectly by coercing private parties to do the same./p pHistory underscores the importance of this free speech protection. Government officials have all too often enlisted private parties—from the White Citizens’ Councils of the Jim Crow South to the blacklists of Communists in the McCarthy era—to punish those with whom they disagree. New York’s efforts to punish the National Rifle Association, at issue before the Supreme Court in a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/national-rifle-association-v-vulloiNational Rifle Association v. Vullo/i/a, follow in the footsteps of those earlier censorship efforts./p div class=alignfullwidth mb-8 wp-pullquote div class= wp-pullquote-inner pThe ACLU disagrees sharply with the NRA on many issues, yet we are representing the group in this case because of the First Amendment principles at stake./p /div /div pThe ACLU disagrees sharply with the NRA on many issues, yet we are representing the group in this case because of the First Amendment principles at stake. We argue that Maria Vullo, a New York state regulator, threatened to use her regulatory power over banks and insurance companies to coerce them into denying basic financial services to the NRA and, in Vullo’s own words, “other gun promotion” groups. Vullo’s threats were expressly based on her disagreement with the NRA’s advocacy. And they worked. Several insurance companies and banks refused to work with the NRA out of fear of reprisals from New York regulators. The ACLU urges the Supreme Court to hold that coercing third parties to break ties with the NRA because of its advocacy violates the First Amendment./p pEven those who oppose government censorship may be sympathetic to New York’s efforts to shut down the NRA. The NRA is dedicated to promoting guns, which play an outsized role in violence and death in this country. The ACLU does not support the NRA’s mission. In fact, we directly oppose the NRA and support the government’s power to adopt sensible tools, like public carry permits and disarming persons subject to domestic violence protective orders. While it#8217;s understandable that Vullo wanted to address the gun violence epidemic, government censorship wasn#8217;t a constitutional response to the problem./p div class=alignfullwidth mb-8 wp-pullquote div class= wp-pullquote-inner pThe right to advocate views the government opposes safeguards our ability to organize for the country we want to see./p /div /div pThe NRA’s case is hardly the first time government officials have sought to use private parties to penalize those with whom they disagree. Our nation’s history is replete with examples. And when the government threatens businesses in this way, the businesses often go along. As summed up by a slogan during the McCarthy Era: “Why buy yourself a headache?”/p pDuring the McCarthy era, from the late 1940s to 60s, the government regularly pressured private entities to fire people it perceived as connected with the Communist Party. The FBI and the House Committee on Un-American Activities delivered the names of employees who had alleged connections to “subversive” organizations, or even subscriptions to their publications, to private employers like defense contractors, universities, newspapers, and major corporations such as General Electric and U.S. Steel. Employers that failed to fire these employees faced loss of lucrative government contracts, necessary licenses, targeted investigations, and public smearing./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/national-rifle-association-v-vullo target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=700 height=350 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/29cdadc17d83f5ef0a78a0e3eca67374.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/29cdadc17d83f5ef0a78a0e3eca67374.jpg 700w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/29cdadc17d83f5ef0a78a0e3eca67374-400x200.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/29cdadc17d83f5ef0a78a0e3eca67374-600x300.jpg 600w sizes=(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/national-rifle-association-v-vullo target=_blank National Rifle Association v. Vullo /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/national-rifle-association-v-vullo target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletOn January 9th, 2024, the American Civil Liberties Union filed its opening brief on behalf of the National Rifle Association (NRA) in National.../p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/national-rifle-association-v-vullo target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pThe ACLU itself has been the target of such efforts. In the late 1930s, Jersey City Mayor Frank Hague bragged that the reason the ACLU and the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) had been unable to book a single private hall for meetings or speakers was because the hall owners are his “friends” and knew that he did “not approve of un-American groups coming into Jersey City.” The one hall owner who did rent his hall to the CIO for a meeting was then charged with a building violation. When asked about the violation at trial, Hague responded “Any port in a storm, Counselor”—effectively acknowledging that the violation was in retaliation for renting the private hall to a disfavored speaker./p pThe ACLU’s predecessor, the National Civil Liberties Bureau, confronted similar efforts during World War I. When the Justice Department attempted to put the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) out of business by filing criminal charges against more than 100 members who had called for labor strikes, accusing them of undermining the war effort, the National Civil Liberties Bureau placed an advertisement seeking funds for the IWW’s “right of a fair trial.” The government responded by coercing iThe New Republic/i, a privately-run media company, to support its goal by threatening to revoke the magazine’s second-class mailing privileges if it reprinted the message./p pSouthern states turned to this tactic in their resistance to racial integration established in a href=https://www.aclu.org/podcast/school-segregation-65-years-after-brown-v-board-ep-46iBrown v. Board of Education/i/a. Some states mandated public disclosure of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s (NAACP) members, and relied on private entities that shared the state’s commitment to maintaining white supremacy, such as the White Citizens’ Councils, to publicize the disclosures to private business owners who were expected to then punish those named. As a result, NAACP members were fired, denied credit, prohibited from purchasing goods, evicted or had their home loans foreclosed, and subjected to threats of and actual violence. This public-private partnership became a blueprint for how to use racialized violence as an “economic cold war” to render both Black and white supporters of the NAACP “destitute” and undermine their ability to advocate for racial justice./p pNor is this tactic a relic of the past. In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis directed the state agency in charge of liquor licensing to see if it could stop private entities hosting performances of “A Drag Queen Christmas.” After the shows went forward, a non-profit theater venue in Orlando and the Hyatt Regency Miami faced actions to revoke their liquor licenses for allegedly violating laws prohibiting lewdness, vulgar exposure of sexual organs, and obscene performances—despite the agency’s own undercover agents attending and reporting that there were no “lewd acts” or “exposure of genital organs.”/p pMaria Vullo followed the same playbook. As the state’s top financial regulator, in coordination with then-Governor Andrew Cuomo, she expressly targeted the NRA for its “gun promotion” advocacy and urged all the banks and insurance companies she regulates to refuse to do business with the NRA. She offered leniency to one insurer for legal infractions if it would cut its ties to the NRA, and extracted promises from the NRA’s three largest insurance partners never to provide “affinity insurance” to the group’s members ever again./p piNRA v. Vullo /iisn’t just about the NRA. It’s about all of our First Amendment rights to advocate for causes we believe in, without being targeted by public-private ventures of retaliation. If New York can do this to the NRA, then Oklahoma could similarly penalize criminal justice reformers advocating for bail reform, and Texas could target climate change organizations advancing the view that all fossil fuel extraction must end. The right to advocate views the government opposes safeguards our ability to organize for the country we want to see. It’s a principle the ACLU has defended for more than 100 years, and one we will continue to protect from government censorship of all kinds, whether we agree or disagree with the views of those being targeted./p

pIn 1987, 15 years after the Women’s Rights Project was established at the ACLU, March was officially designated as Women’s History Month in the United States. This time is for the celebration of the women whose contributions and achievements have shaped our society. Such a celebration may feel painful at this moment, when we are facing the fall of iRoe v. Wade, /ithe Black maternal mortality crisis, as well as ongoing, systemic barriers including the gender wage gap, family policing, lack of affordable housing, and sexual harassment. Yet it is precisely at times like these we need reminders why we still fight – and that we still win. In the perpetual fight for justice and equity, women have not only been essential, but have also consistently led the way. Each March, we must celebrate the progress made, and acknowledge all the work that has been and has yet to be done./p pFor over 50 years, the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project (WRP) has been at the forefront of the fight for gender justice. And just as Women’s History Month continues to evolve each year, our work has expanded and developed, with a focus on taking an intersectional approach. Here are four ways we continue to fight for equality:/p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standard1. Challenging Discriminatory Dress Codes /h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1110 height=740 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/our-voice-is-our-power.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=Three individuals holding ACLU branded posters. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/our-voice-is-our-power.jpg 1110w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/our-voice-is-our-power-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/our-voice-is-our-power-400x267.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/our-voice-is-our-power-600x400.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/our-voice-is-our-power-800x533.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/our-voice-is-our-power-1000x667.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1110px) 100vw, 1110px / /figure pThe ACLU has led the way in fighting discriminatory dress codes that reinforce sexist and racist stereotypes in schools and at work. These discriminatory codes target girls, people of color, and members of the LBGTQIA+ community, particularly girls who live at the intersection of those identities. Many students and workers across the county are subject to senseless, sex-based restrictions such as skirts, dresses, and “modest clothing” for women and girls and short hair, pants, and no accessories for men and boys. We successfully a href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/supreme-court-rejects-appeal-from-public-charter-school-seeking-permission-to-violate-students-constitutional-rightschallenged/a a charter school’s “skirts only” rule for girls, which the school adopted based on the belief that every girl is a “fragile vessel.” The school sought to overturn the decision but, in 2023, the Supreme Court left the victory in place. This past year, we also reached a a href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/groundbreaking-consent-decree-requires-alaska-airlines-to-change-discriminatory-gendered-uniform-policyhistoric settlement/a with Alaska Airlines to remove all gendered restrictions from its uniform policy for flight attendants./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/dresscodeform target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a082360125c2d047aa848acb36042cee.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a082360125c2d047aa848acb36042cee.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a082360125c2d047aa848acb36042cee-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a082360125c2d047aa848acb36042cee-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a082360125c2d047aa848acb36042cee-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a082360125c2d047aa848acb36042cee-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/a082360125c2d047aa848acb36042cee-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/dresscodeform target=_blank Share Your Story: Dress Code Policies Based on Gender Stereotypes /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/dresscodeform target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletWe’d like to hear from you if your school or workplace maintains discriminatory dress and appearance policies./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/dresscodeform target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pAcross the country, we’ve sought to end the enforcement of discriminatory dress codes in a range of other contexts as well. We’ve fought to end discriminatory dress codes in schools that prevent boys and non-binary students from wearing their hair long, which prevents a class=Hyperlink SCXW6015916 BCX0 href=https://www.aclu.org/news/racial-justice/my-sons-hair-is-part-of-a-thousand-year-old-tribal-culture-his-school-called-it-a-fad target=_blank rel=noreferrer noopenerNative American and Black students/a, among others, from expressing their cultural and religious traditions. We’ve also worked to end dress codes that a class=Hyperlink SCXW6015916 BCX0 href=https://www.aclu.org/news/womens-rights/why-im-challenging-my-schools-sexist-dress-code-policies target=_blank rel=noreferrer noopenerpenalize student athletes/a on the girls’ cross-country teams for training in weather-appropriate clothing, as well as those that forbid transgender seniors from attending a class=Hyperlink SCXW6015916 BCX0 href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/aclu-challenges-mississippi-high-schools-refusal-to-let-transgender-student-wear-dress-to-graduation-ceremony target=_blank rel=noreferrer noopenertheir high school graduation/a dressed as themselves./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standard2. Taking on Housing Policies that Blacklist Black and Brown Women/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1110 height=740 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/i-stand-with-black-women.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=Someone holding a sign saying Stand With Black Women. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/i-stand-with-black-women.jpg 1110w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/i-stand-with-black-women-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/i-stand-with-black-women-400x267.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/i-stand-with-black-women-600x400.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/i-stand-with-black-women-800x533.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/i-stand-with-black-women-1000x667.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1110px) 100vw, 1110px / /figure pIn our fight for housing justice, we have taken on “No-Eviction” policies and other screening policies that disproportionately discriminate against Black renters, particularly Black women. These screening policies block potential renters from housing simply because they are connected to any previous eviction case, even if the case was very old, they ultimately won it, or the legal action against them was unlawfully filed in the first place. Black women are significantly more likely to have eviction cases filed against them by landlords, so these policies in turn impact and destabilize Black women, further perpetuating systemic inequality and segregation. In 2023, we filed a class=Hyperlink SCXW192197316 BCX0 href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/advocates-challenge-discriminatory-eviction-screening-policies-enforced-by-two-cook-county-landlords target=_blank rel=noreferrer noopenertwo/a challenges against the use of these screening policies by Chicago-area landlords. These cases were among the first of their kind in the United States and aim to set a precedent for disrupting discriminatory housing practices./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standard3. Advocating for Pregnant and Lactating Workers/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1110 height=740 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/pregnant-workers-fairness-act.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A group of women wearing t shirts saying Pass the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/pregnant-workers-fairness-act.jpg 1110w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/pregnant-workers-fairness-act-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/pregnant-workers-fairness-act-400x267.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/pregnant-workers-fairness-act-600x400.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/pregnant-workers-fairness-act-800x533.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/pregnant-workers-fairness-act-1000x667.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1110px) 100vw, 1110px / /figure pWe have long been at the forefront of fighting for the rights of pregnant and breastfeeding workers who experience discrimination in the workplace. Over the past few years, the ACLU was a key advocate for the enactment of the a class=Hyperlink SCXW136550188 BCX0 href=http://pregnan/ target=_blank rel=noreferrer noopenerPregnan/at Workers Fairness Act and the a class=Hyperlink SCXW136550188 BCX0 href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/aclu-applauds-senate-passage-pregnant-workers-fairness-act-and-pump-nursing-mothers target=_blank rel=noreferrer noopenerPUMP for Nursing Mothers Act/a. These new landmark laws ensure that millions of pregnant and lactating workers have access to reasonable accommodations that allow them to continue working, instead of forcing them to choose between their paycheck and a healthy pregnancy and nursing period. We continue to litigate on behalf of employees who are denied pregnancy-related accommodations and those discriminated against for being pregnant./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standard4. Fighting the Separation of Black and Brown Families/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1110 height=740 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/womens-rights-are-human-rights.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A sign that says Women#039;s Rights Are Human Rights. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/womens-rights-are-human-rights.jpg 1110w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/womens-rights-are-human-rights-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/womens-rights-are-human-rights-400x267.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/womens-rights-are-human-rights-600x400.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/womens-rights-are-human-rights-800x533.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/womens-rights-are-human-rights-1000x667.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1110px) 100vw, 1110px / /figure pAs part of our work on behalf of families of color who are disproportionately impacted by the child welfare system, we have been a strong voice in raising awareness about the widespread use of automated tools by local governments to determine which families to investigate – tools that often heighten the risk of disintegration for Black and Brown families in the United States. In 2023, the ACLU published a a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/womens-rights/how-policy-hidden-in-an-algorithm-is-threatening-families-in-this-pennsylvania-countyreport/a on the discriminatory effects of Allegheny County’s “Family Screening Tool,” which could disproportionately flag family members who were Black or had disabilities for investigation. The ACLU’s report prompted in-depth reporting from the Associated Press and an investigation from the U.S. Department of Justice./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/the-devil-is-in-the-details-interrogating-values-embedded-in-the-allegheny-family-screening-tool target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1000 height=494 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/1339bada98bced1fc0221fb7c78bd574.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/1339bada98bced1fc0221fb7c78bd574.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/1339bada98bced1fc0221fb7c78bd574-768x379.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/1339bada98bced1fc0221fb7c78bd574-400x198.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/1339bada98bced1fc0221fb7c78bd574-600x296.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/1339bada98bced1fc0221fb7c78bd574-800x395.jpg 800w sizes=(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/the-devil-is-in-the-details-interrogating-values-embedded-in-the-allegheny-family-screening-tool target=_blank The Devil is in the Details: Interrogating Values Embedded in the Allegheny Family Screening Tool /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/the-devil-is-in-the-details-interrogating-values-embedded-in-the-allegheny-family-screening-tool target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletWe're examining how algorithmic design choices can function as policy decisions through an audit of a deployed algorithmic tool, the Allegheny Family /p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/the-devil-is-in-the-details-interrogating-values-embedded-in-the-allegheny-family-screening-tool target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pWhile there is still much work ahead of us, our recent victories give us hope for progress toward a more equitable world for everyone, regardless of gender. We will continue the fight for gender justice alongside everyone who has been and continues to be a part of the movement with us./p

pAt the onset of President Biden’s term, in January 2021, he issued an a href=https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/01/26/executive-order-reforming-our-incarceration-system-to-eliminate-the-use-of-privately-operated-criminal-detention-facilities/executive order/a to phase out the federal criminal system’s use of for-profit prisons. This was an important step toward stemming the flow of federal money to corporations that lock people up for profit. The executive order covered both the Federal Bureau of Prisons, which holds people convicted of crimes, and the U.S. Marshals Service, which holds people while they await trial or await transfer to a federal prison after sentencing. However, it left out the federal government’s a href=https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/01/28/biden-is-ending-justice-departments-contracts-with-private-prisons-now-end-ices/heavy use of for-profit immigration detention facilities/a, which are rife with abuse, unsanitary conditions, and overcrowding./p pThe Bureau of Prisons followed the executive order and has a href=https://www.bop.gov/resources/news/20221201_ends_use_of_privately_owned_prisons.jspclosed all of its for-profit prisons/a. The Marshals Service has not. An a href=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/2023.09.15-FINAL-ACLU-Letter-on-USMS-Failure-to-Comply-with-EO-14006.pdfACLU analysis/a of documents produced in response to a Freedom of Information Act request shows that, despite the executive order, the Marshals Service continues to hold nearly a third of its entire detention population in for-profit facilities, totaling 20,000 people. It does this by exploiting two loopholes it has created that undermine the purpose of the executive order: to end prison profiteering./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/2023.09.15-FINAL-ACLU-Letter-on-USMS-Failure-to-Comply-with-EO-14006.pdf target=_blank tabindex=-1 /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/2023.09.15-FINAL-ACLU-Letter-on-USMS-Failure-to-Comply-with-EO-14006.pdf target=_blank The ACLU's Letter to the United States Marshals Service Due to It's Failure to Comply with Executive Order 14006 /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/2023.09.15-FINAL-ACLU-Letter-on-USMS-Failure-to-Comply-with-EO-14006.pdf target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tablet/p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/2023.09.15-FINAL-ACLU-Letter-on-USMS-Failure-to-Comply-with-EO-14006.pdf target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pFirst, the Marshals Service has obtained repeated waivers from the White House that allow it to ignore the executive order and keep five for-profit facilities open. The Marshals Service and White House have not publicized these waivers, and when internal government investigators asked for documentation of these waivers, they were a href=https://oig.justice.gov/sites/default/files/reports/23-055.pdf“told that no such documentation existed.”/a/p pSecond, the Marshals Service has determined that it can continue to pay corporations to operate detention facilities for profit, so long as it uses a city or county government as a middleman. Under this arrangement, known as a “pass-through” agreement, the Marshals Service pays a city or county government, which keeps a portion of the payment and passes along most of the payment to the corporation that runs the facility. An a href=https://oig.justice.gov/sites/default/files/reports/23-055.pdfinternal government investigation/a found that these agreements cost the Marshals Service more and provide less control and oversight over operations at its detention facilities./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/smart-justice/americas-pretrial-system-broken-heres-our-vision-fix-it target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1160 height=768 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/e6684cdc9ab1c58813941b773a90730e.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/e6684cdc9ab1c58813941b773a90730e.jpg 1160w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/e6684cdc9ab1c58813941b773a90730e-768x508.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/e6684cdc9ab1c58813941b773a90730e-400x265.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/e6684cdc9ab1c58813941b773a90730e-600x397.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/e6684cdc9ab1c58813941b773a90730e-800x530.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/e6684cdc9ab1c58813941b773a90730e-1000x662.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1160px) 100vw, 1160px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/smart-justice/americas-pretrial-system-broken-heres-our-vision-fix-it target=_blank America’s Pretrial System Is Broken. Here’s Our Vision to Fix It. /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/smart-justice/americas-pretrial-system-broken-heres-our-vision-fix-it target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tablet/p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/smart-justice/americas-pretrial-system-broken-heres-our-vision-fix-it target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pBy using these two loopholes to keep funneling money to corporations that profit from incarceration, the Marshals Service perpetuates the harm that these corporations cause. In the words of a href=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/biden-private-prisons-susan-rice-b1793046.htmlPresident Biden’s domestic policy advisor/a: “Private prisons profiteer off federal prisoners and are proven to be, or found to be by the Department of Justice inspector general, less safe for correctional officers and prisoners.”/p pA a href=https://news.wsu.edu/press-release/2020/09/15/privatized-prisons-lead-inmates-longer-sentences-study-finds/statistical analysis/a has shown that as states turn more to for-profit prisons, their incarceration rates increase. This should come as no surprise: for-profit prison companies use the taxpayer money they receive to lobby extensively for increased incarceration. The two largest for-profit prison companies spent a href=https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying/clients/summary?cycle=2023amp;id=D000021940$1.7 million/a and a href=https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying/clients/summary?cycle=2023amp;id=D000022003$1.3 million/a lobbying the federal government alone, with more money going to state lobbying. This does not include the for-profit prison industry’s significant donations to political campaigns and PACs. a href=https://www.americanprogress.org/article/trumps-executive-order-rewards-private-prison-campaign-donors/For example/a, these two companies each spent a quarter million on President Trump’s 2017 inauguration festivities, and one donated $225,000 to a pro-Trump super PAC./p pCongress has taken notice. Nine senators wrote a a href=https://judiciary.house.gov/committee-activity/hearings/oversight-united-states-marshals-serviceletter/a to “express deep concern that the [Marshals Service] appears to be circumventing President Biden’s Executive Order.”/p pThere are a few concrete steps that the Biden administration and the Marshals Service can take now to address these problems and plan for an orderly transition away from for-profit prison companies. First and foremost, they should work together to a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/smart-justice/americas-pretrial-system-broken-heres-our-vision-fix-itdivert people away from pre-trial detention/a in a way that protects community safety and ensures people show up for their trials. With fewer people to detain, the Marshals Service will have less need to pay for-profit facilities./p pThe Biden administration and Marshals Service should also work to find viable alternatives to for-profit facilities for those who remain in detention, where people can be held near their families, friends, and lawyers. People have a right to confer with their attorney regularly to prepare a defense, and numerous studies show that proximity to loved ones and support networks supports better outcomes when people are released from custody./p pAs they do this, they should be transparent. The Marshals Service should publish its plan to close the five for-profit prisons with which it continues to directly contract. It should develop a plan to stop using pass-through intergovernmental agreements and publish a plan to phase out these detention facilities as well. Spending taxpayer dollars to enrich private corporations and shareholders who run facilities with abusive practices, poor medical care, and unsanitary conditions is a policy that harms incarcerated individuals and creates unsafe working conditions for correctional officers. The Biden administration has called for an end to this policy, it is past time for the Marshals Service to listen./p

piTwo transgender adolescents and their families are challenging Idaho#8217;s 2023 law, HB 71, which criminalizes gender-affirming medical care for trans youth. Signed by Governor Brad Little, HB 71 prohibits widely accepted treatments for gender dysphoria, despite their endorsement by leading medical organizations like the American Medical Association. In a lawsuit filed by the ACLU and legal firms, plaintiffs argue that the law violates constitutional rights. The law bans puberty blockers, hormone therapy, and certain surgeries for transgender youth, threatening medical providers with felony charges and up to 10 years in prison. /i/p pi /iiIn February 2024, Idaho filed an application to the Supreme Court of the United States for a partial stay against an injunction currently blocking enforcement of HB 71. Jane Doe, a 17-year-old transgender girl living in Idaho and plaintiff in the case alongside her parents, shares her story. /i/p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardAll I Want is to Just Be a Teen /h2 /div pDespite everything, I know I’m lucky. Despite having to watch as politicians in my home state of Idaho and across the country spread lies targeted at transgender youth like me, I know I’m blessed with a family that loves me, friends that support me, and a school that protects my right to be treated like every other student. Despite my governor signing a law threatening to put my doctors in prison just for providing me with medical care I need, I know I’m lucky to have those doctors who, with the support of my parents, have helped me get the hormone therapy I need to address my gender dysphoria, which had been making my life unbearable. And despite needing to join a federal lawsuit against that law that threatens to uproot my entire life and family, I know my parents and my siblings would do anything to protect me no matter what./p pAs a 17-year-old girl, I haven’t even graduated high school. I should be planning for college, hanging out with my friends, and playing video games with my brother. Instead, politicians in my state have forced me to go to court to stop them from denying me the medical care my doctors, my parents, and I all know has saved my life. Now, that fight is at the Supreme Court where the Idaho Attorney General has asked the court to intervene and allow the ban on gender-affirming medical care to go into effect while the case goes forward. I do not want to be doing this. I just want to be a teenager and continue receiving the health care that has made the life I am now living possible./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/poe-v-labrador target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=700 height=350 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/8edf82b64b3db092af443732c95ebc3d.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/8edf82b64b3db092af443732c95ebc3d.jpg 700w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/8edf82b64b3db092af443732c95ebc3d-400x200.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/8edf82b64b3db092af443732c95ebc3d-600x300.jpg 600w sizes=(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/poe-v-labrador target=_blank Poe v. Labrador /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/poe-v-labrador target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletA 2023 Idaho law criminalizing gender-affirming medical is being challenged in federal court by two transgender adolescents and their families./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/poe-v-labrador target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pFor as long as I can remember, I knew that something felt off about living as a boy. I have always naturally related to other girls, felt the most like myself around other girls, and had similar interests as other girls. When I was younger, I did not have the words to express my feelings related to my gender identity or being transgender. But I knew it even before I knew the words for it. When I would play “make believe” with my friends, I was always a girl character. When I would play video games, I would always choose a girl avatar. My mom and dad even told me that, when I was little and my mom was pregnant with my younger sibling, I would lie down and place a doll on my stomach and tell them that I wanted to be a mom./p pWhen I started middle school and my body started changing, the sense that something was “off” gradually became a devastating level of distress. My mental health began to deteriorate as the changes to my body made me look more like my older brother and less like the girl I knew myself to be. I avoided anything social and my grades began to fall. There were times that I simply just did not want to exist because the physical changes to my body were trapping me in an existence I knew was causing me immense mental pain./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardFamily, Friends and Community/h2 /div pAt 14, I shared these feelings with my parents who, by then, could tell something was gravely wrong. Without hesitation, they told me they loved me, would always love me, and just wanted me to be happy and healthy no matter what. Soon after, I started “socially transitioning”#8211;I started going by a new name at home and at school and my friends began using feminine pronouns to refer to me. I wore a feminine hairstyle and I started wearing girls’ clothes. I told my mom I wanted to wear makeup and, as part of how she supported me when I asked for her help, she taught me about makeup and how to apply it./p pAll of this helped my gender dysphoria, but I was still experiencing male puberty, which was causing significant physical changes to my body that I could not hide or cover up with makeup or clothes. The changes to my body caused me so much pain that sometimes I wished I did not even exist. My parents took me to see our family doctor, a pediatrician who’s known me all my life./p p“From the moment you were born,” my doctor told me, “my job has been to make sure you’re healthy and happy, and this doesn’t change anything.” She referred us to a specialist with expertise in gender dysphoria and I started seeing a therapist. The specialist evaluated me, including an extensive conversation about my struggles with my gender. He also provided my parents and me information about gender affirming medical care, including the potential risks, and options to preserve fertility. At 15 and with my mom and dad’s support, I started medication that prevented further changes to my body from puberty, causing immediate relief to my anxiety and giving me much-needed hope. A few months later, I started estrogen, which has allowed me to go through puberty consistent with my gender identity./p div class=alignfullwidth mb-8 wp-pullquote div class= wp-pullquote-inner p#8220;It’s hard to overstate how impactful gender-affirming medical care has been for me.#8221;/p /div /div pIt’s hard to overstate how impactful gender-affirming medical care has been for me. Before treatment, I was isolating myself, depressed, anxious, and I regularly felt trapped and scared. I could not see a future for myself. I am so grateful that when I told my parents about what I was experiencing, they listened to me, trusted me, and took me to providers who could give me the gender-affirming health care that I needed to be who I am. Combined with the support of my friends and school, the love and support I’ve received from my family is what every transgender kid needs and deserves./p pAt the start of 2023, the Idaho State Legislature began debating HB 71, a law that would ban my medical care and even threaten to put my doctors in prison for the “crime” of supporting me. It was both terrifying and infuriating to watch as something so important to me and my life was debated by people who obviously didn#8217;t know anything about us. They didn#8217;t seem to care at all about all the testimonies from parents like mine, the expertise of doctors like mine, and the pleas from trans kids like me begging the state not to take away the care that has saved my life and the lives of so many others. When Governor Brad Little signed the law, my parents and I were terrified for our future./p pWhen HB 71 passed, my parents talked to my siblings and me about trying to travel out of state for care or selling our house and leaving Idaho-the only home I#8217;ve ever known. Having to move would mean losing my friends, my family, my home, my community, my school–everything that I have always known./p pI don’t want politicians trying to control my body, my life, and my family’s lives. And I don’t want any other trans kids to be faced with the same. I’m so fortunate to have the support I have-especially when so many trans kids are denied the same opportunity to thrive–and I wake up every day thankful for the love of my parents and my siblings. But if the Supreme Court allows this law to take effect, my family and my doctors understand that this health care is so central to my well-being that not receiving it is not an option. I ask that the Court please help me and my family. Please do not let my health care be taken away./p

Trans people's ability to work in the US, and our digity, is on the line at the Supreme Court.

Yesterday, the Supreme Court heard argument on whether it is legal to fire people for being transgender or for being gay. I represent Aimee Stephens, the woman who lost her job as a funeral director for being transgender, and I was sitting at counsel table during the argument. You can read the argument transcript online.

I’m optimistic about our chances. We need five votes, and it seemed to me that Justices Kagan, Ginsburg, Breyer, and Sotomayor were leaning our way, as hoped. Justice Gorsuch certainly implied that he thought our textual argument carried some weight, and that it was at least possible he will vote in favor of the employees. Justice Kavanaugh was almost entirely silent, giving very little clue as to his thinking. While Justices Roberts and Alito to me did not seem favorably disposed toward the employees and Justice Thomas presumably feels the same, we only need five votes. I think it is very possible that we will get them, in both the LGBQ cases and the trans case that were argued yesterday.

Our argument is morally right, of course, but it is also simple and legally sound. The question is whether discrimination against LGBTQ people is discrimination because of sex. It makes no sense to say that discrimination against someone for identifying with a sex other than their assigned sex at birth, or for being attracted to people of the same sex, is not about sex. The other side’s arguments sounded strained, and that’s because their arguments have no real basis in law or logic. The justices would have to warp the statute to exclude trans people and LGBQ people, and I think there is reason to hope that a majority will refuse to do that.

Yesterday’s argument included much discussion about a variety of sex-specific policies, and whether trans people may be forced to comply with them based on assigned sex at birth. While none of those policies are actually at issue in these cases, they were the subject of a lot of questions from the justices. That is because the other side’s strategy—even in the sexual orientation context—is to counter our arguments with anti-trans fear-mongering. I fear that to achieve a majority, the justices will write an opinion that would enable forcing trans women to follow the dress code for men, or to use men’s restrooms. While language like that would not technically be binding, it could make things much more difficult for trans people at work, at school, and in public places. And it could shore up the legitimacy of gendered dress codes that currently are legally dubious because they reinforce stereotypes about women in the workplace.

Now, we wait. The decision may come out as early as January, or as late as June. Before and after, we need full-throated support for complete freedom from sex discrimination in the workplace and beyond.  It should be beyond doubt that women get to wear pants to work (something Aimee Stephens’ employer forbade). It should be beyond doubt that trans people get to work as who we really are. It should be beyond doubt that LGBQ people get to be out at work.

I think Aimee Stephens was right when she told Vox:

[T]he fact that we’re able to bring it forth and hear the case presented is a victory already. Regardless of whether it’s a favorable decision or not, we still have a lot of work to do. When this part’s over, we just work on the next issue, and work hard and keeping going.

In three cases at the Supreme Court, the Trump administration is arguing it’s legal to fire workers for being LGBTQ.

This week the Supreme Court heard arguments in three cases in which the Trump administration is urging the court to rule that it’s legal to fire workers for being LGBTQ.

For the LGBTQ civil rights movement, this is a big moment. These cases will affect more people than the Supreme Court’s decision about the freedom to marry, and they potentially implicate a broader range of contexts in which LGBTQ people may face harm, if the Court green-lights discrimination. Worse still, a bad ruling would strip away protections against discrimination that LGBTQ people have been able to use to protect themselves for two decades. And all this in a context where nearly one in three transgender people has experienced discrimination in the workplace.

In short, the stakes are very high.

One of the cases is about the rights of transgender people and involves Aimee Stephens, who worked for nearly six years as a funeral director at a funeral home near Detroit. Earlier in her life, Aimee had considered going into the ministry, but then found her calling in funeral services, where she could help comfort people in a time of great need. Her employer knew her as a man, but Aimee knew from five years old that she was female. After decades of hiding who she really was, Aimee could bear it no more, realizing that the only way to live was as her true self. She gathered the strength to come out to her family, friends, and co-workers as a woman. When she introduced herself as Aimee to her boss, he fired her. He made no pretense about any performance reason; he openly admitted that it was because she is transgender, saying, “this isn’t going to work out.”

The other two cases both involve men who were fired because they are gay. In one case, Gerald Bostock was fired from his job as a social worker for at-risk youth after his employer found out he was gay. The third case involves is Don Zarda, who worked as an instructor for a skydiving outfit on Long Island, New York. Don had become hooked on skydiving years earlier, and it evolved from being his passion to being his profession as well. He loved introducing others to the sport. Don often took customers on tandem jumps, where they are strapped to him shoulder-to-shoulder and hip-to-hip before they jump from the plane. One day, Don told a female customer that he was gay in an effort to make her less uncomfortable with how close they were physically. He thought nothing of the remark, but his boss later fired him for sharing “inappropriate information” with a customer.

When Don called his sister Melissa to tell her he’d been fired, her first reaction was surprise and disbelief. “It’s not legal to fire you because you’re gay,” she told him. And she’s right. Lower courts in both Don’s and Aimee’s cases ruled that their firings violate federal civil rights law, because the employers treated them differently because of their sex. After all, the courts reasoned, if Aimee had been assigned a female sex at birth, her employer would not have fired her for being and living as the woman she is. And if Don had been a woman attracted to men, as opposed to a man attracted to men, he would not have been fired for sharing that information with a customer.

Big picture: it’s hard to see how firing someone for being LGBTQ doesn’t involve the person’s sex. You can’t even describe being trans or gay without talking about the individuals’ sex. At its core, the federal ban on sex discrimination is simple: workers are not supposed to be treated differently because of their sex.

There is an enormous amount at stake in these cases. LGBTQ people could lose protections against discrimination that they have relied on in many cases for two decades. Going back to 2000, federal appeals courts have ruled that anti-trans discrimination is a form of sex discrimination that violates federal law, providing a remedy for trans workers fired for who they are. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, tasked with enforcing the federal workplace non-discrimination law, agrees that anti-LGBTQ discrimination is a form of sex discrimination, and has recovered millions of dollars for LGBTQ workers who sued over discrimination.

And a decision in these cases could affect LGBTQ people in contexts well beyond just the workplace. LGBTQ people have relied on federal protections against sex discrimination to redress housing discrimination, to combat discrimination in schools, and to remedy discrimination in health care. All of these protections could be swept away if the court deletes LGBTQ people from the existing scope of the federal civil rights laws.

A ruling in these cases could affect non-LGBTQ people as well. A crucial Supreme Court precedent for Aimee and Don’s cases is that of Ann Hopkins. As an employee at accounting firm Price Waterhouse, Hopkins was passed over for partner and told she could increase her chances if she would "walk more femininely, talk more femininely, dress more femininely, wear make-up, have her hair styled, and wear jewelry." The Supreme Court ruled that requiring her to conform to stereotypes associated with being a woman demonstrated sex discrimination.

Many federal courts have concluded that firing LGBTQ people because we don’t meet employers’ stereotypes of how women and men should act, identify, and appear is just as much sex discrimination as passing over Ann Hopkins because she was considered “macho.”

But if the Supreme Court says in Aimee’s and Don’s cases that this reasoning doesn’t apply to LGBTQ people, that could spell trouble for everyone. We could return to a world where employers can fire anyone — straight or gay, transgender or not — for not being the “right kind” of woman or man. Scary stuff.

The ACLU is proud to represent Aimee and Don, and to fight alongside Gerald, as we urge the Supreme Court not to roll back the rights of LGBTQ people and not to eviscerate sex discrimination protections for everyone else in the process.

A judge's anti-Semitism towards Randy Halprin is a clear violation of due process, religious neutrality and equal justice.

UPDATE: On Friday, October 4, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, where Randy Halprin had sought relief before turning to the U.S. Supreme Court, granted a stay of execution. We commend this decision.

“A goddamn Kike.”

“That fuckin’ Jew.”

According to pleadings filed yesterday with the U.S. Supreme Court, that’s how Judge Vickers Cunningham referred to Randy Halprin, a Jewish defendant whose trial he presided over. The pleadings ask the court to delay Halprin’s execution—currently scheduled for Thursday, October 10 in Texas—and to review a federal appellate court’s decision denying him the right to seek a new trial.

Halprin’s plea to the Supreme Court is based on substantial new evidence demonstrating that Cunningham, who is no longer a judge, is a virulent racist and anti-Semite who brought his views to bear on Halprin’s case. Based on the evidence gathered by Halprin and his attorneys, it appears that Cunningham hates anyone who is not white and Protestant. For example, an affidavit filed by Tammy McKinney, who grew up with Cunningham and, as an adult, attended the same church and clubs as him, stated that Cunningham regularly used slurs “such as ‘nigger,’ ‘wetback,’ ‘spic,’ ‘kike,’ [and] ‘the fuckin’ Jews.’”

Amanda Tackett, who worked for his campaign to become the Dallas district attorney, similarly attested that Cunningham “said he wanted to run for office so that he could save Dallas from ‘niggers,’ ‘wetbacks,’ Jews, and dirty Catholics.” In addition, she recounted a discussion about a Jewish attorney’s investigation into wrongful convictions during which Cunningham complained that the “‘filthy Jew’ . . . was going to come in and free all these ‘niggers.’”

Cunningham has also repeatedly espoused anti-Jewish stereotypes, according to those who know him. In one instance detailed by Tackett, he warned that Jewish people need “to be shut down” because they control “all the money and all the power.” He reportedly wore a stereotypical banker’s outfit (a green visor and suspenders) at a casino-themed party and declared that he was a “Jew banker.”  Even Cunningham’s mother admitted at one point that her son’s “biggest burden was his bigotry.”

Despite his numerous derogatory comments to friends, family, and acquaintances, Cunningham managed to conceal the extent of his prejudice from the public for years—until a May 2018 article in the Dallas Morning News pulled back the curtain on him. No longer a judge, Cunningham was running for county commissioner when his brother revealed to the newspaper that he was a “lifelong racist.” The article also reported that Cunningham “described criminal cases involving black people as ‘T.N.D.s,’ short for ‘Typical [N-word] Deals.’” And, the article exposed the existence of a trust he had set up in 2010 for his children, with a stipulation that provides a monetary distribution upon marriage but only if the child marries a white, Christian person of the opposite sex.

Although Cunningham acknowledged that he had established the discriminatory trust, he told the newspaper that his views “never translated into unfairness on the bench or discrimination in any way.” But as we all know, that’s not how prejudice works. This sort of lifelong, deep-seated bigotry simply can’t be switched off just because an individual puts on a judge’s robe and takes the bench.

The Dallas News piece immediately garnered the attention of Halprin’s attorneys. As the presiding judge at his 2003 trial, Cunningham knew that Halprin was Jewish: His faith came up several times during the proceedings. On investigating further, the attorneys discovered that not only was Cunningham prejudiced against Jewish people generally, but he used anti-Semitic slurs when talking about Halprin. Moreover, according to McKinney, he “took special pride in the death sentences” of Halprin and his co-defendants (known as the “Texas Seven”) because “they included Latinos and a Jew,” boasting, “From the wetback to the Jew, they knew they were going to die.” 

Like all criminal defendants, Randy Halprin was entitled to a fair trial with an unbiased, neutral arbiter. Instead, key rulings that helped determine his fate—including the decision to prohibit him from presenting evidence to the jury mitigating his guilt—were made by a judge who denigrated him as a “goddamn kike” and “a fucking Jew” and who took pride in sentencing “the Jew” to death. That’s not due process under the Fourteenth Amendment. Nor is it religious neutrality under the First Amendment. And it’s certainly not equal justice under the law.

CBP officers are forcibly returning pregnant asylum-seekers to Mexico in violation of their own rules.

The view from the Matamoros, Mexico side of the Rio Grande — just across from Brownsville, Texas — reveals an unsettling scene.

Young women and children bathe openly in the murky green water, while others wash their clothes on the bank of the river that has claimed so many lives – most recently those of Idalia and her 21-month-old son Iker. This is the new painful reality of seeking asylum in the United States.

These families are not at the river by choice. They are being forced to wait in perilous conditions as a result of the Trump administration’s forced return to Mexico policy, which it perversely calls the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP). 

Under the policy, which the ACLU and partners are challenging in a federal lawsuit, people fleeing persecution and legally seeking asylum in the U.S. are forced to wait in Mexico for months on end while their cases proceed in U.S. immigration courts. The Trump administration wants people to think that the policy is benign, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Since going into effect earlier this year, MPP has been actively putting the lives of asylum-seekers in grave danger. For the most vulnerable people, including pregnant women, young children, and babies, this danger is particularly acute.

Women, children, and men bathing on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande, just across from Brownsville, Texas.

Recently, an 18-year-old Ecuadoran woman named Carolina,* who is more than four months pregnant, was sent to Mexico for a second time after attempting to legally claim asylum in the U.S. She was immediately placed into MPP and returned to Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, a city which according to the U.S. State Department is as dangerous as Afghanistan or Syria. A foreigner to Mexico, she had no safe place to go or community to which to turn. Alone, pregnant, and vulnerable, she was kidnapped and threatened with being sold or killed unless her family paid a ransom.

Carolina was eventually released by her kidnappers. Traumatized, she again returned to the international bridge in Laredo, Texas seeking safety that she believed only the U.S. could provide. But the kidnapping and fear of death was not enough for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents. They instead sent her to the same city where she had been kidnapped, failing even to refer her to an asylum officer to have her fear of returning to Mexico evaluated. 

In Mexico, Carolina fearfully stayed close to the gates of the port of entry, terrified that local cartel scouts were waiting to kidnap her again. Thankfully, Carolina’s family had contacted advocates who tried to get her released from MPP. They were unsuccessful, but were able to help Carolina flee to Mexico City for safety. There, she is currently waiting for her next immigration court date — set to occur in an ad hoc “tent court” in Laredo, Texas — hundreds of miles from Mexico City and just across the river from where she almost lost her life.

Hundreds of heartbreaking stories, just like Carolina’s, began to surface immediately after this policy went into effect in January 2019, and more so after the rapid expansion of the policy to Laredo and Brownsville, Texas in July. Nearly 50,000 people have been placed into MPP so far. One woman interviewed by attorneys described a CBP officer telling her she should abort her unborn child because “Trump didn’t want any more pregnant people here.”

A young pregnant mother holds her toddler in a makeshift migrant encampment created to house asylum seekers sent back to Mexico as a result of the “Remain in Mexico” policy.

MPP is part of a consistent pattern of xenophobic and racist efforts by the Trump administration and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials to prevent people from lawfully being granted asylum in the U.S. Instead of welcoming asylum-seekers, as the U.S. has successfully done for decades, the Trump administration has engaged in a campaign of misinformation to provide cover for unlawful policies against people fleeing persecution. 

This inhumane policy is not aimed at any national security interest or protecting us from serious criminals; it’s an attempt to make it nearly impossible for anyone, no matter what terror they’re fleeing from, to enter into the U.S.

MPP’s impact has been made even worse due to how federal agents are executing it. DHS is well aware that there are populations with special needs that should be exempt from MPP. In fact, it has written guidelines that outline the exemption of vulnerable people — specifically pregnant women — from being forced back into Mexico.

And while DHS knows that northern Mexican border cities are incredibly unsafe, particularly for migrants and asylum-seekers who are unable to defend themselves from being victimized, it continues to send the most vulnerable back to danger. In fact, it has been well documented that asylum-seekers subjected to MPP have faced rape, kidnapping, assault, extortion, and death after being forced to return to Mexico

The policy has also forced migrants and asylum-seekers to live in squalid conditions without access to proper housing, food, or sanitation. This has caused outrage in the medical community. Physicians for Human Rights has publicly warned that the health and lives of mothers and babies are at risk due to grossly unhygienic living conditions, insufficient nutrition, lack of medical care, and inadequate access to potable water at makeshift encampments of people forced into MPP.

The safety and health conditions that pregnant women are forced to endure while languishing in Mexico are abhorrent and unacceptable. And it is happening right at our doorstep.

That is why the ACLU of Texas and ACLU Border Rights Center interviewed 18 pregnant women, including Carolina, and filed an official complaint with the DHS Office of Inspector General, demanding a return to safety inside the U.S. for all pregnant women in MPP. 

Each of the women listed in the complaint have their own harrowing story of legally seeking refuge in the United States, and instead being cruelly denied protection and sent to Mexico without any regard for their safety.  

MPP must end. Every day it is in effect, lives are in imminent risk. In the meantime, the special exemptions for pregnant women and other vulnerable groups must be followed by U.S. immigration authorities. Because what happens along the Rio Grande and the entire borderlands reflects on the conscience of our entire nation. 

*Carolina is a pseudonym used to protect the asylum seeker from reprisals.

Abortion could become inaccessible in entire states even without an explicit abortion ban.

Update: On October 4, 2019, the Supreme Court announced it would hear arguments June Medical Services v. Gee, the case challenging Louisiana's TRAP law, this term. 

Abortion rights captured the nation’s attention earlier this year when seven states passed early abortion bans. With the changes in the Supreme Court, and President Trump’s promise to appoint justices that would overturn Roe v. Wade, the concern about whether these new abortion bans would be upheld by the Supreme Court understandably reached a fever pitch.

But banning abortion outright isn’t the only way to eliminate abortion access in a state.  For decades, anti-abortion politicians have been quietly trying to push abortion out of reach by passing abortion restriction on top of restriction.  The new Supreme Court term started this week, and several challenges to such restrictions are pending in the Supreme Court. The Court could thus issue a ruling that would affect the future of abortion access this year without ever taking up a case involving an outright abortion ban.

Many of the abortion restrictions passed in recent years are called Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) laws. They serve no medical purpose, and are passed with the sole intention of making it difficult — if not impossible — for people to access abortion.  A TRAP case from Louisiana, brought by our colleagues at the Center for Reproductive Rights, is one of the cases that SCOTUS could take up this term.

The TRAP law in question in the Louisiana case requires doctors who work at abortion clinics to have admitting privileges at a local hospital. If it stands, it would shutter all the clinics in the state except for one.

A district court struck down the law after finding that it would serve no medical purpose and would decimate abortion access in the case. The state appealed, and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the law. While it agreed that the law had limited-to-no medical utility, the court inaccurately found that the law wouldn’t cause clinics to close.

If you are experiencing déjà vu, you are not alone.  In 2016, the Supreme Court heard Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, and found that a nearly identical law in Texas, which also required abortion providers to have admitting privileges at a local hospital, served no medical purpose and would unnecessarily force clinics to close.  The Court ruled that the law was therefore unconstitutional. The Whole Woman’s Health decision should have controlled the outcome in the Louisiana case too, but the Fifth Circuit failed to follow it.

Louisiana is not alone in trying to use TRAP laws to effectively ban abortion.  In Kentucky, we represent the last abortion clinic in the state, EMW Women’s Surgical Center, in several lawsuits, including a challenge to a TRAP law that requires abortion facilities to have a written transfer agreement with a local hospital. EMW had a transfer agreement with a local hospital for years, but Governor Bevin’s administration rejected it because it was signed by the head of the OB/GYN department rather than the hospital’s CEO. To prevent the state from shutting EMW down and eliminating abortion access in Kentucky, we went to court.  The law was struck down after trial, but the state’s appeal is now pending in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.

In Ohio, a TRAP law is also being used to quietly and gradually close abortion clinics.  The law creates a complicated obstacle course for clinics: it says surgical facilities must have a written transfer agreement with a hospital, but the state department of health can waive that requirement if the clinic has one or more backup doctors with hospital admitting privileges.  The health department previously said that two backup doctors are insufficient for a waiver, and have arbitrarily demanded three instead.  Now – for no medical reason – they are requiring four back-up doctors. In states where doctors are subject to harassment for simply being associated with abortion access, finding that many back-up doctors can be next to impossible.

In Missouri, the state’s last clinic is facing a similar fight.  Earlier this year, the health department threatened to shut down that clinic, which is a Planned Parenthood affiliate, over disputes about its license. Planned Parenthood’s lawyers ran to court, and were able to get a court order prohibiting the state from closing the clinic—for now.

These states have followed up their restrictive TRAP laws with legislation that effectively bans abortion (although none are currently in effect). The agenda of these anti-abortion politicians is clear: TRAP laws have nothing to do with public safety, and everything to do with hostility to abortion. They are part of a strategy to do anything that eliminates abortion access.         

As the Supreme Court starts its new session this week, all eyes should be on the Louisiana case.  If the Court allows the Louisiana law to take effect, it will not only be devastating for people in Louisiana, it could also pave the way for courts to uphold other TRAP laws and abortion restrictions that will push abortion out of reach even more so than it already is.  TRAP laws hide their true intention under complex regulatory requirements that obscure what they are meant to accomplish, which is an end to abortion access. We must remain vigilant against all attempts to ban abortion, including both explicit as well as more subtle attempts.                   

With a whistleblower under attack by the president, now is the time to strengthen whistleblower protections.

The @realDonaldTrump Twitter handle was on overdrive this weekend, assailing the anonymous whistleblower who reported that President Trump used the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country in the 2020 U.S. election. Like clockwork, President Trump tried to attack the whistleblower’s credibility, questioned the meager whistleblower protections currently in place, labeled those who provided information to the whistleblower as spies, and suggested such “spies” should be treated as they were in “the old days” — presumably referring to execution.

President Trump’s attacks are deeply troubling and should provide lawmakers fresh motive to strengthen whistleblower protections, particularly for the intelligence community. But, the attacks aren’t unprecedented. We’ve seen them before, and for decades have fought to protect whistleblowers from them.

Joining us on ACLU’s At Liberty podcast with ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero, NSA surveillance whistleblower Edward Snowden discusses how the president’s latest antics fit a larger, bipartisan government playbook to delegitimize and intimidate whistleblowers and those who expose government wrongdoing to the media. He also details what it means to be a whistleblower and the enormous risks they assume in order to disclose information vital to the broader public.

Below is a partial transcript of Romero’s conversation with Snowden. It has been edited in places for length and clarity. The full podcast episode is here.

SNOWDEN:

The whistleblower that's in the public right now I think will actually come out of this okay. They're going to be attacked. They're going to face retaliation. But I think they'll be protected because they're not indicting the system. They're indicting a man.

But that man who has been indicted by this complaint is already out there saying, “Who is this person? You know they're acting like a spy. You know what we used to do with spies?” — implying, ‘I don't like that this person exposed me. It would be better if these people were killed.’ Right?

It's the proof that matters, not where it came from. It's, what are the facts? Is this a violation? Is it not? Whenever power faces some kind of opposition, they immediately try to change the conversation into: Who are you? How dare you? And get people talking about who brought this forward instead of what was brought forward. And that's why we need processes to account for that right.

ROMERO: 

Right. I think the part that I think is so relevant for today is what you said on the bottom of 238 [of your new memoir, Permanent Record], when you said, “A whistleblower in my definition is a person who through hard experience has concluded that their life inside an institution has become incompatible with the principles developed in and their loyalty owed to the greater society outside it. This person knows that they can't remain inside the institution and knows that the institution can't or won't be dismantled. Reforming institution might be possible, however, so they blow the whistle and disclosing information to bring public pressure to bear.” It's relevant not just for what you did in 2013, but relevant today. 

Talk to me about the decision to go to journalists. 

SNOWDEN:

Yeah. So I mean this is the thing that we are struggling with right now. And we have struggled within this country for 50 years. I mean Daniel Ellsberg back in the 1970s when he was revealing the secret history of the Vietnam War. He was accused of all the things you see whistleblowers accused of today. He was charged under the precisely the same Espionage Act that I have been charged under. He believed he was going to spend the rest of his life in prison and he would have if Nixon hadn't pooched up the investigation.

But what you have to realize in all of these things is what drives a person to abandon the safety of their office? What drives a person to abandon the safety of the system? Whistleblowing is never rewarded. That's just not how it works. And the CIA, the NSA, the intelligence community broadly sees itself as kind of a paramilitary organization. They see following orders as equivalent to morality. You don't question the lawfulness. You don't question the propriety of what you're doing. If you question it, you end up with problems.

But what happens when the system fails? And what happens when your organization can't respond to it? What happens when you are required by the process to report the wrongdoing that you've witnessed to the people who are responsible for that wrongdoing? What if you're supposed to be going to Congress and Congress is the one who's directing the wrongdoing? What if you're supposed to go to the head of an agency and the agency's director is the one whose name is on the order that is violating the law or the Constitution?

And this is where we have seen time and time again that when you go through these proper channels, as you call them, they don't resolve the problem. Rather, they're a kind of trap where whistleblowers go into and then they're flushed from the system. The complaints are buried, the programs are shored up and made even more secret. And the person who reported them has their life destroyed. They lose their career. In some cases, they lose their freedom, their family. These are not hypotheticals – we can cite names if you want them. 

But this is where we go. All right. There's all this risk. How do we ensure that the public's interest is what's actually served? I mean this is where the whistleblower takes an enormous amount of risk stepping outside of that system to tell the public what they need to know.

The ACLU is in court fighting to block cruel anti-asylum policies, but we need your help.

In June 1939, a passenger ship named the St. Louis approached the coast of Florida, planning to dock in Miami. The boat was packed with nearly a thousand refugees fleeing Nazi persecution in Europe. Most were Jewish, and they thought they’d find a safe haven in the United States.

They were wrong. President Franklin Roosevelt denied their pleas for help, and the U.S. Coast Guard prevented the St. Louis from reaching our shores. By the end of World War 2, nearly a third of the people on board had been killed by the Nazis.

As Europe emerged from the inferno of war and the Holocaust, nations across the world resolved that people fleeing violence and persecution, like those on the St. Louis, would no longer be met with indifference by other nations. In 1951, the Refugee Convention was signed, and by 1980 Congress enshrined the principle of asylum for refugees in domestic immigration law. Under both Republican and Democratic administrations, America has been a leader in providing humanitarian protections to people fleeing persecution, torture, and genocide.

For decades, these protections have been the law of the land in the U.S. We have sheltered people from across the globe, enriching our communities and proudly standing as a beacon of hope in the process.

Today, the U.S. government under President Donald Trump is doing everything it can to destroy those protections. And although the ACLU and our partners have managed to block some of their efforts, the administration is currently being allowed to implement key aspects of its ruthless agenda on the ground.

In the past few months, nearly 50,000 vulnerable asylum-seekers have been placed into a cruel program that forcibly returns them to Mexico before their applications are even processed by U.S. immigration authorities. The program was designed for one purpose: to make it so difficult and dangerous to apply for asylum that people will simply give up and return to the persecution they fled. Cartels and criminals in the border cities where asylum-seekers are stuck have learned they are easy prey for extortion, kidnapping, and sexual assault.

And that’s not all. Another new policy bans virtually all asylum-seekers from receiving asylum if they arrived at the border after transiting through a ‘third-country.' This regulation is especially vicious, given the dangerous overland journeys many asylum-seekers make, and the inability of most to arrive directly in the U.S. from their home country without passing through another one first.

The stories emerging from the border right now due to these policies are horrifying. Border Patrol agents giving pregnant women medication to stop their contractions so they can be dumped in Mexico without shelter. Children kidnapped after being placed into the program, with their assailants threatening to kill them and sell their organs. Vulnerable young women raped and assaulted in cities where they don’t know anyone and can’t rely on the authorities for protection. Entire families stuck in squalid tent camps just a stone’s throw from safety in the U.S.

What we know of the dangers these people are facing on our doorstep is just the tip of the iceberg. Because advocates, journalists, and lawyers have limited access to them, most of their suffering is unheard and unseen by people in the U.S. After harrowing journeys fleeing gang violence, political persecution, domestic abuse, and ethnic targeting, they’ve found only indifference at our hands.

The Trump Administration can’t be allowed to unilaterally strip people of humanitarian protections created by Congress.  A majority of the judges who have considered our challenge to the forced return to Mexico program have found it has serious legal flaws, but the government has been permitted to implement it during the initial stage of litigation anyway. It has thus become part of a virtual border wall being built by Trump as he builds his physical one. And no degree of cruelty goes too far for its architects.

They want you to believe that the asylum system was broken before they took office, and that these policies were created to stop people from “gaming the system.” In fact, the opposite is true: the administration's policies are causing chaos and making the system unworkable for people who need – and are legally entitled to – our protection. In 2017, for example, it ended a program that had assisted asylum-seekers in attending 99% of check-ins and court dates while claiming that it needs to radically expand the immigration detention system because asylum-seekers don't show up for hearings. Government asylum officers themselves call Trump’s new asylum policies a “supervillain plan” and immigration judges have described the newly created “tent courts” as something that might exist in “China or Russia.”

The president and his appointees are the ones breaking the asylum system, and they are hoping that you won’t notice or be outraged. They want the people pleading for help at our border to stay out of sight and out of mind, and for you to assume they’re someone else’s problem. We can’t let that happen.

We’re in court tomorrow challenging two of Trump’s most ruthless anti-asylum policies. The stakes could not be higher. If these policies are allowed to stand, tens of thousands of people will remain in danger, with few options other than to return back to the persecution they're trying to escape. Make no mistake, that’s exactly what this administration wants.

There is no way to sugar-coat the reality of what’s happening at the border. Our government is waging a war on asylum-seekers, and it's counting on the American public to stay silent and not pay attention. We’re doing what we can in the courts and in Congress, but we need you to get informed, get angry, and generate public pressure on our elected officials – as well as all the presidential candidates – to demand an immediate reversal of these policies.

We need your help, and so do the vulnerable families in danger at our doorstep within arms reach of the safety they deserve. It’s time for us to look at ourselves in the mirror and decide who we want to be. Are we going to protect those families and welcome them onto our shores, or will we be like those who turned the St. Louis away and condemned hundreds of its passengers to death?

Another attack on Muslims and communities of color seeking safety.

The Trump administration yesterday announced its plan to admit 18,000 refugees this fiscal year, taking another step in its agenda to dismantle the program that has long provided protection for people and families seeking safety from persecution. This sickening announcement is consistent with Trump’s attacks on refugees, Muslims, and immigrants across the board — particularly those who are Brown or Black.

The U.S. has long been a global leader in refugee admissions. By the end of the Obama administration, the United States’ annual refugee admissions ceiling was 110,000 — and many felt it should be higher in light of multiple international crises that were causing many people to flee their homes. Given that many of these crises were in Muslim-majority countries like Syria, and that some Muslim communities, like the Rohingya in Myanmar, were being specifically targeted for persecution, nearly half of refugees admitted to the U.S. at the time were Muslim.

While crises around the world continue, the Trump administration has consistently and significantly reduced refugee admissions, lowering the previous 110,000 admissions ceiling to 45,000 in fiscal year 18; 30,000 in FY 19; and now to 18,000 in FY 20. This is consistent with their targeting of Black and Brown people, including Muslims whose admissions dropped to 17 percent in the first half of FY 18 (as compared to the then 63 percent Christian admissions). In addition, only 62 Syrians were admitted in FY 18 — a 99.05 percent decline from FY 17 to FY 18.

These attacks on those seeking our help through the refugee program have extended to individuals seeking asylum. The asylum program, like the refugee admissions program, is intended to help those seeking refuge from persecution. While those applying for refugee status apply from abroad, those seeking asylum apply in the U.S. In fact, many are making claims at our southern border and others are already living in the United States.

The substance of the claims is the same — people in need, calling for our help, asking that we welcome them so that they may survive. These humanitarian programs are a part of our immigration laws and are the country we strive to be.

But the administration disagrees, and is trying to unilaterally erase these protections.  Just recently, for example, the administration abruptly announced that individuals, other than Mexicans, at our southern border can’t get asylum here unless they apply for protection in a third country and are rejected there. This directive could virtually shut down a large part of the asylum system. It has been challenged in an ACLU lawsuit and found unlawful by multiple courts, but is currently being implemented while the litigation continues. 

With that policy and yesterday’s announcement, Trump continues the legacy he began with the Muslim ban, betraying communities and implementing discriminatory and hateful policies. The original Muslim ban included a ban on refugees. Even once the administration split the Muslim and refugee ban into two orders, the targeted countries for the refugee ban were almost entirely Muslim-majority countries. And now, the administration’s minimal number of  refugee admissions is another part of Trump’s systemic effort to dismantle our humanitarian programs and further eliminate admissions of Muslims, Black, and Brown people.

Trump is doing everything he can, whether through policy or early morning Twitter rants, to send people back to the “places from which they came” or prevent them from coming at all. His rhetoric and his policies are consistent — spreading the message that Congresswoman Omar, a U.S. citizen, is less than American, while simultaneously dismantling the refugee process through which she came to the U.S. 

There is a Muslim ban in place, the administration has slowly but surely put forward policies to dismantle the asylum process, and visa numbers for Brown and Black immigrants have dropped significantly in the employment and family-based system. The agenda is clear.

The implementation of these discriminatory policies and processes are as revolting as Trump’s rhetoric and attacks on people of color and other marginalized communities. These attacks are part of the fabric of this administration and cannot be viewed in isolation. They are part of his anti-immigrant agenda to turn our backs on those in need. That may be Trump’s version of America, but it’s not ours. And we won’t stop fighting until our country reflects the humanity, diversity, and justice for which we strive. This is our America.

We're demanding the administration end its politicized investigation into Duke-UNC's Middle East Studies program, and turn over all related records.

In a move that would make even Senator McCarthy blush, the Trump administration is threatening to pull federal funding from a Middle East Studies program for failing to toe the government’s line on Islam and Muslims.

Last week, Betsy DeVos’s Department of Education sent a letter to administrators of the Duke-UNC Consortium for Middle East Studies — a jointly run program that receives federal funding under Title VI of the Higher Education Act — warning that the department would cut the Consortium’s federal aid unless the Consortium submits plans to remake its Middle East studies program and curriculum to the department’s satisfaction. Among other complaints, the department demanded that the Consortium temper its portrayal of “the positive aspects” of Islam and cease “advancing ideological priorities.”

The department’s attempt to inject the Trump administration’s long pattern of anti-Muslim bigotry and discrimination into higher education represents a significant threat to academic freedom at colleges and universities like UNC and Duke. In response, the ACLU sent a letter today urging Secretary DeVos to end the department’s investigation into the Consortium and to prevent future attempts to politicize federal funding for higher education. We also filed a Freedom of Information Act request for records related to the department’s decision to investigate the Consortium as well as any similar investigations the department may have undertaken at other educational institutions that receive Title VI funding.

The origins of the Education Department’s investigation are as troubling as the letter itself. In June, Secretary DeVos ordered an inquiry into whether the Duke-UNC Consortium misused its Title VI funds to sponsor a conference on the Gaza conflict, after a member of Congress accused the conference of “radical anti-Israel bias.” As it turned out, less than $200 of federal funds were spent on the event. When this allegation didn’t stick, it appears that the department — not content to let the matter rest — scoured the Consortium’s programming to ferret out other objectionable viewpoints and purported deficiencies.

The department identifies a number of ways in which the Consortium supposedly violates the Title VI funding requirements, not only complaining about the curriculum’s inclusion of “positive aspects of Islam” but also accusing the Consortium of inappropriately “advancing ideological priorities.” As we explain in our letter to Secretary DeVos, however, it is the Department of Education — not the Consortium — that inappropriately attempts to advance ideological priorities

Although the government may attach certain conditions to the use of federal funding — such as compliance with statutory and constitutional requirements — the proud boast of our universities is that they are free from the ideological micromanagement of the government censor. Title VI does not, and cannot, authorize the government to require federal funding recipients to de-emphasize the “positive aspects of Islam” to the Department’s satisfaction. The Department’s assumption of such authority threatens core constitutional principles protecting freedom of speech and freedom of religion. 

This ham-fisted attempt to wield funding authority over the Consortium’s academic programming illustrates yet again the Trump Administration’s deep-seated anti-Muslim bias. It should also be alarming to anyone who cares about academic freedom, a bedrock principle of higher education.

Higher education institutions throughout the country are now on false notice that federal funding requires conformity to the Trump administration’s ideological standards. The Department’s ultimatum issued to the Consortium will no doubt have a chilling effect on these institutions as they determine the curricular content of federally funded programming. That’s why we’re asking Secretary DeVos to terminate the Department’s investigation into the Duke-UNC Consortium and to take affirmative measures to prevent similar politicized investigations in the future.

Colleges and universities are under no obligation to further the administration’s anti-Muslim agenda. The government has a constitutional obligation to respect that.

H.B. 2 is cruel, offensive, and the Supreme Court should strike it down.

I’m a doctor at the only abortion clinic in Kentucky. Providing safe, compassionate medical care has been my life’s calling, and my patients’ well-being is always my first priority. But Kentucky politicians — determined as usual to interfere with access to reproductive healthcare — are trying to force me to harm and humiliate the patients who entrust me with their welfare. That’s why I’m joining with the ACLU today to ask the Supreme Court to keep Kentucky lawmakers’ insulting, anti-abortion political agenda out of the exam room. 

H.B. 2, the law we’re asking the Supreme Court to review, is cruel and offensive. It mandates that I display an ultrasound to every abortion patient, describe it in detail, and play the sound of the fetal heartbeat — even if the patient does not want it, even if in my medical judgment I believe that forcing it on them will cause them harm. The law forces me to do this to a patient who is half-naked on the exam table, usually with their feet in stirrups and an ultrasound probe inside their vagina. With my patient in this exposed and vulnerable position, the law forces me to keep displaying and describing the image, even when the patient shuts her eyes and covers her ears. 

Take a moment to imagine what this must be like. To tell your doctor, “thank you, but I don’t want to hear you describe the ultrasound,” and to have your doctor tell you that you have no say in the matter — that you must lie there, undressed, with an ultrasound probe inside of you, and have the images described to you in government-mandated detail over your objection. Even if the patient has already had one or more ultrasounds performed. Even if the fetus has been diagnosed with a condition incompatible with survival. Or even if the patient is pregnant as a result of sexual assault, and having to watch and listen to the ultrasound over their objection forces them to relive that trauma. 

We have had patients burst into tears when we tell them that they must undergo an unwanted narrated ultrasound and that they must close their eyes and cover their ears if they want to avoid the speech Kentucky politicians insist we force upon them. I’ve had patients sob through the experience, and others pull their shirts up over their faces to cover their eyes. 

As physicians who have dedicated our professional lives to providing compassionate medical care, being ordered by politicians to force this unwanted and harmful experience on patients who have sought our help is appalling. It goes against the very fundamentals of our role as healers and violates the trust at the heart of the physician-patient relationship. 

My patients’ health and well-being come first, and if there is anything I can do to protect them from politicians trying to barge into the exam room, I will do it. Today, that includes asking the Supreme Court to put an end to this insulting political intrusion.

Enough is enough. 

pWith his white handlebar mustache, Levon “Bo” Jones was a striking and unmistakable presence. Mr. Jones, a Black man from Duplin County, North Carolina, was wrongfully convicted in 1993 and sentenced to death. a href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/innocent-north-carolina-man-exonerated-after-14-years-death-row After 14 years on death row/a, Mr. Jones, who had always maintained his innocence, was exonerated and released in 2008. We were among the lawyers working with Mr. Jones to win his freedom./p pIn 2009, Mr. Jones was among three death row exonerees — found guilty and sentenced by all-white or nearly all-white juries — who lobbied in support of novel and transformative legislation that would allow people on death row to challenge their convictions if they could show race played a significant factor in their prosecution. Out of that effort, the state legislature passed the North Carolina Racial Justice Act (RJA)./p pThe RJA was a historic and overdue piece of legislation that sought to rectify long standing racial injustices in death penalty cases. After its momentous passage in 2009, more than 100 people on death row filed RJA claims, challenging their convictions. We represented several of these people, bringing some of the first successful cases under the RJA and reducing four people’s sentences from death to life./p pUnfortunately, a new conservative majority in the North Carolina Legislature repealed the law four years after it was passed./p pBut the fight for justice never stopped. After a lengthy legal battle, the North Carolina Supreme Court ruled, in 2020, that all lawsuits brought under the RJA before its repeal could still move forward./p pThat brings us to this month, where, in a landmark hearing, we’ll be back in court arguing on behalf of Hasson Bacote, a Black man who was sentenced to death after the prosecution prevented multiple qualified Black jurors from serving on his jury. He argues that race played an impermissible role in jury selection, not just in his case, but in all death penalty cases in North Carolina./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardPervasive Racial Discrimination in Jury Selection/h2 /div pWe will come to court with statistical, case specific, and historical evidence that racial discrimination tainted jury selection in Mr. Bacote’s case, in Johnston County (where Mr. Bacote was prosecuted), and the entire state./p pIn Mr. Bacote’s case, the prosecution a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/north-carolina-v-hasson-bacote?document=North-Carolina-v-Bacote-Amended-RJA-Motion-with-Exhibits#press-releasesstruck/a three times more Black prospective jurors than white prospective jurors. In Johnston County, prosecutors struck prospective jurors of color at nearly twice the rate of white prospective jurors in all capital cases. A similar pattern emerges across the state: in North Carolina capital cases, prosecutors struck Black prospective jurors at nearly twice the rate of white jurors./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/north-carolina-v-hasson-bacote target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=3000 height=2058 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295.jpg 3000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-768x527.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-1536x1054.jpg 1536w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-2048x1405.jpg 2048w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-400x274.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-600x412.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-800x549.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-1000x686.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-1200x823.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-1400x960.jpg 1400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/39338ce9384b4dff4baa9810b8eb2295-1600x1098.jpg 1600w sizes=(max-width: 3000px) 100vw, 3000px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/north-carolina-v-hasson-bacote target=_blank North Carolina v. Hasson Bacote /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/north-carolina-v-hasson-bacote target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletHasson Bacote, a Black man from Johnston County, is challenging his death sentence under the North Carolina Racial Justice Act./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/north-carolina-v-hasson-bacote target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pHow have prosecutors gotten away with this?/p pIn all criminal cases that go to trial, prosecutors and defense attorneys have what are known as “peremptory strikes” — that is, an attorney can remove a certain number of potential jurors for any reason. Often, prosecutors exclude Black jurors on the basis of their race./p pEven though the landmark 1986 Supreme Court case, iBatson v. Kentucky,/i prohibited peremptory strikes on the basis of race or gender, unconstitutional juror discrimination persists./p pOften, prosecutors offer pretextual — or disingenuous — reasons for excluding Black jurors and other jurors of color. In our previous RJA casei, /ia href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/north-carolina-v-robinson?document=north-carolina-v-robinson-orderiNorth Carolina v. Robinson/i/a, a judge found North Carolina prosecutors excluded Black jurors for pretextual, even irrational, reasons, interrogated Black jurors with invasive questions not posed to white jurors, and struck Black jurors even though they allowed white jurors with similar characteristics to remain in the jury pool./p pWe even have a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/capital-punishment/will-north-carolinas-supreme-courtevidence/a of overt racism in jury selection which we’ve presented in past RJA cases. One prosecutor wrote in his notes that a Black juror with a criminal record was a “thug” while a white juror with a criminal record was “a fine guy;” a Black juror was described as a “blk wino” while a white juror with a DUI conviction was a “country boy – ok.” In another case, a prosecutor noted on a juror questionnaire that a Black woman was “too dumb.”/p figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=2294 height=1112 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM.png class=attachment-original size-original alt=Handwritten jury selection notes in which a black candidate was described as a “blk wino.” decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM.png 2294w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-768x372.png 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-1536x745.png 1536w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-2048x993.png 2048w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-400x194.png 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-600x291.png 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-800x388.png 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-1000x485.png 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-1200x582.png 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-1400x679.png 1400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-21-at-3.32.06-PM-1600x776.png 1600w sizes=(max-width: 2294px) 100vw, 2294px / /figure pThe effect of outright or pretextual racial discrimination is ultimately the same: Black prospective jurors are excluded from jury service at greater rates than white prospective jurors, and a person facing capital punishment is judged by a jury inot/i of their peers./p pThe results of these unrepresentative juries are stark: Since 1990, a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/north-carolina-v-hasson-bacote?document=North-Carolina-v-Bacote-Amended-RJA-Motion-with-Exhibits#press-releasesevery Black person/a facing a capital prosecution in Johnston County has been sentenced to death./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardA Question of Democracy /h2 /div pParticipation in the jury box is one of the fundamental ways Americans engage with their democracy. Even though the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth amendments conferred citizenship rights and equal protection to Black Americans, the right to serve in a jury remains compromised by racial discrimination. Jury service — like the right to vote — is a question of democracy. Who do we consider part of our community, whose voices matter, who has power./p pLevon “Bo” Jones’ voice mattered. Even though he was disenfranchised for the years he was wrongfully convicted, he became a powerful voice for freedom and equal justice. Because of his efforts and the efforts of other Black exonerees — survivors of the racist death penalty and criminal legal system — our client Hasson Bacote will have his day in court on February 26, and the opportunity to win relief for his case, and a ruling that could mean relief for almost all of North Carolina#8217;s death row./p pRace has always been at the center of the death penalty. The RJA challenges give North Carolina the rare legal opportunity to confront that shameful fact. In court this month, we will take another step with our client Mr. Bacote to shed light on and rectify the harms that racism has caused in our legal system./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardThe Racial Justice Act: A Timeline/h2 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark1977/h2 /div pNorth Carolina passes the current law authorizing the death penalty. Johnston County a href=https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/article233018762.htmlremoves the KKK billboards /athat line the highway into Smithfield, the County Seat./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark1987/h2 /div pIn iMcCleskey v. Kemp/i, the Supreme Court majority holds that, despite statistical evidence of racial discrimination in Georgia’s administration of the death penalty, there is no Equal Protection violation because the petitioner, Warren McCleskey, couldn’t show overt racial discrimination occurred in his case./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark1988/h2 /div pA federal Racial Justice Act bill is drafted in response to iMcCleskey/i. The federal RJA ultimately passed the House of Representatives in 1992 and in 1994, but failed in the Senate./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark1998/h2 /div pKentucky becomes the first state to enact a Racial Justice Act statute./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2007-2008/h2 /div pThree Black men, Jonathan Hoffman, Levon Jones, and Glen Chapman, are exonerated from death row in North Carolina. All three innocent men, wrongfully convicted by all-white or nearly all-white juries, become inspired to help other people wrongfully convicted on the basis of race./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2009/h2 /div pMr. Jones, Mr. Hoffman, and Mr. Chapman join with Darryl Hunt, another wrongfully convicted person charged with capital murder and later exonerated, to lobby the North Carolina Legislature. North Carolina enacted the Racial Justice Act in August, allowing people on death row to challenge their sentences if they could show race played a significant factor. The North Carolina law is the first law in the country to specify that statistical evidence of discrimination in jury selection and/or jury sentencing is sufficient proof to set aside a death sentence./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2009/h2 /div pOur client, Hasson Bacote, is convicted of felony murder in Johnston County. Like every Black man tried in Johnston County, Mr. Bacote receives the death penalty./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2010/h2 /div pIn August, more than 100 people on North Carolina’s death row filed RJA motions. At least 30 of those people were sentenced to death by all-white juries./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2010/h2 /div pIn November, control of the North Carolina General Assembly flipped from Democratic control to Republican control. A single Republican donor, Art Pope, was connected toa href=https://www.npr.org/2011/10/06/141078608/the-multimillionaire-helping-republicans-win-n-c 75 percent/a of all outside group spending on the race, spending millions on small local campaigns. Some of these groups ran ads deliberately attacking candidates for voting for the Racial Justice Act. Ironically, these ads profiled a href=https://nccadp.org/stories/henry-mccollum-leon-brown/Henry McCollum/a, a Black man then on North Carolina’s death row who would ultimately be exonerated./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2012/h2 /div pNorth Carolina Gov. Beverly Perdue issued pardons of innocence to the defendants in the a href=https://www.cnn.com/2012/12/31/justice/north-carolina-wilmington-10/index.htmlWilmington 10 case/a on December 31, citing “the dominant role that racism played in jury selection.” The prosecution’s jury selection notes included overt race-based bias, such as a capital B written next to the name of every Black juror, and “KKK good!!” written next to the names of at least six prospective jurors./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2012/h2 /div pThe first RJA case in the country is heard by a superior court judge in Cumberland County in a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/north-carolina-v-robinsoniNorth Carolina v. Robinson/i/a. The death row petitioner, Marcus Robinson, proved widespread discrimination in jury selection across North Carolina, in Cumberland County, and in his own case. a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/north-carolina-v-tilmon-golphin-christina-walters-and-quintel-augustineThree other cases/a were heard in Cumberland County later that year based on similar evidence, and those challengers, Tilmon Golphin, Christina Walters, and Quintel Augustine, also prevailed. The state sought review of these decisions by the North Carolina Supreme Court./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2013/h2 /div pThe North Carolina Legislature repealed the Racial Justice Act on June 19 and overrode the governor’s veto./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2015/h2 /div pThe North Carolina Supreme Court held that prosecutors should have been given more time to prepare for the Cumberland County RJA hearings, vacated the decisions, and remanded for new cases. This meant that the iRobinson/i and other Cumberland County case orders had no precedential value./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2017/h2 /div pA North Carolina Superior Court dismissed the claims of Mr. Robinson and the other three people in Cumberland County, holding that the legislature’s repeal was retroactive and required dismissal of their cases. The four defendants sought review./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2019/h2 /div pCharles Finch, a Black man, is exonerated from North Carolina’s death row. Mr. Finch is the 12th person exonerated in North Carolina since the death penalty was reinstated in 1973. a href=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/database/innocence?state=North+CarolinaEleven of the 12/a men exonerated are men of color and 10 are Black men./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 hr class=mark / h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-mark2020/h2 /div pIn iState v. Ramseur/i, and iState v. Burke/i, the North Carolina Supreme Court held that application of the repeal to bar review of properly-filed RJA claims violated the Ex Post Facto clause of the North Carolina Constitution. This ruling effectively reinstated the more than 100 filed claims by people on death row, including Hasson Bacote./p pIn iState v. Robinson/i, the Hon. Justice Cheri L. Beasley, the first African-American woman to serve as Chief Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court, wrote for the majority in an opinion that cataloged the history of Black citizens’ exclusion from jury service in the United States and North Carolina, and the failure of state appellate courts to confront the problem. The state Supreme Court reinstated the life sentences of Marcus Robinson, Tilmon Golphin, Christina Walters, and Quintel Augustine./p

pOn January 5, Governor DeWine introduced draft rules that, if implemented, would have resulted in thousands of transgender people in Ohio going without the health care they need, and forcing many to move out of their home state — including my friend, Emma. Due to an outpouring of dissent from the trans community, those proposed rules will not go into effect./p pFor years, politicians across the nation have been pushing legislation that would block critical gender-affirming medical care for transgender people, taking life-saving health care decisions out of the hands of trans people, their doctors, and their families, and putting it in the hands of politicians. Much of this legislation has focused on spreading inaccuracies and stoking fear specifically about care for trans youth. But the Ohio government tried to take it even further. DeWine’s proposed rules were the most extreme regulations on medical treatment for transgender adults anywhere in the United States, and would have prevented children and adults alike from receiving medically-necessary care. These changes were not based in any medical science, and were proposed against the recommendations of every major medical organization in the nation, despite the outcries from the trans community./p pEmma and I are both born and raised Ohioans. We have frequently shared our fear and disappointment in the actions of Ohio’s political leaders and how out of touch they are with the wants and needs of Ohio communities. We were both part of the thousands of people who submitted comments in opposition to the opposed rules, and we both know that this is a victory worth celebrating — but also that these planned attacks against the trans community in Ohio are not in the past. I sat down with Emma to talk through what these proposed bans would have meant for her and her trans community, and how we can continue working to defend trans rights in Ohio and across the nation./p div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--half alignment--right figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1080 height=1316 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screenshot_20240202_153023_Instagram-1.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A photo of Emma M. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screenshot_20240202_153023_Instagram-1.jpg 1080w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screenshot_20240202_153023_Instagram-1-768x936.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screenshot_20240202_153023_Instagram-1-400x487.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screenshot_20240202_153023_Instagram-1-600x731.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screenshot_20240202_153023_Instagram-1-800x975.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screenshot_20240202_153023_Instagram-1-1000x1219.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1080px) 100vw, 1080px / figcaption class=wp-image__caption is-caption mt-3pEmma M./p /figcaption /figure /div pbHanna:/b iHow would the proposed changes to transgender health care access in Ohio have impacted you? How would they have impacted your friends and other trans people in the state?/i/p pbEmma/bbi:/i/b I#8217;ve lived my whole life in Ohio. It#8217;s my home, somewhere I can be myself and be supported by my friends and family. Since the proposed changes were announced, I#8217;ve seen the future I envisioned for myself here change drastically. If trans health care access was restricted for adults, many of us would be forced to move. Friends had told me all the places they#8217;re considering moving to, and others were planning on leaving the country entirely. I know plenty of others, myself included, who want to stay and fight it. It#8217;s hard though. To make it through the day, you have to have some sort of plan about what to do when things get bad. If I am ever forced to [leave], I know I#8217;ll be able to move somewhere and be okay, but not everyone can move; it#8217;s expensive, and it#8217;s daunting to have to find a job somewhere else away from our friends and families./p pbHanna:/b iHow do the limits on health care for trans youth tie into the proposed restrictions for the care you receive? /i/p pbEmma:/b If you#8217;re a trans kid in Ohio, you#8217;re being told that you can#8217;t be who you want to be until you#8217;re an adult. You reach adulthood, and then the state still is trying to put laws in place to limit your access to health care. It#8217;s just cruel because it makes it that much harder to be hopeful as a trans kid. Suicide rates among trans youth are already frighteningly high, and we know how to lower them. This is why we spread mantras like Protect Trans Kids, they#8217;re in an increasingly difficult situation and need support. The proposed changes made me more concerned for trans youth in particular, because I think it would be really difficult to remain hopeful in the face of these extra barriers. You#8217;d have to make it to adulthood, save money not just for the myriad of expenses that are typical for transition, but also to move out of state. To all trans kids, I want you to know that things will get better. It#8217;s up to the rest of us to fight back and make sure we#8217;re providing a future to look forward to for the trans youth of Ohio./p pbHanna:/b iWhat can people do to help, whether they’re in Ohio or wanting to support from afar when these kind of attacks on trans care are introduced by politicians? /i/p pbEmma:/b People can do a couple things to show support. First, check in on your trans friends and family. It#8217;s pretty hard on our mental health when laws like this are proposed or passed, even if they’re eventually defeated, and it#8217;s helpful to know that our loved ones are here for us. It is incredibly stressful thinking about how these changes would impact our access to health care. Outside of that, we need help pushing back on the laws themselves. Show up to protests, submit your feedback online, or call your representatives to let them know how you feel about anti-trans legislation. Right now, trans people are looking to our friends to speak up and speak out. We can#8217;t fight this battle alone. If you can, there are many great organizations worth donating to as well, like the ACLU, the ACLU of Ohio, or the TransOhio Emergency Fund, to both push back on harmful legislation and provide trans people with much needed assistance./p div class=wp-audio mb-8 div class=wp-audio__content span class=wp-audio__episode-title is-hidden-tablet is-hidden-desktop is-size-5 is-size-6-mobile The Way Forward for Trans Justice /span div class=wp-audio__metadata columns div class=column span class=wp-audio__episode-title is-hidden-mobile is-size-5 is-size-6-mobileThe Way Forward for Trans Justice/span p class=wp-audio__episode-description line-clamp-3 is-size-6 is-hidden-mobile Last year, states passed a record number of bills restricting health care, athletics, public accommodations, expression, and educational materials for trans people — trans kids, more specifically. With the turn of a new year, the situation continu... /p p class=wp-audio__episode-description line-clamp-5 is-size-7 is-hidden-tablet is-hidden-desktop Last year, states passed a record number of bills restricting health care, athletics, public accommodations, expression, and educational materials for trans people — trans kids, more specifically. With the turn of a new year, the situation continu... /p /div div class=wp-audio__thumbnail-wrapper column img class=wp-audio__thumbnail src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/themes/aclu-wp/img/at-liberty_500x500.jpg alt=Cover artwork for / /div /div /div div class=wp-audio__links is-flex is-align-items-center pl-none pl-4-tablet div class=wp-audio__links-episode is-size-7 has-text-grey has-text-weight-bold p-4 a href=https://www.aclu.org/podcast/the-way-forward-for-trans-justice class=visit-link p-none mb-none no-underline column span class=visit-link__textVisit this episode/spanspan class=icon caret is-dark right / /a /div /div /div pbHanna:/b iWhat would it mean for you and your community if DeWine’s proposed changes to trans health care had taken effect? /i/p pbEmma:/b It would have been devastating, because we#8217;ve fought for this to be our home. It would have been a very clear announcement that we aren#8217;t welcome here, and that legislators will keep trying to push us out. Not everyone can afford to move to the safety of another state. It#8217;s already a struggle for some trans adults to access medical care, largely because of long wait times. I think these proposed changes would have worsened that issue and placed an unfair burden on trans people that would have negatively affected our physical and mental health. I didn’t believe these changes were an accurate representation of what the people of Ohio wanted, and I#8217;m grateful that with enough awareness, people provided the support we needed to shut down these proposals. It was an immeasurable relief that the proposals were changed, thanks to a massive influx of comments from the community. I think there#8217;s more to be done, it#8217;s easy to fall into a false sense of security now that some provisions have been walked back, but the reality is trans youth is still actively affected and trans adults remain a political target. We need to keep this energy, this outpouring of support, to prevent future attempts by the state against trans rights./p pbHanna:/b iHow has access to gender-affirming care affected your quality of life?/i/p pbEmma:/b Unequivocally, I can say gender-affirming care saved my life. It#8217;s difficult for me to explain what it was like before I came out and had access to gender-affirming care. I had been dangerously depressed for a long time and didn#8217;t have hope that things were going to get better. It felt like I was living someone else#8217;s life, where none of the pieces fit. I think from the outside it seemed like I should have been happy. I had a loving family, a great group of friends, and did well in school. The reality was that I was disconnected from it, and tried desperately to hide how hopeless I felt. I was unaware that there were other people like me, and there were resources to help transition. Luckily, I came out and had support from friends and family. I#8217;m truly happy with my life now, and hopeful for my future. Gender-affirming care isn#8217;t just hormones or surgeries, it#8217;s a whole range of things that might not be the same for everyone. For me, the first thing was seeing a therapist who helped me work through my anxieties related to transitioning, then other medical professionals to start hormone replacement therapy. They made sure I was well informed through every step in the process. It lifted that weight off my shoulders, helped me feel at home in my body. Being happy in your body is fundamental, and because of that, I#8217;m able to find joy in things I didn#8217;t before. The reality was that before, hobbies were just a way to distract myself, and now they#8217;re things I choose to pursue for happiness. I#8217;ve picked up softball, reading, music, and even sewing. I attribute the change in my mental health completely to gender-affirming care, it#8217;s helped me to see myself and life in a new light. Gender-affirming care gave me the hope I needed to continue, and I#8217;m thankful everyday for it./p div class=rss-ctadiv class=rss-cta__subtitleWhat you can do:/divdiv class=rss-cta__titleProtect Trans Care Now/diva href=https://action.aclu.org/send-message/protect-trans-care-now class=rss-cta__buttonSend your message/a/div

pFirst, Donald Trump and right-wing extremists attacked government trainings on racism and sexism. Then the far right tried to censor classroom instruction on racism and sexism. Next, they banned books about BIPOC and LGBTQ lives. Today, the extreme right’s latest attack is aimed at dismantling diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs./p pIn 2023, the far right introduced at least a href=https://www.chronicle.com/article/here-are-the-states-where-lawmakers-are-seeking-to-ban-colleges-dei-efforts?emailConfirmed=trueamp;supportSignUp=trueamp;supportForgotPassword=trueamp;email=lwatson%40aclu.orgamp;success=trueamp;code=successamp;bc_nonce=7dgurpqns0w1d7cyy44vqy65 bills/a to limit DEI in higher education in 25 states and the U.S. Congress. Eight bills became law. If this assault on our constitutional rights feels familiar, that’s because it is. It was last seen in 2020 when Trump-aligned politicians fought to pass unconstitutional laws aimed at censoring student and faculty speech about race, racism, sex and sexism. The ACLU challenged these laws in three states, but today, anti-DEI efforts are the new frontier in the fight to end the erasure of marginalized communities./p pDEI programs recruit and retain BIPOC, LGBTQ+, and other underrepresented faculty and students to repair decades of discriminatory policies and practices that excluded them from higher education. The far right, however, claims that DEI programs universally promote undeserving people who only advance because they a href=https://twitter.com/JDVance1/status/1742925449465135262check a box/a. Anti-DEI activists like Christopher Rufo consistently frame their attack as a strike against “identity politics,” and have a href=https://twitter.com/realchrisrufo/status/1371540368714428416?lang=enweaponized/a the term “DEI#8221; to reference any ideas and policies they disagree with, especially those that address systemic racism or sexism./p pThis attack on DEI is part of a larger a href=https://journals.law.harvard.edu/crcl/wp-content/uploads/sites/80/2023/09/HLC208_Watson.pdfbacklash/a against racial justice efforts that ignited after the 2020 killings of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor. At the time, workplaces, schools, and other institutions announced plans to expand DEI efforts and to incorporate anti-racism principles in their communities. In response, far-right activists, led by Rufo and supported by right-wing think tanks such as The Manhattan Institute, The Claremont Institute, and The Heritage Foundation, went on the offensive./p pLeveraging Fox News and other mainstream media outlets, Rufo and his supporters sought to manufacture hysteria around the inclusion of critical race theory in schools and workplaces. After a 2020 appearance on Fox News where Rufo misrepresented the nature of federal trainings on oppression, white privilege, and intersectionality as indoctrination of critical race theory in our public spaces, Rufo convinced former President Trump to end federal DEI training. Rufo’s goal was to limit discourse, instruction, and research that refuted the false assertion that racism is not real in America – and he succeeded. Just three weeks later, a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/civil-liberties/the-trump-administration-is-banning-talk-about-race-and-genderTrump issued Executive Order 13950/a, which banned federal trainings on systemic racism and sexism. This Executive Order served as the template for most of the educational gag orders, or bills introduced to limit instruction on systemic sexism and racism in 40 states, 20 of which are now law./p pThe ACLU has consistently opposed efforts to censor classroom instruction on racism and sexism, including in Florida where some of the most egregious attacks on DEI, critical race theory and inclusive education have been mounted. Following the far right’s “anti-wokeism” playbook, in April 2022, Florida Governor Ron Desantis signed the Stop W.O.K.E. Act, which seeks to ban training or instruction on systemic racism and sexism in workplaces, K-12 schools, and higher education. The ACLU, the ACLU of Florida and our co-counsel challenged the law, claiming it violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments by imposing viewpoint-based restrictions on instructors and students in higher education, and fails to state explicitly and definitely what conduct is punishable. A federal judge has blocked it from being enforced in public universities across the state./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/lessons-learned-from-our-classroom-censorship-win-against-floridas-stop-w-o-k-e-act target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/a826b64d446092dcdc923dd2a83f8cad.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/a826b64d446092dcdc923dd2a83f8cad.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/a826b64d446092dcdc923dd2a83f8cad-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/a826b64d446092dcdc923dd2a83f8cad-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/a826b64d446092dcdc923dd2a83f8cad-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/a826b64d446092dcdc923dd2a83f8cad-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/a826b64d446092dcdc923dd2a83f8cad-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/lessons-learned-from-our-classroom-censorship-win-against-floridas-stop-w-o-k-e-act target=_blank Lessons Learned from Our Classroom Censorship Win Against Florida’s Stop W.O.K.E. Act /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/lessons-learned-from-our-classroom-censorship-win-against-floridas-stop-w-o-k-e-act target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletHere’s what the judge’s order could mean for challenges to censorship efforts nationwide./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/lessons-learned-from-our-classroom-censorship-win-against-floridas-stop-w-o-k-e-act target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pInstead of ceasing to censor free speech, the far right pivoted to target DEI programs. For example, Florida passed Senate Bill 266 in April 2023. This law would expand the Stop W.O.K.E. Act’s prohibition on training and instruction on racism and sexism, seeking to eliminate DEI programs and heavily restrict certain college majors related to DEI. Just last month, the Florida State Board of Education moved forward with regulations to limit the use of public funds for DEI efforts in Florida’s 28 state colleges. The State Board also replaced the Principles of Sociology course, which was previously required, with an American History course to avoid “radical woke ideologies.”/p pLed by the same far-right leaders, including Rufo and various think-tanks, these anti-DEI efforts utilize the same methods as the attack on critical race theory. They represent yet another attempt to re-whitewash America’s history of racial subjugation, and to reverse efforts to pursue racial justice—or any progress at all. Anti-DEI rhetoric has been used to a href=https://twitter.com/JDVance1/status/1742925449465135262invalidate/a immunological research supporting the COVID-19 vaccine, conclusions by economists on mass migration, and even the January 6 insurrection. But these false claims are not what DEI is about. By definition equity means levelling the playing field so qualified people from underrepresented backgrounds have a fair chance to succeed. We cannot let a loud fringe movement convince us otherwise./p pIn its attacks on DEI, the far right undermines not only racial justice efforts, but also violates our right to free speech and free association. Today, the ACLU is determined to push back on anti-DEI efforts just as we fought efforts to censor instruction on systemic racism and sexism from schools./p div class=rss-cta__titleWe need you with us to keep fighting/diva href=https://action.aclu.org/give/now class=rss-cta__buttonDonate today/a/div

pLast year, the Supreme Court overturned its prior holdings on affirmative action, effectively ending race-conscious admissions practices in most colleges and universities and, consequently, restricting the ability of schools to address systemic racial inequalities that persist in higher education. But the court’s decision was left with one exception: military service academies. Now, the same group that brought to the Supreme Court the case that overturned affirmative action, Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA), is suing the U.S. Naval Academy and West Point, alleging in two separate lawsuits that the military academies’ use of race in their admissions processes is unconstitutional./p pAffirmative action at service academies is essential for confronting our military’s discriminatory history, which continues to impact service members of color. The ACLU, the ACLU of Maryland, and NYCLU, along with our partners NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the National Association of Black Military Women, filed two amicus briefs in a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/amici-curiae-of-the-aclu-and-nyclu-students-for-fair-admissions-v-the-u-s-military-academy-at-west-point-et-alNew York /aand a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/amici-curiae-of-the-aclu-and-aclu-md-for-students-for-fair-admissions-v-the-u-s-naval-academy-et-alMaryland/a in support of affirmative action, highlighting the experiences of people of color, specifically the unique experience of Black women in the military./p pWe recently spoke with three veterans who are members of the National Association of Black Military Women. They shared insight into their personal experiences and challenges within the military — from facing unachievable uniform requirements to highlighting the importance of representation. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardNavy Veteran Sheena Todd - 2010 - 2015/h2 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--half alignment--left figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=467 height=640 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/IMG_4133.jpeg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A photo of Sheena Todd. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/IMG_4133.jpeg 467w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/IMG_4133-400x548.jpeg 400w sizes=(max-width: 467px) 100vw, 467px / /figure /div pbACLU: /bCould you tell us about your time in the military and why you decided to join?/p pbVeteran Todd:/b I was working a few jobs, going to school, and times were tough. This was a way to get out of Detroit and also do something really amazing and scary. It was very important for me to take some time to find myself, grow up a little bit, explore the world, and see what the American dream was about. I#8217;ve always been in jobs that were geared towards service. For me, it was just important to learn to take care of myself and then taking care of others just came naturally./p pbACLU:/b How important is it to have military leadership that represents the diversity of service members?/p div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--half alignment--right figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1985 height=3000 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-scaled.jpeg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A photo of Sheena Todd. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-scaled.jpeg 1985w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-768x1160.jpeg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-1017x1536.jpeg 1017w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-1355x2048.jpeg 1355w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-400x604.jpeg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-600x907.jpeg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-800x1209.jpeg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-1000x1511.jpeg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-1200x1813.jpeg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-1400x2115.jpeg 1400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image1-1600x2418.jpeg 1600w sizes=(max-width: 1985px) 100vw, 1985px / /figure /div pbVeteran Todd: /bHaving a role model, mentorship, and someone who is culturally competent of what African Americans go through, while also allowing others to get some exposure to that type of leadership, is important in addressing discrimination. It definitely affects morale and the cohesion of the group to walk into a room and look around, and no one looks like you at your job, at a hearing, or at a base. It’s also super important when you think about retention and recruitment. If I am not comfortable or I#8217;m not in a place where I feel like I#8217;m in alignment with who I#8217;m surrounded by, it#8217;s really tough. You don#8217;t feel accepted, welcomed, or valued. The other part of this is seeing what’s possible, and being able to learn from each other and what their experiences were. Seeing those positive examples and building credibility and trust with people that are not like you – that exposure opens up your mindb. /b/p pbACLU: /bThe military imposes certain uniform requirements that can disproportionately impact people of color. Did the uniform requirements affect your time in the military?/p pbVeteran Todd: /bThat was a big deal for me in the military. When it came to uniforms, the regulations were not put in place for us. It was put in place for people with hair that could conform to those regulations. Our hair doesn#8217;t do that. We have to do a little more extra. I was the yeoman that kept instructions in my pocket because they were up for interpretation. I used to get stopped all the time about my hair. There was this one time where I was actually put at attention by a superior. He said I was distracting the sailors and needed to do something about myself. I didn’t have any makeup on, my hair was natural, and I had on overalls and big boots, so I didn’t know what he wanted me to change. I looked around at every other Black girl on that ship; their hair was shaved off. Then I looked at some of our counterparts who had flipped up hair and all this extra stuff. Were they getting pulled to the side? Absolutely not. I#8217;m really glad that they began to change some of those regulations./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardRetired Air Force Chief Master Sergeant Sebrena L. Flagg-Briggs - 1986 - 2021/h2 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--half alignment--left figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1638 height=2048 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A photo of Sebrena L. Flagg-Briggs. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement.jpg 1638w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement-768x960.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement-1229x1536.jpg 1229w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement-400x500.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement-600x750.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement-800x1000.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement-1000x1250.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement-1200x1500.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement-1400x1750.jpg 1400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flaggs-Briggs-Last-Photo-Before-Retirement-1600x2000.jpg 1600w sizes=(max-width: 1638px) 100vw, 1638px / /figure /div pbACLU: /bCould you tell us about your time in the military and why you decided to join?/p pbRetired Chief Master Sgt. Flagg-Briggs: /bIt was rewarding. It was awesome and it was tough. I joined the military because I wanted to do more for my community. I felt the need to serve others and in my mind, the best way was to serve my country. I would be serving everybody by joining the military./p pbACLU:/b Our amicus highlights that people of color collectively make up as much as 37 percent of the enlisted ranks, but only 14.8 percent of the highest pay grade officers. How do you think this affects the experiences of service members of color?/p pbRetired Chief Master Sgt. Flagg-Briggs/b: When I first came into the military, there was no one that looked like me in a lot of the rooms that I entered. When you don#8217;t see people in the room that represent you, you don#8217;t feel heard. They don#8217;t understand where we’re coming from or how it makes us feel to not see someone that looks like us in higher rank positions. How can they decide uniform policies like how my hair should be, or how the makeup fits my face, or what color is my natural hair color? Those things came up a lot in the military. It affects morale, and it affects people wanting to join./p div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--half alignment--right figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=2000 height=2328 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A younger photo of Sebrena L. Flagg-Briggs in service. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986.jpg 2000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-768x894.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-1320x1536.jpg 1320w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-1759x2048.jpg 1759w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-400x466.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-600x698.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-800x931.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-1000x1164.jpg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-1200x1397.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-1400x1630.jpg 1400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Flagg-Briggs-1986-1600x1862.jpg 1600w sizes=(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px / /figure /div pI was very heavy on joining an organization that promoted diversity because I thought it was important that men, women, Black, white, different nationalities be represented. It gave me a greater understanding of their perspective, and I was able to share my perspective. We were able to gather our thoughts, our differences, and come up with a common solution that would make everybody feel included./p pbACLU: /bDisciplinary hearings affecting service members are reviewed by the military’s own judge panel. How important is it to have leadership that represents the diversity of service members and understands different upbringings?/p pbRetired Chief Master Sgt. Flagg-Briggs/b: That is extremely important. Sometimes when the decisions are made, it perpetuates in your mind that there’s no way they understand who I am or what I represent, because that opinion doesn#8217;t sound like it is for me. There have been examples where there was one type of solution or punishment that was going to be put upon a person and because I was in the room, I helped them understand that it wasn#8217;t as they saw it. The relief that they got from having me in the room was astounding. Many times I was the only woman of color or the only person of color in the room, and I was always opinionated and spoke for folk that were on the line. That was truly important during my 35 years of service. Rising to the rank of Chief, it made me more aware. It helped me help others to understand why it#8217;s important to get in the room, earn more rank, so that we can be better understood, and we could share our experiences and other folks would understand as well./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardMarine Corps Veteran Marnisha Mintlow - 1997 - 2001/h2 /div div class=wp-sizing-container sizing--half alignment--left figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=871 height=1024 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image_picker_7A803C1D-2D61-4582-9E72-ACA27735790C-36649-00000901EE79E7CE-photo-processed.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A photo of Marnisha Mintlow. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image_picker_7A803C1D-2D61-4582-9E72-ACA27735790C-36649-00000901EE79E7CE-photo-processed.jpg 871w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image_picker_7A803C1D-2D61-4582-9E72-ACA27735790C-36649-00000901EE79E7CE-photo-processed-768x903.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image_picker_7A803C1D-2D61-4582-9E72-ACA27735790C-36649-00000901EE79E7CE-photo-processed-400x470.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image_picker_7A803C1D-2D61-4582-9E72-ACA27735790C-36649-00000901EE79E7CE-photo-processed-600x705.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/image_picker_7A803C1D-2D61-4582-9E72-ACA27735790C-36649-00000901EE79E7CE-photo-processed-800x941.jpg 800w sizes=(max-width: 871px) 100vw, 871px / /figure /div pbACLU: /bCould you tell us about your time in the military and why you decided to join?/p pbVeteran Mintlow: /bWhen I joined, it was about me getting money for school. But as you’re gaining education and knowledge of what this branch has gone through, the wars it has fought and won for our country, and you built a relationship with the branch, you learn the importance. So then it becomes, I served my country, I did my part, I put my life on the line./p pbACLU: /bThe military imposes certain uniform requirements that can disproportionately impact people of color. Did the uniform requirements affect your time in the military?/p pbVeteran Mintlow:/b It wasn#8217;t necessarily uniforms that were my issue. It was the weight requirement. Once you hit the maximum weight requirement, they will do what#8217;s called a body fat measurement. When they do that for women, they measure our necks, our waists, and hips. I still believe that is not a fair measurement for women of color. In my culture and as a Black woman, the widest part of my body is my hips, and there is nothing I can do about it. There are some things that we cannot fix, and to have that held against me, it negatively impacted my military career. I was at a point in my career where I was supposed to get a meritorious promotion, but did not get it because I was considered overweight by their metrics./p pbACLU: /bWhy is it important to have representation in the military?/p pbVeteran Mintlow:/b It#8217;s important to have a diverse population amongst enlisted members and officers so that people who are not in the military have an opportunity to see themselves in the military. When I wasn#8217;t in the military, every person I saw in the Marine Corps was a man. So while I was at my recruiter#8217;s office, they had a poster on the wall of a Black woman in a blue dress, and I said, I need to see her in real life. When I went to the Military Entrance Processing Station, which is where you do your swearing in and you sign all your paperwork, I met a Black woman. She was my visual. I knew I could do this because she looked like me and she did it. It#8217;s very important to have those role models and those mentors in real life. When we see people who are like us, doing these things, it gives us the initiative, the drive, and the inspiration to know that we can do those things, too./p div class=rss-cta__titleWe need you with us to keep fighting/diva href=https://action.aclu.org/give/now class=rss-cta__buttonDonate today/a/div

pOver the last decade, California has built up some of the nation’s strongest driver privacy protections, thanks to the hard work of activists, civil rights groups, and elected leaders./p pOne law in particular, often called a href=https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB34SB 34/a, prohibits police from circulating detailed maps of people’s driving patterns with the federal government and agencies in other states– a protection that has only grown more important with the end of iRoe v. Wade/i and the subsequent surge in abortion criminalization./p pBut dozens of California police departments have decided to defy the law, even after receiving a href=https://oag.ca.gov/system/files/media/2023-dle-06.pdfclear guidance/a from California Attorney General Rob Bonta, the chief law enforcement officer in the state. Last month the ACLU of Northern California and our partners a href=https://www.aclunc.org/sites/default/files/2024-01-31_letter_to_ag_bonta_re_sb_34_final.pdfsent Attorney General Bonta a letter/a listing 35 police agencies that have refused to comply with the law and protect driver privacy./p pWe should all be able to drive to a doctor’s office, place of worship, or political rally without being tracked and cataloged by police agencies. But for years now, police have used automated license plate readers (ALPRs) to record and track the movements of drivers on a previously unseen scale. These a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/you-are-being-tracked-how-license-plate-readers-are-being-used-record-americans-movementssystems/a allow police to collect and store information about drivers whose cars pass through ALPR cameras’ fields of view, which, along with the date and time of capture, can reveal sensitive details about our movements and, as a result, our private lives./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/you-are-being-tracked-how-license-plate-readers-are-being-used-record-americans-movements target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1120 height=788 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-12.35.20-PM.png class=attachment-4x3_full size-4x3_full alt=A highway with fast moving cars. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-12.35.20-PM.png 1120w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-12.35.20-PM-768x540.png 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-12.35.20-PM-400x281.png 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-12.35.20-PM-600x422.png 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-12.35.20-PM-800x563.png 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-12.35.20-PM-1000x704.png 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1120px) 100vw, 1120px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/you-are-being-tracked-how-license-plate-readers-are-being-used-record-americans-movements target=_blank You Are Being Tracked: How License Plate Readers Are Being Used to Record Americans' Movements /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/you-are-being-tracked-how-license-plate-readers-are-being-used-record-americans-movements target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pThe ACLU has long seen the danger ALPR surveillance poses, and working alongside communities on the ground, has fought to bolster California’s legal protections for driver privacy. For over a decade, we have conducted investigations, advocacy, and litigation focused on how police agencies use ALPR to track law-abiding drivers, amass hordes of sensitive information, and use it to harm people./p pIn the wake of a href=http://chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.aclu.org/files/assets/071613-aclu-alprreport-opt-v05.pdfACLU’s groundbreaking report/a on ALPR across the US, a href=https://www.aclunc.org/blog/use-automated-license-plate-readers-expanding-northern-california-and-data-shared-fedswe called out/a police use of ALPRs in 2013 as a threat to driver privacy and warned that California lacked statewide driver privacy protections. In 2016, thanks in part to the advocacy of the ACLU and a href=https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/10/success-sacramento-four-new-laws-one-veto-all-victories-privacy-and-transparencyallies/a, the California legislature passed a href=https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB34SB 34/a, the law at issue today. In a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/immigrants-rights/documents-reveal-ice-using-driver-location-data2019/a we discovered Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) exploitation of ALPR-collected information to track and target immigrants in California and across the United States./p pFrom there, we took action to enforce California’s driver privacy protections. In a href=https://www.aclunc.org/news/california-activists-sue-marin-county-sheriff-illegally-sharing-drivers-license-plate-data-ice2021/a we sued Marin County, California for illegally sharing millions of local drivers’ license plates and locations with federal and out-of-state agencies, including ICE. The sheriff eventually agreed to comply with SB 34 as part of a a href=https://www.aclunc.org/our-work/legal-docket/lagleva-v-doyle-license-plate-surveillance#:~:text=In%20May%202022%2C%20the%20plaintiffs,54.settlement agreement/a, but we believed that many other California police agencies were still violating SB 34./p pWe rang the alarm again in the wake of the iDobbs /idecision overturning iRoe v. Wade./i Alongside our partners at the Electronic Frontier Foundation and ACLU of Southern California, we a href=https://www.aclunc.org/news/civil-liberties-groups-demand-california-police-stop-sharing-drivers-location-data-police-antisent letters to over 70 law enforcement agencies in California/a demanding they stop sharing people’s driving patterns with states that have criminalized abortion care. We also notified the attorney general’s office of these violations./p pFollowing our letters, the attorney general issued a href=https://oag.ca.gov/system/files/media/2023-dle-06.pdfinstructions/a to police across the state to follow SB 34’s plain text and cease sharing license plate information with state and federal agencies outside California. While some agencies have come into compliance, many police are digging in and refusing to follow the law. Police lobbyists have even a href=https://www.eff.org/files/2024/01/23/bulletin_reponse_letter.03_jrt_final.khb_.02.pdfasked/a the attorney general to withdraw his interpretation of the law./p pSimply put, the position touted by police agencies and their lobbyists puts Californians at risk. SB 34 is important because when police track and share the locations of law-abiding drivers, that information can easily be used to facilitate racist policing, a href=https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/alexcampbell/the-ticket-machinepunitive fees/a, and the a href=https://www.ap.org/ap-in-the-news/2012/with-cameras-informants-nypd-eyed-mosquesdiscriminatory targeting/a of people in California and beyond. And, as a href=https://www.eff.org/files/2023/05/24/tracy.pdfour letters warned/a, when California shares ALPR information with authorities in states with anti-abortion or anti-trans laws, police and prosecutors gain new power to track and prosecute people who traveled to California to receive reproductive or gender-affirming care./p pWe should all be able to travel safely on the state’s roads without our movements being handed to authorities outside the state. That is why we have continued to push California police agencies to follow California’s driver privacy law. And it’s why we have supported localities a href=https://www.aclunc.org/blog/alameda-rejects-surveillance-deal-company-tied-icethat reject/a ALPR programs at odds with their values./p pIt is unacceptable that police agencies charged with enforcing laws are refusing to comply with this one. While we are pleased with Attorney General Bonta’s strong statement on SB 34, we urge the attorney general to use all available means at his disposal to ensure compliance. And rest assured, that the ACLU will continue fighting to enact and enforce protections that keep all of us safe, no matter where we go in the state./p piThis article was a href=https://www.aclunc.org/blog/californians-fought-hard-driver-privacy-protections-why-are-police-refusing-follow-themoriginally featured/a on the blog of the ACLU of Northern California./i/p div class=rss-cta__titleWe need you with us to keep fighting/diva href=https://action.aclu.org/give/now class=rss-cta__buttonDonate today/a/div

pSeeking lives of safety and opportunity, people coming to the United States as migrants and asylum-seekers may carry only their most essential and beloved possessions. When they arrive in the U.S. and are taken into Border Patrol custody, many migrants endure the devastating loss of their property: Border Patrol agents routinely confiscate, trash, or force them to throw away their precious belongings./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/publications/from-hope-to-heartbreak-the-disturbing-reality-of-border-patrols-confiscation-of-migrants-belongings target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1216 height=680 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.02.10-PM.png class=attachment-4x3_full size-4x3_full alt=An individual holding a small bag of important belongings and documents. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.02.10-PM.png 1216w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.02.10-PM-768x429.png 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.02.10-PM-400x224.png 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.02.10-PM-600x336.png 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.02.10-PM-800x447.png 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.02.10-PM-1000x559.png 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.02.10-PM-1200x671.png 1200w sizes=(max-width: 1216px) 100vw, 1216px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/publications/from-hope-to-heartbreak-the-disturbing-reality-of-border-patrols-confiscation-of-migrants-belongings target=_blank From Hope to Heartbreak: The Disturbing Reality of Border Patrol's Confiscation of Migrants' Belongings /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/publications/from-hope-to-heartbreak-the-disturbing-reality-of-border-patrols-confiscation-of-migrants-belongings target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pIn a new report published in partnership with organizations working on the southern border, From Hope to Heartbreak, we document routine cases of this abusive treatment focusing on confiscation of medication and medical devices, legal and identity documents, religious items, and items of financial, practical, or sentimental value./p pThe report relies heavily on hundreds of intakes conducted by the Kino Border Initiative (KBI), which runs a migrant aid center along Mexico’s border with Arizona, and ProtectAZ Health, which offers free medical screenings and care to migrants in Phoenix./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardMedications and Medical Devices/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1280 height=960 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Medications-Near-Yuma-Arizona-December-2023.jpeg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A pile of various medical materials. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Medications-Near-Yuma-Arizona-December-2023.jpeg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Medications-Near-Yuma-Arizona-December-2023-768x576.jpeg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Medications-Near-Yuma-Arizona-December-2023-400x300.jpeg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Medications-Near-Yuma-Arizona-December-2023-600x450.jpeg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Medications-Near-Yuma-Arizona-December-2023-800x600.jpeg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Medications-Near-Yuma-Arizona-December-2023-1000x750.jpeg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Medications-Near-Yuma-Arizona-December-2023-1200x900.jpeg 1200w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /figure pBorder Patrol and its parent agency, Customs and Border Protection (CBP), have routinely confiscated life-saving medications and medical devices from adults and children who have illnesses such as seizure disorders, high blood pressure, diabetes, asthma, and genetic conditions./p pCBP agents took a 5-year-old girl’s epilepsy medications away from her mother. When the little girl, whom we are calling Rosa, experienced convulsions, she was taken to the hospital. When she was discharged from the hospital and returned to CBP custody with new medications and special dietary supplements, CBP agents confiscated those. Not until the family was released to a shelter in Las Cruces, New Mexico, did Rosa receive the medical care she needed./p pDepriving people of their necessary medication obviously risks their health and safety. It also adds stress to local hospital systems, as people need to visit the emergency room or be hospitalized because their health deteriorates from missing their medication./p pProtectAZ received a 13-year-old boy, whom we are calling Leonel, at their shelter. Leonel has a genetic condition in which he lacks a necessary amino acid that prevents the build up of ammonia in his body. The condition can have serious consequences if untreated, including seizures, coma and death. Leonel needed to take daily supplements, but they were confiscated by Border Patrol in Casa Grande, Arizona. At the ProtectAZ shelter, Leonel’s health deteriorated, and he had to be admitted to the hospital for a week to stabilize his condition./p pIn a separate occurrence, a 7-year-old boy with moderate-persistent asthma was detained for two days. His inhaler was taken away, and he wasn#8217;t given a replacement. After being released, he developed respiratory symptoms, and his condition worsened quickly. His family took him to the emergency department, and he was transferred to a pediatric intensive care unit./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardLegal and Identity Documents/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=3000 height=2335 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-scaled.jpeg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A honduran passport. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-scaled.jpeg 3000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-768x598.jpeg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-1536x1196.jpeg 1536w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-2048x1594.jpeg 2048w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-400x311.jpeg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-600x467.jpeg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-800x623.jpeg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-1000x778.jpeg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-1200x934.jpeg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-1400x1090.jpeg 1400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Honduran-passport-and-birth-certificate-Near-border-wall-in-South-Texas-September-2021-Photo-credit_-Scott-Nicol-1600x1246.jpeg 1600w sizes=(max-width: 3000px) 100vw, 3000px / /figure pConfiscating or destroying legal and identity documents, such as birth certificates, passports, medical records, and documents to substantiate asylum claims, has been a hallmark of Border Patrol’s operations./p pOne man told KBI that Border Patrol agents tore his birth certificate up in front of him. He managed to save his Mexican identity card because he had hidden it in his shoe. Advocates in the Rio Grande Valley Sector in Texas report finding discarded documents that could be important in substantiating asylum claims, such as police reports and medical records. Volunteers with the Borderlands Collective in San Diego say document confiscation is especially concerning for parents of minor children, who may not be able to prove that they are family without their children’s birth records./p p“Passports are very important here,” one person had shared. “To open an account, to identify yourself, and I don’t have that document. I don’t have the children’s birth records because they took them from me. That makes me feel terrible.”/p pMigrants who are deported, expelled or returned to Mexico cannot withdraw or receive money without identity documents. Confiscated or destroyed documents pose a significant barrier to asylum-seekers’ ability to substantiate their claims. The Children’s Legal Center sued Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on behalf of 68 asylum-seekers whose documents the agency had confiscated. The lawsuit argues the confiscation violates the plaintiffs’ due process rights to seek work authorization and to support their asylum cases./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardReligious Items/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1280 height=960 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Religious-items-Near-Yuma-Arizona-April-2023.jpeg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A pile of religious items, including a small Buddha statue and an image of the Virgin Mary. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Religious-items-Near-Yuma-Arizona-April-2023.jpeg 1280w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Religious-items-Near-Yuma-Arizona-April-2023-768x576.jpeg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Religious-items-Near-Yuma-Arizona-April-2023-400x300.jpeg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Religious-items-Near-Yuma-Arizona-April-2023-600x450.jpeg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Religious-items-Near-Yuma-Arizona-April-2023-800x600.jpeg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Religious-items-Near-Yuma-Arizona-April-2023-1000x750.jpeg 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Religious-items-Near-Yuma-Arizona-April-2023-1200x900.jpeg 1200w sizes=(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px / /figure pOver the summer of 2022, there was a spike in reports of Border Patrol taking away Sikh asylum-seekers’ turbans. Forcing a Sikh person to remove their turban is a serious violation of their faith. #8220;They told me to take off my turban. I know a little English, and I said, ‘It’s my religion.#8217; But they insisted.#8221; The man pleaded with the officers, but they forced him to remove his turban and toss it in a pile of trash. He asked if he could at least keep his turban for when he was released from custody, but they told him no./p pWhile Border Patrol has since taken positive steps forward on how it handles turbans and other Sikh articles of faith, the agency’s religious freedom violations aren’t limited to people of the Sikh faith. A person told KBI that Border Patrol agents took his Bible, which he told them had significant spiritual meaning to him, and trashed it in front of him. Border Patrol agents in Yuma told several Muslim migrants they had to throw away their prayer mats. One of the men said his prayer mat had been in his family for more than 100 years./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://action.aclu.org/petition/border-patrol-must-stop-trashing-migrant%E2%80%99s-cherished-belongings target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1000 height=655 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.21.07-PM.png class=attachment-4x3_full size-4x3_full alt=An illustration of a young woman walking nervously with a backpack. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.21.07-PM.png 1000w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.21.07-PM-768x503.png 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.21.07-PM-400x262.png 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.21.07-PM-600x393.png 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-13-at-1.21.07-PM-800x524.png 800w sizes=(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://action.aclu.org/petition/border-patrol-must-stop-trashing-migrant%E2%80%99s-cherished-belongings target=_blank BORDER PATROL MUST STOP TRASHING MIGRANT’S CHERISHED BELONGINGS /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://action.aclu.org/petition/border-patrol-must-stop-trashing-migrant%E2%80%99s-cherished-belongings target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletIf you believe that people seeking refuge in our country deserve to be welcomed with dignity, join us by advocating for change./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://action.aclu.org/petition/border-patrol-must-stop-trashing-migrant%E2%80%99s-cherished-belongings target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pMigrants’ religious freedom is protected both by the First Amendment and the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which provides additional protection for the free exercise of religion. Some asylum-seekers are fleeing religious persecution in their home countries, and the experience of CBP violating their religious faith can be a retraumatizing experience. CBP has been made aware of their violations for years, suggesting a failure of CBP policy and practice to fully respect the religious freedom rights of migrants and asylum-seekers./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardItems of Practical, Financial, or Sentimental Value/h2 /div figure class=wp-image mb-8 img width=1200 height=980 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Personal-documents-including-vaccination-records-money-and-a-cellphone-Near-Lukeville-AZ-May-2023.jpeg class=attachment-original size-original alt=A collection of documents, money, and a damaged smartphone. decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Personal-documents-including-vaccination-records-money-and-a-cellphone-Near-Lukeville-AZ-May-2023.jpeg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Personal-documents-including-vaccination-records-money-and-a-cellphone-Near-Lukeville-AZ-May-2023-768x627.jpeg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Personal-documents-including-vaccination-records-money-and-a-cellphone-Near-Lukeville-AZ-May-2023-400x327.jpeg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Personal-documents-including-vaccination-records-money-and-a-cellphone-Near-Lukeville-AZ-May-2023-600x490.jpeg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Personal-documents-including-vaccination-records-money-and-a-cellphone-Near-Lukeville-AZ-May-2023-800x653.jpeg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAPTION_-Personal-documents-including-vaccination-records-money-and-a-cellphone-Near-Lukeville-AZ-May-2023-1000x817.jpeg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /figure pMigrants have regularly reported Border Patrol agents confiscate their money and cellphones. These items are of clear value and represent a devastating loss: impoverishment and loss of contact with loved ones. Several migrants told KBI they lost the equivalent of hundreds of dollars to Border Patrol. One man described seeing a Border Patrol agent take 3,000 pesos from another man and rip it up in his face. Other migrants described the loss of family photos on their confiscated cellphones./p pConfiscation of clothing appears to be widespread in Border Patrol custody, leaving migrants with only a single layer of clothing. “The official asked me how many shirts I had, and I responded that I had two shirts plus a sweater. The official started laughing and told me I had to take everything off but one shirt,” one person recounted./p pVolunteers and shelters supporting migrants are critical of this practice, especially during the winter and if migrants are traveling north. One shelter in Las Cruces, New Mexico, said it spent $100,000 every month to provide clothes to migrants. Once the Border Patrol sectors in New Mexico reduced their confiscation of people’s clothes, the shelter reported reducing costs for clothing people by half./p pFinally, migrants report having their cherished belongings confiscated or trashed – children’s toys, heirloom jewelry, and even a loved one’s ashes. One man said Border Patrol agents forced him to throw away his father’s ashes – his father had died while journeying to the U.S. from Nicaragua./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardThe Systematic Confiscation of Migrants' Belongings at the U.S. Southern Border, Despite the Vast Resources Available to Border Patrol, is Indefensible/h2 /div pCBP’s practice of property confiscation and destruction isn’t only cruel, unnecessary, and, in some cases, life-threatening, in many cases, it likely violates federal law and policy. We outline achievable policy changes that CBP can adopt to protect the dignity, safety, and rights of people arriving in the U.S./p pBorder Patrol must ensure migrants in its custody and those released from custody have continuous access to their medications and medical devices. Migrants should be allowed to keep as many of their personal belongings as possible in custody and after they are released. CBP must change its policies to comply with federal safeguards of religious freedom in its treatment of people’s religious garb and religious items./p pThe bottom line is that CBP can and must do better to live up to our nation’s values and commitments to people seeking safety within our borders. People seeking refuge in the U.S. deserve to be welcomed with dignity./p div class=rss-ctadiv class=rss-cta__subtitleWhat you can do:/divdiv class=rss-cta__titleTell Congress: Protect families seeking asylum/diva href=https://action.aclu.org/send-message/tell-congress-protect-families-seeking-asylum class=rss-cta__buttonSend your message/a/div

pWhile studying abroad a couple of years ago, I heard first-hand accounts from Jordanian-Palestinian friends about the displacement their families, and families like theirs, experienced during the 1948 Nakba (Arabic for “catastrophe”). Moved by the painful memories they shared, I started researching student organizations advocating for Palestinian rights, and came across the Instagram of the University of Florida (UF) chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP). When I enrolled at UF a few months later, I immediately joined./p pAs a member of UF SJP, it was devastating when top Florida officials ordered public universities to deactivate all SJP chapters in the state, including ours. I remember being in shock when I read the order. Officials justified deactivating our chapter not because of anything our group had said or done—but because of our affiliation with the national chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, a separate group. According to the order, certain views expressed in an advocacy toolkit the National SJP issued on October 7 violated Florida’s “material support of terrorism” law. But my student group was not even involved with the creation of that toolkit, which itself is protected by the First Amendment./p pOn October 8, our SJP chapter issued its own statement, saying that we “mourned the loss of innocent Palestinian and Israeli life,” and made clear that “the killing of any life is always undignified and heartbreaking.” Later, we issued another statement urging the University of Florida to condemn all violence, antisemitism, Islamophobia, Palestinian erasure, and anti-Palestinian sentiment./p pOur chapter has students from a variety of religious, racial, and cultural backgrounds, including members who are Jewish, Palestinian, and Palestinian-American, who believe that speaking up for Palestine is speaking up for humanity. Reading the deactivation order, we felt like we had no choice but to sue to protect our First Amendment right to free speech and free assocation. We know of multiple current and potential members of UF SJP who feared being punished and investigated. Our advocacy has suffered from having our state and university officials levy false accusations of “terrorism” against us. For months, we feared that at any moment the University could have denied us access to critical school funds, resources, and facilities that are fundamental to the survival and operation of our organization./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/defending-free-speech-students-justice-palestine-florida target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/32e3bcaaa00f43000507a39dc63faeae.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/32e3bcaaa00f43000507a39dc63faeae.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/32e3bcaaa00f43000507a39dc63faeae-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/32e3bcaaa00f43000507a39dc63faeae-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/32e3bcaaa00f43000507a39dc63faeae-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/32e3bcaaa00f43000507a39dc63faeae-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/32e3bcaaa00f43000507a39dc63faeae-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/defending-free-speech-students-justice-palestine-florida target=_blank The Importance of Defending the Free Speech Rights of Pro-Palestinian Students in Florida /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/defending-free-speech-students-justice-palestine-florida target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletExplore the critical case that could shape the future of public students’ right to free speech and free association on campus./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/defending-free-speech-students-justice-palestine-florida target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pNear the end of January, the ACLU, ACLU of Florida, and Palestine Legal went to court to defend our rights and, on January 31, a federal judge dismissed our lawsuit. The court found that after issuing the order, Florida officials do not intend to deactivate our chapter. Although the court did not rule on our First Amendment claims, it’s a relief to know that the court concluded our chapter does not currently face deactivation./p pAs the judge acknowledged during the hearing on our case: “Words have consequences.” For months we have lived with fear and anxiety as a result of the order. I still carry a deep worry for my safety, for my loved ones’ safety, and the safety of any student who chooses to get involved in our SJP chapter. We hope that state officials learned their lesson when they walked back the deactivation order, and that the State University System Chancellor will now take his order down from his website./p pI remember learning about my constitutional rights in seventh grade civics class, including how we were all entitled to free speech. The juxtaposition of what I grew up thinking college kids in the U.S. were allowed to do and say and what we went through last semester is really stark. I can’t overstate how deeply disappointing it was to see our state’s highest officials attempt to censor us. Their actions were contrary to everything I understood about how our democracy is supposed to work./p div class=alignfullwidth mb-8 wp-pullquote div class= wp-pullquote-inner pI can’t overstate how deeply disappointing it was to see our state’s highest officials attempt to censor us. Their actions were contrary to everything I understood about how our democracy is supposed to work./p /div /div pAt a time when the number of Palestinians killed or injured in Gaza is rising exponentially each day, standing up for our right to speak out on the issue felt like a no-brainer. While this experience hasn’t been easy, we’re proud to have fought for our rights in court. We hope our case sets a precedent that students cannot be silenced./p div class=rss-cta__titleWe need you with us to keep fighting/diva href=https://action.aclu.org/give/now class=rss-cta__buttonDonate today/a/div

pThe Senate voted on Wednesday against a bill that would have been the first major overhaul of asylum and immigration law in a generation — and would have been a disastrous retreat from basic principles of fairness. As our elected leaders continue to debate immigration reforms, they must instead advance humane and sensible solutions that help manage the border without compromising our nation’s values and the safety of people fleeing danger./p pAlthough branded as a compromise bipartisan “border security” package, this bill would have been a major rewrite of our nation’s long-standing asylum laws. To make matters worse, these changes were attached to a supplemental funding bill that also included a massive investment in failed and punitive immigration enforcement policies, such as funding to finish former President Trump’s border wall, an expansion of nationwide immigration detention, and a significant increase in surveillance targeting immigrant families. Although ostensibly dead, Senate Republicans are reportedly trying again to push for another vote on this immigration package as an amendment to foreign aid, plus additional extremist policies that would remove protections from unaccompanied children./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standard1. It would have shut down the U.S.-Mexico border to asylum seekers/h2 /div pAt its core lay a new rule that would have fundamentally blocked asylum for the vast majority of people who come to our southern border seeking protection. Under this new rule, once an average of 5,000 people arrive at the border daily over a seven-day period, or 8,500 people on a single day, no one would be eligible to apply for asylum between ports of entry. Furthermore, the government would have gained the power to enforce this “no-asylum” rule when there is an average of 4,000 people per day over a seven-day period./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/immigrants-rights/showing-up-to-protect-the-right-to-seek-asylum target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/26f980d9135735ce0b525d8e63cce9ca.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/26f980d9135735ce0b525d8e63cce9ca.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/26f980d9135735ce0b525d8e63cce9ca-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/26f980d9135735ce0b525d8e63cce9ca-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/26f980d9135735ce0b525d8e63cce9ca-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/26f980d9135735ce0b525d8e63cce9ca-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/26f980d9135735ce0b525d8e63cce9ca-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/immigrants-rights/showing-up-to-protect-the-right-to-seek-asylum target=_blank Showing Up to Protect the Right to Seek Asylum /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/immigrants-rights/showing-up-to-protect-the-right-to-seek-asylum target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletFor decades, the ACLU has worked to protect the rights of asylum seekers./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/immigrants-rights/showing-up-to-protect-the-right-to-seek-asylum target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pThis was poised to become an operational nightmare, and there’s no need for speculation regarding the horrible consequences if the government implemented this rule. We need only to look back at the chaotic and violent days under the Trump era Title 42 policy, which similarly closed our asylum system under the guise of public health. During that period a href=https://humanrightsfirst.org/title-42/#:~:text=As%20of%20December%202022%2C%20Human,since%20President%20Biden%20took%20officeover 13,480/a people were raped, murdered, kidnapped, tortured, or extorted while waiting for the border to reopen. As history has taught us, this new rule would not have stopped people from seeking safety in the U.S., but people who have undoubtedly been sent back to danger as a result./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standard2. This plan would have fundamentally changed our country’s core protections for people seeking safety/h2 /div pEven when people were allowed to apply for asylum, they would have been subject to a mind-boggling and dangerous fast-track deportation process, with punishing timelines for those who could not meet new restrictive screening tests./p pIf passed, the vast majority of asylum seekers would no longer be able to seek court review of their cases, representing a major shift from our asylum and legal system. This would have denied them one of the most essential due process safeguards in a system riddled with errors. Independent judicial review has been a life-saving protection, with courts a href=https://humanrightsfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Preserve_Judicial_Review_of_Asylum_Decisions-formatted.pdfconsistently finding /athat asylum officers wrongly denied people protection. Asylum officers currently conduct their case screenings and interviews with the understanding that their work will be checked by an immigration judge. Eliminating that legal review would have meant sacrificing basic fairness in cases where life or death is at stake./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standard3. An unprecedented increase in funding for punitive immigration policies would have been a waste of taxpayer dollars/h2 /div pThe other major story about this bill is the money. It was a shockingly punitive, pro-detention bill that revived the construction of Trump’s failed border wall and included an unprecedented $3.2 billion for immigration detention — more than even allocated or requested under the previous administration. The bill also included over a billion dollars for surveillance technology that would subject individuals and a href=https://www.aclu-or.org/en/news/whats-hiding-immigration-border-deal-more-mass-surveillancefamilies/a to 24-hour suspicionless surveillance. This amounted to $4.5 billion dollars directed towards harmful and punitive immigration enforcement measures that would have impacted all immigrant families throughout the United States. Most of that funding would have lined the pockets of the for-profit prison industry, which stands to get a href=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/mar/07/us-immigration-surveillance-ice-bi-isapbillions more/a in taxpayer dollars and without the overdue oversight and accountability./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu-or.org/en/news/whats-hiding-immigration-border-deal-more-mass-surveillance target=_blank tabindex=-1 rel=noreferrer noopener img width=1200 height=630 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/2168519ceac1da204c4f825d20480d5a.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/2168519ceac1da204c4f825d20480d5a.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/2168519ceac1da204c4f825d20480d5a-768x403.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/2168519ceac1da204c4f825d20480d5a-400x210.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/2168519ceac1da204c4f825d20480d5a-600x315.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/2168519ceac1da204c4f825d20480d5a-800x420.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/2168519ceac1da204c4f825d20480d5a-1000x525.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu-or.org/en/news/whats-hiding-immigration-border-deal-more-mass-surveillance target=_blank rel=noreferrer noopener What’s Hiding in the Immigration Border Deal? More Mass Surveillance /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu-or.org/en/news/whats-hiding-immigration-border-deal-more-mass-surveillance target=_blank tabindex=-1 rel=noreferrer noopener p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletCongress is considering expanding a harmful surveillance program. A second Trump presidency could make those risks even more severe./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu-or.org/en/news/whats-hiding-immigration-border-deal-more-mass-surveillance target=_blank tabindex=-1 rel=noreferrer noopener p class=is-size-7Source: ACLU of Oregon/p /a /div /div pIn addition to the unimaginable harm inflicted on immigrant families, the bill would have permanently undermined our moral standing in the world, and ensured the return of people to danger and even death./p pThere is no denying the need for real changes at our southern border. However, none of these callous and extremist policies were ever going to “fix” the border: they wouldn’t have created a fairer immigration system or helped cities, states, and communities support and welcome new immigrants. What’s more, they wouldn’t even have deterred people from seeking protection or opportunities here in the U.S., as their proponents suggested. This bill would have essentially altered who we are as a country without improving the situation at the border from any perspective./p pWith thanks to Senators Markey, Menendez, Padilla, Sanders, and Warren, all of whom voted against this deal, this harmful legislation will no longer move forward — but our work here isn’t done just yet. Now it’s time for all our elected leaders to take this failed vote as an opportunity to finally get immigration reform right and ensure we pass sensible and humane solutions to address the challenges at the border./p div class=rss-ctadiv class=rss-cta__subtitleWhat you can do:/divdiv class=rss-cta__titleTell Congress: Protect families seeking asylum/diva href=https://action.aclu.org/send-message/tell-congress-protect-families-seeking-asylum class=rss-cta__buttonSend your message/a/div

pWe often hear about government misuse of face recognition technology (FRT) and how it can a href=https://www.wired.com/story/wrongful-arrests-ai-derailed-3-mens-lives/derail/a a person’s life through wrongful arrests and other harms. Despite mounting evidence, government agencies continue to push face recognition systems on communities across the United States. Key to this effort are the corporate makers and sellers who market this technology as reliable, accurate, and safe – often by pointing to their products’ scores on government-run performance tests./p pAll of this might tempt policymakers to believe that the safety and civil rights problems of facial recognition can be solved by mandating a certain performance score or grade. However, relying solely on test scores risks obscuring deeper problems with face recognition while overstating its effectiveness and real-life safety./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardHow are facial recognition systems tested? /h2 /div pMany facial recognition systems are tested by the federal National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). In one of their tests, NIST uses companies’ algorithms to try and search for a face within a large “matching database” of faces. In broad strokes, this test appears to resemble how police use face recognition today, feeding an image of a single unknown person’s face into an algorithm that compares it against a large database of mugshot or driver’s license photos and generates suggested images, paired with numbers that represent estimates of how similar the images are./p pThese and other tests can reveal disturbing racial disparities. In their own a href=http://gendershades.org/overview.htmlgroundbreaking research/a, computer scientists Dr. Joy Buolamwini and Dr. Timnit Gebru tested several prominent gender classification algorithms, and a href=https://proceedings.mlr.press/v81/buolamwini18a/buolamwini18a.pdffound that/a those systems were less likely to accurately classify the faces of women with darker complexions. Following that, the ACLU of Northern California performed its own test of Amazon’s facial recognition software, which a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/amazons-face-recognition-falsely-matched-28falsely matched/a the faces of 28 members of Congress with faces in a mugshot database, with Congressmembers of color being misidentified at higher rates. Since then, additional testing by a href=https://pages.nist.gov/frvt/reports/demographics/nistir_8429.pdfNIST/a and a href=https://openaccess.thecvf.com/content/WACV2023W/DVPBA/papers/Bhatta_The_Gender_Gap_in_Face_Recognition_Accuracy_Is_a_Hairy_WACVW_2023_paper.pdfacademic researchers/a indicates that these problems persist./p pWhile testing of facial recognition for accuracy and fairness across race, sex, and other characteristics is critical, the tests do not take full account of practical realities. There is no laboratory test that represents the conditions and reality of a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/parks-v-mccormac?document=Amicus-Briefhow police use face recognition/a in real world-scenarios. For one, testing labs are not going to have access to the exact “matching database,” the particular digital library of faces on mugshots, licenses, and surveillance photos, that police in a specific community search through when they operate face recognition. And tests cannot account for the full range of low-quality images from surveillance cameras (a href=https://www.wired.com/story/parabon-nanolabs-dna-face-models-police-facial-recognition/and truly dubious sources/a) that police feed into these systems, or the trouble police have when visually reviewing and choosing from a set of possible matches produced by the technology./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/parks-v-mccormac target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=700 height=350 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/01b485e2a16c02cde9cc7378926d513c.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/01b485e2a16c02cde9cc7378926d513c.jpg 700w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/01b485e2a16c02cde9cc7378926d513c-400x200.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/01b485e2a16c02cde9cc7378926d513c-600x300.jpg 600w sizes=(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/parks-v-mccormac target=_blank Parks v. McCormac /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/parks-v-mccormac target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletOn January 29, 2024, the ACLU and the ACLU of New Jersey filed an amicus brief in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey in support of/p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/cases/parks-v-mccormac target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pIn response to these real concerns, vendors routinely hold up their performance on tests in their a href=https://www.clearview.ai/post/debunking-the-three-biggest-myths-about-clearview-aimarketing to government agencies/a as evidence of facial recognition’s reliability and accuracy. Lawmakers have also a href=https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB642/id/2796168sought to legislate performance scores/a that set across-the-board accuracy or error-rate requirements for facial recognition algorithms used by police that would allow police to use FRT systems that clear these requirements. This approach would be misguided./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardHow can performance scores be misleading? /h2 /div pIt is easy to be misled by performance scores. Imagine a requirement that police can only use systems that produce an overall true positive rate, a measure of how often the results returned by a FRT system include a match for the person depicted in the probe image when there is a matching image in the database, above 98 percent in testing. At first glance, that might sound like a pretty strong requirement — but a closer look reveals a very different story./p pFor one, police typically configure and customize facial recognition systems to return a list of multiple results, sometimes as many as hundreds of results. Think of this as a ‘digital lineup.’ In NIST testing, if at least one of the results returned is a match for the probe image, the search is considered successful and counted as part of the true positive rate metric. But even when this happens in practice — which certainly isn’t always the case — there is no guarantee that police will select the true match rather than one of the other results. True matches in testing might be crowded out by false matches in practice because of these police-created ‘digital lineups.’ This alone makes it difficult to choose one universal performance score that can be applied to many different FRT systems./p pLet’s look at another metric called the false positive rate, which assesses how often a FRT search will return results when there is no matching image in the database. Breaking results down by race, the same algorithm that produces the 98 percent true positive rate overall can also produce a false positive rate for Black men several times the false positive rate for white men — and an even higher false positive rate for Black women. This example is not merely a hypothetical: in a href=https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/ir/2019/nist.ir.8280.pdfNIST testing,/a many algorithms have exhibited this pattern. (1) a href=https://pages.nist.gov/frvt/html/frvt_demographics.htmlOther recent NIST testing/a also shows algorithms produced false positive rates tens or hundreds of times higher for females older than 65 born in West African countries than for males ages 20-35 born in Eastern European countries. (2)/p pBy only considering the true positive rate, we miss these extreme disparities, which can lead to devastating consequences. Across the United States, police are arresting people based on false matches and harming people like a href=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/29/technology/facial-recognition-misidentify-jail.htmlNijeer Parks/a, a Black man who police in New Jersey falsely arrested and held in jail for ten days because police trusted the results of face recognition, overlooking obvious exonerating evidence. Human mis-reliance on face recognition is already a problem; focusing on performance scores might make things worse./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardWhat’s the takeaway for policymakers? /h2 /div pLawmakers should know that a facial recognition algorithm’s performance on a test cannot be easily or quickly generalized to make broad claims about whether a facial recognition algorithm is safe. Performance scores are not an easy fix to the harms that are resulting from the use of face recognition systems, and they of course don’t account for humans that will inevitably be in the loop./p pAs the ACLU explained in its recent a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13epublic comment/a to the Biden Administration, the problems of facial recognition run deep and beyond the software itself. Facial recognition is dangerous if it’s inaccurate — a problem that testing aims to address — but also dangerous even if it could hypothetically be perfectly accurate. In such a world, governments could use face surveillance to precisely track us as we leave home, attend a protest, or take public transit to the doctor’s office. This is why policymakers in an expanding list of U.S. cities and counties have decided to prohibit government use of face recognition. And it’s why a href=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/aclu-calls-moratorium-law-and-immigration-enforcement-use-facial-recognitionACLU supports a federal moratorium/a on its use by law and immigration enforcement agencies./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13e target=_blank tabindex=-1 /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13e target=_blank ACLU Comment re: Request for Comment on Law Enforcement Agencies' Use of Facial Recognition Technology, Other Technologies Using Biometric Information, and Predictive Algorithms (Exec. Order 14074, Section 13(e)) /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13e target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tablet/p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-comment-facial-recognition-and-biometric-technologies-eo-14074-13e target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pConversations about the shortcomings of performance scores are important, but instead of trying to find some magic number, policymakers should focus on how any use of facial recognition can expand discriminatory policing, massively expand the power of government, and create the conditions for authoritarian control of our private lives./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h4 id= class=wp-heading-h4 with-standardEndnotes: /h4 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h4 id= class=wp-heading-h4 with-standard(1) For one demonstrative example, an FRT algorithm developed by the vendor NEC and submitted to NIST’s vendor testing program produced an overall true positive rate above 98% in some of the testing. See National Institute of Standards and Technology, Face Recognition Vendor Test Report Card for NEC-2 1, https://pages.nist.gov/frvt/reportcards/1N/nec_2.pdf (finding a false negative identification rate (FNIR) of less than .02—or 2%—for testing using multiple datasets. The true positive identification rate (TPIR) is one minus the FPIR). However, in other NIST testing, the same algorithm also produced false positive rates for Black men more than three times the false match rate for white men at various thresholds. See Patrick Grother et al., U.S. Dep’t of Com., Nat’l Inst. for Standards amp; Tech., Face Recognition Vendor Test Part 3: Demographic Effects Annex 16 at 34 fig.32, (Dec. 2019), https://pages.nist.gov/frvt/reports/demographics/annexes/annex_16.pdf. /h4 /div div class=wp-heading mb-8 h4 id= class=wp-heading-h4 with-standard(2) See National Institute of Standards and Technology, Face Recognition Technology Evaluation: Demographic Effects in Face Recognition, FRTE 1:1 Demographic Differentials Summary, False Positive Differentials, https://pages.nist.gov/frvt/html/frvt_demographics.html (Last visited February 6, 2024). The table summarizes demographic differentials in false match rates for various 1:1 algorithms and highlights that many algorithms exhibit false match rates differentials for images of people of different ages, sexes, and regions of birth. For example, the algorithm labelled as “recognito_001” produced a false match rate for images of females over 65 born in West African countries 3000 times the false match rate for images of males ages 20-35 born in Eastern European countries. NIST notes that “While this table lists results for 1:1 algorithms, it will have relevance to that subset of 1:N algorithms that implement 1:N search as N 1:1 comparisons followed by a sort operation. The demographic effects noted here will be material in 1:N operations and will be magnified if the gallery and the search stream include the affected demographic.” /h4 /div div class=rss-cta__titleWe need you with us to keep fighting/diva href=https://action.aclu.org/give/now class=rss-cta__buttonDonate today/a/div

pOn October 24, 2022 at 2 a.m., 27-year-old Joshua Wesley called a crisis help line from his home in Washington County, Oregon, just west of Portland. He was having suicidal thoughts and knew that he needed professional help. But instead of receiving a mental health provider as specifically requested, he encountered a group of armed police officers at his door. This response not only deprived Wesley of the immediate psychiatric care that he needed, but it also led to him being arrested and seriously injured by the responding officer. He ultimately spent two weeks in the hospital, and six months in jail./p pWesley told us that he felt that he needed qualified professionals to console him, talk him down, and give him solutions. But the officers that showed up made the situation worse by simply trying tried to put him in handcuffs and cart him off./p pJoining forces with the ACLU, Disability Rights Oregon, the ACLU of Oregon, and the law firm Shepherd Mullin, Wesley is a plaintiff in a recently filed lawsuit against Washington County and the local 911 dispatch center. The lawsuit asserts that the county’s emergency response system discriminates against people with mental health disabilities and exposes them to risk of serious harm, including injury, arrest, and incarceration. Wesley said that he joined the case because he believes strongly in helping out others facing similar struggles./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardA Life-or-Death Situation/h2 /div pWashington County has a history of inappropriately responding to mental health crises. In 2022, police officers were dispatched to 100 percent of the calls coded as “behavioral health incidents” in Washington County. The county does have mobile crisis teams comprised exclusively of mental health clinicians, the sole non-police response available there. But, while the mobile crisis teams are intended to be available 24/7, in practice, they’re underfunded, not connected with the emergency dispatch system, and often unavailable — especially at night, when many mental health crises occur./p pPolice response to mental health crises can be dangerous and even deadly. Police officers are not qualified mental health professionals and should not be expected to assess and treat people in crisis. Beyond that, police presence may actually make mental health symptoms worse, triggering anxiety and paranoia. Most alarming of all, it is a href=https://www.treatmentadvocacycenter.org/reports_publications/overlooked-in-the-undercounted-the-role-of-mental-illness-in-fatal-law-enforcement-encounters/estimated/a that people with untreated mental illness are 16 times more likely than others to be killed by the police during an encounter./p div class=mp-md wp-link div class=wp-link__img-wrapper a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/criminal-law-reform/911-reimagining-a-system-that-defaults-to-dispatching-police target=_blank tabindex=-1 img width=1200 height=628 src=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/7d213448e117ddd5d2241ad28928c059.jpg class=attachment-original size-original alt= decoding=async loading=lazy srcset=https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/7d213448e117ddd5d2241ad28928c059.jpg 1200w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/7d213448e117ddd5d2241ad28928c059-768x402.jpg 768w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/7d213448e117ddd5d2241ad28928c059-400x209.jpg 400w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/7d213448e117ddd5d2241ad28928c059-600x314.jpg 600w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/7d213448e117ddd5d2241ad28928c059-800x419.jpg 800w, https://www.aclu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/7d213448e117ddd5d2241ad28928c059-1000x523.jpg 1000w sizes=(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px / /a /div div class=wp-link__title a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/criminal-law-reform/911-reimagining-a-system-that-defaults-to-dispatching-police target=_blank 911: Reimagining a System that Defaults to Dispatching Police /a /div div class=wp-link__description a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/criminal-law-reform/911-reimagining-a-system-that-defaults-to-dispatching-police target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7-mobile is-size-6-tabletEmergency response systems must be revamped to equip 911 call-takers to dispatch non-police first responders./p /a /div div class=wp-link__source p-4 px-6-tablet a href=https://www.aclu.org/news/criminal-law-reform/911-reimagining-a-system-that-defaults-to-dispatching-police target=_blank tabindex=-1 p class=is-size-7Source: American Civil Liberties Union/p /a /div /div pThat’s what nearly happened in Wesley’s case. Instead of being provided with the care he was seeking — on-site psychiatric assessment and treatment — he was placed under a “police officer hold,” a form of involuntary detention, and transported to a hospital via ambulance. Wesley was not treated or stabilized during transport and his symptoms worsened. At the hospital, Wesley was still suicidal and he attempted to take an officer’s firearm to use on himself. During the incident, the officer stabbed Wesley several times, resulting in serious injuries to his chest, stomach, and head./p pThe damage to Wesley’s body serves as a constant reminder of the incident. The scars left from the incident demonstrate that there could have been other ways to deal with the situation, Wesley told us./p pWesley then spent two weeks in the hospital recovering. During this time, his repeated requests for mental health assistance and therapy were denied. He remained handcuffed to his bed and kept under near-constant police surveillance. Wesley felt that the doctors stopped looking at him as a patient who needed help and treatment to heal, but rather, as a criminal./p pAfter being released from the hospital, Wesley faced criminal charges arising from the altercation with the officer. He spent six months in jail, missing the birth of his first and only son. He also missed the holidays and time with his family at a time of great strife./p pUltimately, it took months for Wesley to receive the psychiatric help that he first sought in October./p div class=wp-heading mb-8 h2 id= class=wp-heading-h2 with-standardA More Humane Emergency Response/h2 /div pWhen someone in Washington County experiences a physical health crisis, like a heart attack or a severe allergic reaction, they can call 911 and expect a response from a qualified medical professional, like an EMT or paramedic. The same cannot be said, however, for someone experiencing a mental health crisis./p pThe lawsuit explains how this discrepancy violates the Americans with Disabilities Act and Rehabilitation Act. Mental health crises demand a mental health response — not a police response — because they are, at their core, health emergencies./p pExperts agree that mental health emergencies should be addressed by mental health professionals, not the police. As part of theira href=https://www.samhsa.gov/sites/default/files/national-guidelines-for-behavioral-health-crisis-care-02242020.pdf recommended best practices,/a the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) proposes a three-tiered system that includes a crisis call center, mobile crisis teams, and stabilization centers for walk-ins and drop-offs. SAMHSA also noted that responding with police is “unacceptable and unsafe,” a view that the a href=https://www.nami.org/Blogs/NAMI-Blog/July-2022/Mobile-Crisis-Teams-Providing-an-Alternative-to-Law-Enforcement-for-Mental-Health-CrisesNational Alliance on Mental Illness/a shares./p pAs a result of Washington County’s inappropriate response to mental health crises, it discriminates against people with mental health disabilities on a daily basis. . This lawsuit seeks to improve its mental healthcare system. Possible solutions include fully funding mobile crisis response teams that can bring care and support to the people who need it, when they need it./p pWashington County isn#8217;t the only jurisdiction with a system in need of reform. Justice Department investigations have found similar discrimination in Louisville and Minneapolis, stating that relying on police as mental health first responders causes “real harm in the form of trauma, injury, and death to people experiencing behavioral health issues.”/p pWesley hopes that this case brings widespread attention to an issue that impacts many lives on a daily basis. People with mental health disabilities are harmed both because of a failed response to mental health crises , and because many people with mental health disabilities don’t want to call for help out of fear of an armed police response. Wesley sees a need nationwide for an important reckoning for how jurisdictions respond to mental health crises. Counties and other locales should be looking at their systems and asking, “Is our system for mental health crisis response fair? Is it safe? Is it right?”/p pHow jurisdictions answer these questions could have a major impact on the care and support people with mental health disabilities receive while in crisis. We must not allow discriminatory practices that cause real harm and death to go unchecked./p div class=rss-cta__titleWe need you with us to keep fighting/diva href=https://action.aclu.org/give/now class=rss-cta__buttonDonate today/a/div