News & Commentary
ACLU-SDIC Testimony – San Diego City Council Considers Whether to Continue Surveillance Use Policies
By Blair Overstreet
ACLU-SDIC Testimony – Vista City Council Considers the Community Safety and Due Process Resolution
ACLU-SDIC Testimony – San Diego County Board of Supervisors Considers Drafting CLEAR Ordinance
By Brisa Velazquez
ACLU-SDIC Testimony – San Diego City Council Considers Due Process & Safety Ordinance
By Brisa Velazquez
On Immigration, a Ray of Fairness Shines Bright in California
In a recent interview with 60 Minutes, President-Elect Donald J. Trump said that he planned to deport some three million immigrants—allegedly all “criminal immigrants.” Many people, myself included, were alarmed to hear this. The details of these new mass-deportation policies remain unclear, although some reports have surfaced that the policies would include anyone who has ever been arrested, even if the person was later found innocent or the charges were eventually dropped.
But California is moving in the opposite direction and instead undertaking efforts to make things fairer for immigrant and Muslim communities. Due process, the idea that everyone deserves fair treatment by our government whenever any of their civil liberties are at stake, is a cornerstone of our democracy and one of the most cherished American values.
And at bottom, that is what these three bills are all about: fairness. It is about how we treat other human beings and about bringing some semblance of fairness into an inherently unfair immigration system.
Because the fact is that our immigration system is deeply flawed and outdated, and relies on an equally flawed and biased criminal justice system as its deportation pipeline. Many of the people with arrests or convictions have been subjected to racial profiling and discrimination.
Take for example the California Gang Database (CalGang). For years, community members and advocates alike denounced CalGang as an error-prone database that lacks transparency and accountability, and relies on racial profiling and discrimination. This year, a state audit confirmed what many of us have been saying all along when it revealed that 42 children younger than one year had been erroneously included in the database. Yet we know that the federa
SDACLU Demands Public Records Proving Charter School Did Not Discriminate Against Transgender Student
SAN DIEGO, CA - The ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties (“ACLU-SDIC”) filed suit in California Superior Court yesterday against e3 Civic High School (“e3”), a charter school located in the downtown San Diego Central Library building. ACLU-SDIC and co-counsel, Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP (“Pillsbury”), seek to compel disclosure of documents related to e3’s claim it did not discriminate against a fifteen-year-old transgender student because of her gender identity.
SDACLU Applauds Study Recommendations To Address Biased Policing
SAN DIEGO, CA – Norma Chavez-Peterson, Executive Director of the San Diego ACLU delivered the following statement regarding the final SDSU Study of SDPD Traffic Stop data during the 2pm meeting of the Public Safety & Livable Neighborhoods Committee Meeting today:
Stay Informed
Sign up to be the first to hear about how to take action.
By completing this form, I agree to receive occasional emails per the terms of the ACLU’s privacy statement.
By completing this form, I agree to receive occasional emails per the terms of the ACLU’s privacy statement.