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Our Vision to Achieve True Public Safety
For decades, local, state and federal public officials from both political parties and powerful interest groups engineered the system of mass incarceration. They did this in part by constructing a narrative of fear fueled by racism through which they passed laws, spent billions of dollars, and separated millions of families. It was a disaster of epic proportions that unfolded in slow motion and for which we are still paying the price today as a nation.
T
By aclutn
Jan 23, 2017
In Trump’s America, the Future of Police Reform Will Be Forged at the City and County Level
In the final entry in the series, "Waking Up in Trump's America," Seattle Councilmember At-Large Lorena González argues that police reform will come from pressure on local and county government and not from Washington, D.C.
One of the hardest things I’ve done in my career is to sit with the family of a man who
By aclutn
Jan 23, 2017
On Donald Trump’s First Full Day in Office, Millions Showed the President That ‘Dissent Is Patriotic’
As inauguration ceremonies commenced for President Trump, I was aboard the Amtrak 2117 from New York to Washington, D.C. Almost everyone on the train was female, and there was no need to ask anyone where they were going. The train was a river of pink pussy hats. Amy Schumer was in the next car over, with a running commentary on the inaugural, which a fellow passenger was streaming.
When we arrived in Washington’s Union Station, our pink hats met a smattering of
By aclutn
Jan 20, 2017
Will the Momentum to Stop Solitary Grind to a Halt Under Trump?
In the fifth piece in the series, "Waking Up in Trump's America," solitary confinement survivor James Burns describes the barbaric practice and worries that President Trump will do nothing, or worse, to end this form of cruel and usual punishment.
On any given day there are 100,000 men, women, and adolescent youth languishing in solitary confin
By aclutn
Jan 19, 2017
Here Is the ACLU's 7-Point Plan of Action to Take on the Trump Administration
After it became clear that Donald Trump would be the Republican nominee for president, the ACLU got to work digging into his policy statements. In July, we released "The Trump Memos," which was the first comprehensive constitutional analysis of his public statements and policy proposals regarding immigration enforcement, Muslim rights, torture, and freedom of the press. Our conclusions were alarming. According to our analysis, then-candidate Trump articulated policies that would flagrantly violate the First, Fourth, Fifth, Eighth, and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
That man is now on the verge of swearing a solemn oath to "preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United Stat
By aclutn
Jan 19, 2017
In First of Many, ACLU FOIA Request Seeks Information about the New President’s Conflicts of Interests
During the Trump administration, our country faces an unprecedented constellation of threats to the regular oversight processes that keep the powers that be in check. Faced with attacks on journalists critical of the president as perpetrators of “fake news,” an era of one-party rule threatening healthy competition between the branches of government, the constant subversion of democratic and ethical norms, and more, the ACLU and the citizenry will unfortunately have many opportunities to provide a public check to keep our government honest.
Well, we just couldn’t wait: on Thursday, we filed our first
By aclutn
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