News & Commentary

An American illegally detained in Iraq by the U.S. military for more than a year has finally won his freedom. On Sunday, after a long court battle, the Trump administration let our client go. Under a settlement agreement, he was

Last week, Jeff Sessions attacked a court ruling that gave a temporary reprieve to hundreds of thousands of immigrants facing imminent deportation after years of living lawfully in this country.  "Federal district court judges are not empowered to fashion immigration policy," Sessions

New York City Transit President Andy Byford announced this week that he would ask the city, including the police, to help respond to homeless people exhibiting “offensive, obnoxious and anti-social” behavior on subways. The comments prompt fresh concerns that the NYPD could exacerbate the city’s already problematic track recor

I was in funeral services for nearly three decades before I was fired in 2013 for being transgender. In March, a federal appeals court agreed that it was wrong to fire me just because of who I am. Now, the Supreme Court will consider whether to review that court ruling. While studying to be a pastor in college, I needed a job, and I found one in a funeral home. There are a lot of

Jeff Sessions and Donald Trump think federal law shouldn’t protect transgender people. They think it should be legal to fire someone just because she’s trans. Five federal appeals courts disagree. On Wednesday, the ACLU asked the Supreme Court to let stand one of those rulings, in the case of Aimee Stephens. Aimee had worked at a funeral home in Detroit for nearly six years when she wrote a letter telling her

When Richard Gardner, a convicted child sex offender, was released from prison after serving almost 30 years, he quietly moved into the Washington Park neighborhood in Providence. One would not have expected a welcome wagon — but an angry mob should not have been the result either. Because his crimes were committed so long ago, Gardner is not subject to the community notification provisions that app

Over the weekend, The New York Times revealed that officials within the Trump administration are pushing for a definition of the term “sex” in federal civil rights laws that would eliminate non-discrimination protections for transgender people. Transgender people and their families understandably panicked at that news. The reality, though, is that transgender people are already protected from discrimination in many contexts under federal law. And we ar

In a victory for the people of Georgia, a federal appeals court ruled on Friday that the state can no longer charge individuals hundreds of dollars to see the laws that govern them. To get there, the court relied on a central tenet of American democracy: The government works on behalf o

Patrick Beadle, a 46-year-old father and musician, received an eight-year prison sentence in Mississippi for possessing 2.89 pounds of marijuana. If his sentence stands, he would spend nearly a decade behind bars for possessing a substance that is legal in nine states and now all of Canada. Such a severe, inhumane sentence speaks volumes about the inanity and heartlessness of our criminal justice system. But this story gets worse. Mr. Beadle says he bought the marijuana legally in Oregon, where he is a resident and a medical marijuana patient. Oregon i