The Supreme Court Dealt A Blow to Trans Rights. Here's How to Take Action
Last week, the Supreme Court dealt a devastating blow to trans youth, their families and the communities that support them. In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court ruled in Skrmetti v. U.S. that SB1— Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming care for minors —does not illegally discriminate against individuals on the basis of sex or transgender status. This allows Tennessee, and any other states that may choose to follow its discriminatory lead, to ban medically-necessary health care for minors.
As one of the Tennessee parents challenging this ban put it, “the Supreme Court’s ruling on Wednesday will make it even harder for our daughter to get lifesaving health care. It will harm the lawsuit’s unnamed families and those that come after us, with younger kids just starting to understand and express themselves.”
This is a blow for trans youth who simply want to grow up healthy, supported, and seen. It is not, however, where the legal battle ends. Importantly, the Supreme Court limited its ruling to just Tennessee’s law. It did not decide on the broader questions about the legality of discrimination against transgender people in other areas.
Below, the American Civil Liberties Union breaks down what the court’s ruling means for trans youth across the nation, how we can all fight back, and how we can best support ourselves and our communities in this moment.
What Does the Court’s Ruling Mean For Trans Youth?
The Supreme Court’s ruling does not impact youth in states that have not passed gender-affirming care bans. For young people in Tennessee and Kentucky, however, this ruling means that access to medical care that has been deemed essential by every major medical organization will be denied. In states like Indiana, Alabama, and Florida, where courts have upheld similar bans, this ruling may embolden lawmakers and courts to let those bans stay in place.
Does Skrmetti Limit Care for Trans Adults?
No. This case was specifically about minors in two states – Kentucky and Tennessee.
The ruling didn’t address an equally powerful claim raised in Skrmetti and other cases: that these bans violate the rights of parents to direct their children’s medical care. In this case parents, who are legal adults, can challenge whether denying their minor child health care is a violation of their rights. That fight continues in lower courts, including a major case in Arkansas where four transgender youth and their families are challenging a similar ban.
What Can State Courts Do to Protect Trans Rights?
Though the Supreme Court did not provide federal-level security for trans individuals to seek care, at the state-level, bans can still be challenged under state constitutions and laws, which in some cases offer stronger protections than federal law.
This work is already happening in states like Montana, where state courts have blocked gender-affirming care bans under state law, and medical care is still accessible. Kansas and Ohio are also challenging bans on gender-affirming care in their court systems.
Does the Skrmetti Ruling Impact Any of Trump's Anti-Trans Executive Orders?
No. U.S. v. Skrmetti does not resolve challenges to anti-trans executive orders from the Trump administration. This case was about medical care for transgender minors in two states—it does not speak to broader attacks on transgender rights.
The ACLU, our nationwide affiliate network, and other LGBTQ rights organizations are challenging many of Trump’s attacks on transgender people’s rights and health care, including his orders restricting our ability to update passports and his order attempting to coerce doctors to drop their transgender patients.
How Can We Support the Trans Community Today?
Transgender youth deserve to be safe, loved, and respected—everywhere. You can help by taking action:
Connect with your state ACLU affiliate, PFLAG, or local LGBTQ organizations.
Support the Trans Youth Emergency Project, a nationwide effort by the Campaign for Southern Equality helping families access the care their children need.
Contact your members of Congress and demand they stand with transgender people and families—rejecting laws that let politicians dictate our personal health care decisions.
Every action, every voice, every ally matters. The fight for trans lives isn’t over—and it needs you.
Published June 26, 2025 at 07:55PM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/lrKAdfU
The Supreme Court Dealt A Blow to Trans Rights. Here's How to Take Action
Last week, the Supreme Court dealt a devastating blow to trans youth, their families and the communities that support them. In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court ruled in Skrmetti v. U.S. that SB1— Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming care for minors —does not illegally discriminate against individuals on the basis of sex or transgender status. This allows Tennessee, and any other states that may choose to follow its discriminatory lead, to ban medically-necessary health care for minors.
As one of the Tennessee parents challenging this ban put it, “the Supreme Court’s ruling on Wednesday will make it even harder for our daughter to get lifesaving health care. It will harm the lawsuit’s unnamed families and those that come after us, with younger kids just starting to understand and express themselves.”
This is a blow for trans youth who simply want to grow up healthy, supported, and seen. It is not, however, where the legal battle ends. Importantly, the Supreme Court limited its ruling to just Tennessee’s law. It did not decide on the broader questions about the legality of discrimination against transgender people in other areas.
Below, the American Civil Liberties Union breaks down what the court’s ruling means for trans youth across the nation, how we can all fight back, and how we can best support ourselves and our communities in this moment.
What Does the Court’s Ruling Mean For Trans Youth?
The Supreme Court’s ruling does not impact youth in states that have not passed gender-affirming care bans. For young people in Tennessee and Kentucky, however, this ruling means that access to medical care that has been deemed essential by every major medical organization will be denied. In states like Indiana, Alabama, and Florida, where courts have upheld similar bans, this ruling may embolden lawmakers and courts to let those bans stay in place.
Does Skrmetti Limit Care for Trans Adults?
No. This case was specifically about minors in two states – Kentucky and Tennessee.
The ruling didn’t address an equally powerful claim raised in Skrmetti and other cases: that these bans violate the rights of parents to direct their children’s medical care. In this case parents, who are legal adults, can challenge whether denying their minor child health care is a violation of their rights. That fight continues in lower courts, including a major case in Arkansas where four transgender youth and their families are challenging a similar ban.
What Can State Courts Do to Protect Trans Rights?
Though the Supreme Court did not provide federal-level security for trans individuals to seek care, at the state-level, bans can still be challenged under state constitutions and laws, which in some cases offer stronger protections than federal law.
This work is already happening in states like Montana, where state courts have blocked gender-affirming care bans under state law, and medical care is still accessible. Kansas and Ohio are also challenging bans on gender-affirming care in their court systems.
Does the Skrmetti Ruling Impact Any of Trump's Anti-Trans Executive Orders?
No. U.S. v. Skrmetti does not resolve challenges to anti-trans executive orders from the Trump administration. This case was about medical care for transgender minors in two states—it does not speak to broader attacks on transgender rights.
The ACLU, our nationwide affiliate network, and other LGBTQ rights organizations are challenging many of Trump’s attacks on transgender people’s rights and health care, including his orders restricting our ability to update passports and his order attempting to coerce doctors to drop their transgender patients.
How Can We Support the Trans Community Today?
Transgender youth deserve to be safe, loved, and respected—everywhere. You can help by taking action:
Connect with your state ACLU affiliate, PFLAG, or local LGBTQ organizations.
Support the Trans Youth Emergency Project, a nationwide effort by the Campaign for Southern Equality helping families access the care their children need.
Contact your members of Congress and demand they stand with transgender people and families—rejecting laws that let politicians dictate our personal health care decisions.
Every action, every voice, every ally matters. The fight for trans lives isn’t over—and it needs you.
Published June 27, 2025 at 12:25AM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/VSGCQD5
Jose Antonio Vargas on What We Get Wrong About Immigration Reform
This Mother’s Day was the first one that Jose Antonio Vargas celebrated with his mother in person in 32 years. It was also the first one his grandmother, who immigrated to the states in 1984 and helped raise Vargas from the age of 12, had celebrated with her daughter in as many years.
“I don’t have language for what [the reunion] was like,” says Vargas, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and immigrant rights activist. “There are just no words.”
Credit: Jose Antonio Vargas
Born in the Philippines, Vargas was sent to California to live with his grandparents, who were naturalized U.S. citizens. Though raised in America, Vargas remained undocumented and spent more than three decades without legal status. That changed this year after he took the significant risk of leaving the country to be processed for reentry with no guarantee he’d be allowed back in.
Christmas night 2024, Vargas drove from San Diego to Tijuana, Mexico. It was the first time he had left the U.S. since he arrived more than 20 years ago. After risking deportation by leaving, Vargas was eventually granted a temporary non-immigrant O visa for individuals with “extraordinary ability” — the same category once held by former First Lady Melania Trump.
“I would argue that all undocumented people in Trump’s America require extraordinary ability — and resilience — just to survive,” he says.
For Vargas, immigration isn’t just personal, it’s foundational to the American experience. In conversations with people across the country, he has encountered widespread misconceptions about how the immigration system works.
“People ask, ‘Why don’t you just get legal?’ as if it’s as simple as flipping a switch,” Vargas says. But legal pathways are narrow, costly, and often unavailable, even for those with U.S. citizen relatives or long-standing ties to the country.
Below, Vargas shares with the ACLU five common misconceptions that he’s encountered in his experience as an immigrant rights’ advocate – and how he’s fighting for change.
Everyone Can Get a Green Card or Visa
The U.S. offers green cards through just a handful of narrow paths: refugee status, the diversity visa lottery, family or employer sponsorship, or for people with extraordinary skills or wealth. These options are either highly competitive, extremely limited, or out of reach for most people.
For example, the diversity lottery only accepts a small number of applicants and excludes many countries entirely. Most family sponsorships have decades-long wait times. Employer-based green cards are usually reserved for people with advanced degrees. And marriage to a U.S. citizen doesn’t bypass the system—it requires financial sponsorship and, for those who entered unlawfully, can mean a three- or 10-year bar from re-entering the country.
The reality is that even when someone qualifies, long backlogs and strict caps often make immigration impossible. It’s not just difficult; it’s often not an option at all.
Being Undocumented Is a Choice
It’s a common assumption that people who are undocumented have ignored legal paths. But we know that many legal paths to citizenship are, in fact, blocked, crowded or impractical. When someone’s survival is at risk, waiting years for a visa isn’t realistic. Many come because they have no other option—and they often try to fix their status later, only to face bans, income requirements, or rejection.
Around one in five undocumented people are Dreamers—brought here as young kids, raised in the U.S., and often unaware of their status until they’re older. For them, and for many others, being undocumented isn’t about ignoring the rules, it’s about surviving a system that offers no real way in to the only place they’ve ever known as home.
Marriage Guarantees Legal Status
There’s a common misconception that marrying a U.S. citizen automatically leads to legal residency. It doesn’t. The process is complicated, and for many, it’s filled with risks.
If someone entered the U.S. without a visa and stayed more than six months, they can be barred from returning for three or 10 years if they leave to attend their green card interview abroad. That puts families in an impossible situation: stay together without status, or be separated for years. Even when the bars don’t apply, the process takes time, money, and documentation. The citizen-spouse must prove they can financially support their partner, and both must go through background checks, interviews, and legal filings.
Marriage can be a path, but it’s not simple, fast, or guaranteed. For many mixed-status couples, it’s a stressful, uncertain process with no clear outcome.
Immigration Policy Has Nothing to Do With Race
Much of today’s anti-immigrant rhetoric is rooted in fear of demographic change, especially when it comes to immigrants from nonwhite countries. After 2016, my nonprofit, Define American, studied top anti-immigration content on YouTube. Many of the most-watched videos promoted the “Great Replacement” theory: the idea that immigration is meant to undermine white political and cultural power. Once a fringe belief, it’s now echoed in mainstream political messaging.
Terms like “invasion” have been used widely in political campaigns and media coverage, fueling fear and dehumanization. This kind of rhetoric shapes public opinion and justifies harmful policies, including mass deportations and family separations. If we want fair and humane immigration policies, we have to address how racism continues to shape the conversation.
"Too Many" Immigrants Saps Resources
Immigrants play a critical role in the U.S. economy and communities. They make up about 18 percent of the workforce, contribute more than $3 trillion to our gross domestic product, and pay more than $500 billion in taxes each year.
They also fill jobs in industries with ongoing labor shortages, like agriculture, construction, and elder care. In health care, immigrants make up a major share of doctors, nurses, and home health aides, keeping essential systems running, especially during crises like the COVID-19 pandemic. Beyond the labor force, immigrants open businesses, create jobs, and support public services through taxes. As the U.S. population ages, we’ll increasingly rely on immigrants to sustain economic growth and meet basic workforce needs.
These are not people taking from the country—they’re helping it move forward. Policies that restrict their ability to stay and contribute don’t just hurt them—they hold all of us back.
An updated edition of Vargas’ memoir, “Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen,” which reflects even more deeply on how the rise of mis- and disinformation is reshaping how we think about immigration and fanning of anti-immigration sentiment, is available now.
Published June 18, 2025 at 01:07AM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/TzdIAiU
Jose Antonio Vargas on What We Get Wrong About Immigration Reform
This Mother’s Day was the first one that Jose Antonio Vargas celebrated with his mother in person in 32 years. It was also the first one his grandmother, who immigrated to the states in 1984 and helped raise Vargas from the age of 12, had celebrated with her daughter in as many years.
“I don’t have language for what [the reunion] was like,” says Vargas, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and immigrant rights activist. “There are just no words.”
Credit: Jose Antonio Vargas
Born in the Philippines, Vargas was sent to California to live with his grandparents, who were naturalized U.S. citizens. Though raised in America, Vargas remained undocumented and spent more than three decades without legal status. That changed this year after he took the significant risk of leaving the country to be processed for reentry with no guarantee he’d be allowed back in.
Christmas night 2024, Vargas drove from San Diego to Tijuana, Mexico. It was the first time he had left the U.S. since he arrived more than 20 years ago. After risking deportation by leaving, Vargas was eventually granted a temporary non-immigrant O visa for individuals with “extraordinary ability” — the same category once held by former First Lady Melania Trump.
“I would argue that all undocumented people in Trump’s America require extraordinary ability — and resilience — just to survive,” he says.
For Vargas, immigration isn’t just personal, it’s foundational to the American experience. In conversations with people across the country, he has encountered widespread misconceptions about how the immigration system works.
“People ask, ‘Why don’t you just get legal?’ as if it’s as simple as flipping a switch,” Vargas says. But legal pathways are narrow, costly, and often unavailable, even for those with U.S. citizen relatives or long-standing ties to the country.
Below, Vargas shares with the ACLU five common misconceptions that he’s encountered in his experience as an immigrant rights’ advocate – and how he’s fighting for change.
Everyone Can Get a Green Card or Visa
The U.S. offers green cards through just a handful of narrow paths: refugee status, the diversity visa lottery, family or employer sponsorship, or for people with extraordinary skills or wealth. These options are either highly competitive, extremely limited, or out of reach for most people.
For example, the diversity lottery only accepts a small number of applicants and excludes many countries entirely. Most family sponsorships have decades-long wait times. Employer-based green cards are usually reserved for people with advanced degrees. And marriage to a U.S. citizen doesn’t bypass the system—it requires financial sponsorship and, for those who entered unlawfully, can mean a three- or 10-year bar from re-entering the country.
The reality is that even when someone qualifies, long backlogs and strict caps often make immigration impossible. It’s not just difficult; it’s often not an option at all.
Being Undocumented Is a Choice
It’s a common assumption that people who are undocumented have ignored legal paths. But we know that many legal paths to citizenship are, in fact, blocked, crowded or impractical. When someone’s survival is at risk, waiting years for a visa isn’t realistic. Many come because they have no other option—and they often try to fix their status later, only to face bans, income requirements, or rejection.
Around one in five undocumented people are Dreamers—brought here as young kids, raised in the U.S., and often unaware of their status until they’re older. For them, and for many others, being undocumented isn’t about ignoring the rules, it’s about surviving a system that offers no real way in to the only place they’ve ever known as home.
Marriage Guarantees Legal Status
There’s a common misconception that marrying a U.S. citizen automatically leads to legal residency. It doesn’t. The process is complicated, and for many, it’s filled with risks.
If someone entered the U.S. without a visa and stayed more than six months, they can be barred from returning for three or 10 years if they leave to attend their green card interview abroad. That puts families in an impossible situation: stay together without status, or be separated for years. Even when the bars don’t apply, the process takes time, money, and documentation. The citizen-spouse must prove they can financially support their partner, and both must go through background checks, interviews, and legal filings.
Marriage can be a path, but it’s not simple, fast, or guaranteed. For many mixed-status couples, it’s a stressful, uncertain process with no clear outcome.
Immigration Policy Has Nothing to Do With Race
Much of today’s anti-immigrant rhetoric is rooted in fear of demographic change, especially when it comes to immigrants from nonwhite countries. After 2016, my nonprofit, Define American, studied top anti-immigration content on YouTube. Many of the most-watched videos promoted the “Great Replacement” theory: the idea that immigration is meant to undermine white political and cultural power. Once a fringe belief, it’s now echoed in mainstream political messaging.
Terms like “invasion” have been used widely in political campaigns and media coverage, fueling fear and dehumanization. This kind of rhetoric shapes public opinion and justifies harmful policies, including mass deportations and family separations. If we want fair and humane immigration policies, we have to address how racism continues to shape the conversation.
"Too Many" Immigrants Saps Resources
Immigrants play a critical role in the U.S. economy and communities. They make up about 18 percent of the workforce, contribute more than $3 trillion to our gross domestic product, and pay more than $500 billion in taxes each year.
They also fill jobs in industries with ongoing labor shortages, like agriculture, construction, and elder care. In health care, immigrants make up a major share of doctors, nurses, and home health aides, keeping essential systems running, especially during crises like the COVID-19 pandemic. Beyond the labor force, immigrants open businesses, create jobs, and support public services through taxes. As the U.S. population ages, we’ll increasingly rely on immigrants to sustain economic growth and meet basic workforce needs.
These are not people taking from the country—they’re helping it move forward. Policies that restrict their ability to stay and contribute don’t just hurt them—they hold all of us back.
An updated edition of Vargas’ memoir, “Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen,” which reflects even more deeply on how the rise of mis- and disinformation is reshaping how we think about immigration and fanning of anti-immigration sentiment, is available now.
Published June 17, 2025 at 08:37PM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/Sh1iy2X
Parents Push Back Against the Trump Administration's Latest Attack on Working Families
The Trump administration has followed through on its promise to gut the Head Start program. Since , it has slashed 60 percent of the Office of Head Start staff, closed half of the regional offices where staff with local knowledge worked, delayed funding necessary for payroll and rent, and undermined the program’s mission through its ban on anything it views as promoting diversity, equity, inclusion, and/or accessibility, or “DEIA.”
Launched in 1965, Head Start was an outgrowth of the Civil Rights Movement and its promise of racial and economic justice, particularly for Black women and children in the United States. For 60 years, Head Start has transformed the lives of more than 40 million families by preparing children for school, supporting parents -- particularly mothers -- with access to childcare, and strengthening health, education, and economic outcomes for children under five.
The Trump administration's efforts to shutter Head Start have forcibly closed some programs temporarily and have made it virtually impossible for programs to meet the needs of the children and families that rely on them. The result is chaos, confusion, and uncertainty for working families seeking childcare. This is but one of the administration’s latest attacks on children, women, and especially Black women and other women of color. Like the attacks on other safety net programs, like food stamps and Medicaid, attacks on Head Start seek to deprive women of the means to be financially independent. Without Head Start, many women would not be able to work or go to school.
The ACLU Women’s Rights Project, the ACLU of Washington, the ACLU of Illinois, the Impact Fund, filed a lawsuit on behalf of Parent Voices Oakland and Family Forward Oregon, and the Head Start Association of Washington state, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. The lawsuit asks the court to order the administration to stop the gutting of Head Start and to block the enforcement of its unconstitutional ban on programs that promote diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility.
Parents on the frontlines of the fight to protect Head Start have shared how they have already been affected by office closures, staff layoffs, and other attempts to undermine Head Start programming.
Desiree Guerra
Credit: Desiree Guerra
My two-year-old son is enrolled in an Early Head Start program, and my three-year-old daughter is planning to begin Head Start this September. Without Head Start, I would not be able to afford the rising cost of childcare in Oregon.
I have seen firsthand how Head Start has changed my children’s lives. Since joining Head Start, my son has improved his speech and motor skills, become more confident, and developed greater empathy for others. My daughter became more outgoing and confident through her experience with Head Start and had the opportunity to develop socially with other children her own age. Both children are proudly Black, Chilean, and white, and benefit from Head Start’s diverse environment, where they are able to learn about and are taught to celebrate their heritage and identity.
Head Start provides my son with healthy foods that he does not have access to at home due to cost. It also empowers me to be a better mother. I enrolled in Head Start’s parenting classes, which taught me to better understand the needs of my children and helped me to reparent myself. Today, because of Head Start, I can attend college as a full-time student, where I am studying social work. My ultimate goal is to obtain a master’s degree and to open a shelter for domestic violence survivors and their children. As a survivor, I want to help other families like mine and be part of the change I believe in. I can’t stay in college and achieve my dreams without the support the Head Start program provides. In fighting for Head Start, my family is not asking for handouts—we’re asking for a fair shot. It gives kids a chance to succeed and parents the support they need to keep going. These attacks on Head Start send the message that our children’s futures don’t matter, but they do. I won’t stop speaking up until they’re heard.
Osbornique Williams
Credit: Osbornique Williams
The Head Start teachers have been incredibly helpful in supporting my son learn how to better communicate. They take the time to make him feel heard and understood. With three kids, our household is very busy. Head Start provides a space for my son that is just for him—a setting where he gets to learn, interact, and play with other kids his own age.
My son is Black and multi-racial. His identity is celebrated in Head Start, where the students and staff also share his diverse background. I’m very fearful of my son losing this.
Because we cannot afford to pay for pre-school, without Head Start, my three-year-old son would lose access to Education. Since he is behind his peers in speech and language, losing the support of Head Start could undo the progress he has made and set him back even more.
Access to Head Start means that I am able to go to my doctor’s appointments, go grocery shopping, prepare meals, and otherwise take care of my family. Because of Head Start, I am able to be more focused and present with my other children, including going to my eight-year-old son’s sports practices and games to support and spend time with him. It takes a village to raise children, and Head Start is a part of that village.
Published June 13, 2025 at 08:51PM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/epWVAgx
Parents Push Back Against the Trump Administration's Latest Attack on Working Families
The Trump administration has followed through on its promise to gut the Head Start program. Since , it has slashed 60 percent of the Office of Head Start staff, closed half of the regional offices where staff with local knowledge worked, delayed funding necessary for payroll and rent, and undermined the program’s mission through its ban on anything it views as promoting diversity, equity, inclusion, and/or accessibility, or “DEIA.”
Launched in 1965, Head Start was an outgrowth of the Civil Rights Movement and its promise of racial and economic justice, particularly for Black women and children in the United States. For 60 years, Head Start has transformed the lives of more than 40 million families by preparing children for school, supporting parents -- particularly mothers -- with access to childcare, and strengthening health, education, and economic outcomes for children under five.
The Trump administration's efforts to shutter Head Start have forcibly closed some programs temporarily and have made it virtually impossible for programs to meet the needs of the children and families that rely on them. The result is chaos, confusion, and uncertainty for working families seeking childcare. This is but one of the administration’s latest attacks on children, women, and especially Black women and other women of color. Like the attacks on other safety net programs, like food stamps and Medicaid, attacks on Head Start seek to deprive women of the means to be financially independent. Without Head Start, many women would not be able to work or go to school.
The ACLU Women’s Rights Project, the ACLU of Washington, the ACLU of Illinois, the Impact Fund, filed a lawsuit on behalf of Parent Voices Oakland and Family Forward Oregon, and the Head Start Association of Washington state, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. The lawsuit asks the court to order the administration to stop the gutting of Head Start and to block the enforcement of its unconstitutional ban on programs that promote diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility.
Parents on the frontlines of the fight to protect Head Start have shared how they have already been affected by office closures, staff layoffs, and other attempts to undermine Head Start programming.
Desiree Guerra
Credit: Desiree Guerra
My two-year-old son is enrolled in an Early Head Start program, and my three-year-old daughter is planning to begin Head Start this September. Without Head Start, I would not be able to afford the rising cost of childcare in Oregon.
I have seen firsthand how Head Start has changed my children’s lives. Since joining Head Start, my son has improved his speech and motor skills, become more confident, and developed greater empathy for others. My daughter became more outgoing and confident through her experience with Head Start and had the opportunity to develop socially with other children her own age. Both children are proudly Black, Chilean, and white, and benefit from Head Start’s diverse environment, where they are able to learn about and are taught to celebrate their heritage and identity.
Head Start provides my son with healthy foods that he does not have access to at home due to cost. It also empowers me to be a better mother. I enrolled in Head Start’s parenting classes, which taught me to better understand the needs of my children and helped me to reparent myself. Today, because of Head Start, I can attend college as a full-time student, where I am studying social work. My ultimate goal is to obtain a master’s degree and to open a shelter for domestic violence survivors and their children. As a survivor, I want to help other families like mine and be part of the change I believe in. I can’t stay in college and achieve my dreams without the support the Head Start program provides. In fighting for Head Start, my family is not asking for handouts—we’re asking for a fair shot. It gives kids a chance to succeed and parents the support they need to keep going. These attacks on Head Start send the message that our children’s futures don’t matter, but they do. I won’t stop speaking up until they’re heard.
Osbornique Williams
Credit: Osbornique Williams
The Head Start teachers have been incredibly helpful in supporting my son learn how to better communicate. They take the time to make him feel heard and understood. With three kids, our household is very busy. Head Start provides a space for my son that is just for him—a setting where he gets to learn, interact, and play with other kids his own age.
My son is Black and multi-racial. His identity is celebrated in Head Start, where the students and staff also share his diverse background. I’m very fearful of my son losing this.
Because we cannot afford to pay for pre-school, without Head Start, my three-year-old son would lose access to Education. Since he is behind his peers in speech and language, losing the support of Head Start could undo the progress he has made and set him back even more.
Access to Head Start means that I am able to go to my doctor’s appointments, go grocery shopping, prepare meals, and otherwise take care of my family. Because of Head Start, I am able to be more focused and present with my other children, including going to my eight-year-old son’s sports practices and games to support and spend time with him. It takes a village to raise children, and Head Start is a part of that village.
Published June 14, 2025 at 01:21AM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/SFw3EhJ
Activist Mahmoud Khalil was illegally arrested and detained in March for being an outspoken advocate for Palestinian rights at Columbia University. He has been held at a detention facility in Louisiana thousands of miles away from his family for over three months now. While detained, his wife Dr. Noor Abdalla gave birth to the couple’s first child. Khalil was only briefly able to meet and hold his son last month.
On June 11, a judge granted Mahmoud Khalil’s request for a preliminary injunction, after concluding that he would continue to suffer irreparable harm if he remains detained.
Below, read Khalil’s letter to his son, which describes the pain and grief he has experienced being separated from his family:
Yaba Deen, it has been two weeks since you were born, and these are my first words to you.
In the early hours of 21 April, I waited on the other end of a phone as your mother labored to bring you into this world. I listened to her pained breaths and tried to speak comforting words into her ear over the crackling line. During your first moments, I buried my face in my arms and kept my voice low so that the 70 other men sleeping in this concrete room would not see my cloudy eyes or hear my voice catch. I feel suffocated by my rage and the cruelty of a system that deprived your mother and me of sharing this experience. Why do faceless politicians have the power to strip human beings of their divine moments?
Since that morning, I have come to recognize the look in the eyes of every father in this detention center. I sit here contemplating the immensity of your birth and wonder how many more firsts will be sacrificed to the whims of the US government, which denied me even the chance of furlough to attend your birth. How is it that the same politicians who preach “family values” are the ones tearing families apart?
Deen, my heart aches that I could not hold you in my arms and hear your first cry, that I could not unfurl your clenched fists or change your first diaper. I am sorry that I was not there to hold your mother’s hand or to recite the adhan, or call to prayer, in your ear. But my absence is not unique. Like other Palestinian fathers, I was separated from you by racist regimes and distant prisons. In Palestine, this pain is part of daily life. Babies are born every day without their fathers – not because their fathers chose to leave, but because they are taken by war, by bombs, by prison cells and by the cold machinery of occupation. The grief your mother and I feel is but one drop in a sea of sorrow that Palestinian families have drowned in for generations.
Deen, it was not a gap in the law that made me a political prisoner in Louisiana. It was my firm belief that our people deserve to be free, that their lives are worth more than the televised massacre we are witnessing in Gaza, and that the displacement that began in 1948 and culminated in the current genocide must finally end. This mere belief is what made the state scramble to detain me. No matter where I am when you read this – whether I’m in this country or another – I want to impress upon you one lesson:
The struggle for Palestinian liberation is not a burden; it is a duty and an honor we carry with pride. So at every turning point in my life, you will find me choosing Palestine. Palestine over ease. Palestine over comfort. Palestine over self. This struggle is sweeter than a life without dignity. The tyrants want us to submit, to obey, to be perfect victims. But we are free, and we will remain free. I hope you feel this as deeply as I do.
Deen, as a Palestinian refugee, I inherited a kind of exile that followed me to every border, every airport, every form. Borders mean something to me that they may not mean to you. Each crossing required me to prove my docility, my identity and my very right to exist. You were born an American citizen. You may never feel that weight. You may never have to translate your humanity through paperwork, countless visa applications and interview appointments. I hope you use this not to separate yourself from others, but to uplift those who live under the same circumstances that once constrained me. But I won’t pretend this citizenship protects you. Not completely. Not when you have my name. Not when those in power still see our people as threats.
One day, you might ask why people are punished for standing up for Palestine, why truth and compassion feel dangerous to power. These are hard questions, but I hope our story shows you this: the world needs more courage, not less. It needs people who choose justice over convenience.
It is nothing but the dehumanization and racist disregard for Palestinians that renders their lives forgettable and that dares describe Palestinian fathers who love their sons as “terrorists”. Perhaps that is why the world so quickly forgot the killing of four-month-old Iman Hijjo in Gaza in 2001. Why did Ahmed Abu Artema’s beloved son Abdullah die hungry for bread? Who recalls the children lost in the Flour Massacre? Where is the justice for the fathers in the West Bank who carefully dress their sons for prison? Why does liberty not visit the bodies of Palestinian children whose limbs are missing, whose ribs are exposed under thin skin and who are born lovingly only to die under an Israeli bomb?
On this first Mother’s Day for Noor, I dream of a world where all families are reunited to celebrate the incredible women in their lives. Many years ago, on one of our very first dates, I had asked your mother what she would change in the world if she could. Her simple response was: “I just want people to be nicer to each other.” Deen, you were born to a mother as gentle as she is fierce. I pray that you live in a world shaped by that kindness. I hope, with all my heart, that you will not witness the oppression that I’ve known. I hope that you never need to chant for Palestine, because it has long been free with dignity and prosperity for all. Should that day come, know that it was ushered in through the courage of those who came before you. I am certain that in this new world, you and I will visit Tiberias together, drink from the river and marvel at the sea. There, in a free and just Palestine, you will see the fruits of our struggle.
Deen, my love for you is deeper than anything I have ever known. Loving you is not separate from the struggle for liberation. It is liberation itself. I fight for you, and for every Palestinian child whose life deserves safety, tenderness and freedom. I hope one day you will stand tall knowing your father was not absent out of apathy, but out of conviction. And I will spend my life making up for the moments we lost – starting with this one, writing to you with all the love in my heart.
Published June 13, 2025 at 06:57PM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/7zE15Um
Activist Mahmoud Khalil was illegally arrested and detained in March for being an outspoken advocate for Palestinian rights at Columbia University. He has been held at a detention facility in Louisiana thousands of miles away from his family for over three months now. While detained, his wife Dr. Noor Abdalla gave birth to the couple’s first child. Khalil was only briefly able to meet and hold his son last month.
On June 11, a judge granted Mahmoud Khalil’s request for a preliminary injunction, after concluding that he would continue to suffer irreparable harm if he remains detained.
Below, read Khalil’s letter to his son, which describes the pain and grief he has experienced being separated from his family:
Yaba Deen, it has been two weeks since you were born, and these are my first words to you.
In the early hours of 21 April, I waited on the other end of a phone as your mother labored to bring you into this world. I listened to her pained breaths and tried to speak comforting words into her ear over the crackling line. During your first moments, I buried my face in my arms and kept my voice low so that the 70 other men sleeping in this concrete room would not see my cloudy eyes or hear my voice catch. I feel suffocated by my rage and the cruelty of a system that deprived your mother and me of sharing this experience. Why do faceless politicians have the power to strip human beings of their divine moments?
Since that morning, I have come to recognize the look in the eyes of every father in this detention center. I sit here contemplating the immensity of your birth and wonder how many more firsts will be sacrificed to the whims of the US government, which denied me even the chance of furlough to attend your birth. How is it that the same politicians who preach “family values” are the ones tearing families apart?
Deen, my heart aches that I could not hold you in my arms and hear your first cry, that I could not unfurl your clenched fists or change your first diaper. I am sorry that I was not there to hold your mother’s hand or to recite the adhan, or call to prayer, in your ear. But my absence is not unique. Like other Palestinian fathers, I was separated from you by racist regimes and distant prisons. In Palestine, this pain is part of daily life. Babies are born every day without their fathers – not because their fathers chose to leave, but because they are taken by war, by bombs, by prison cells and by the cold machinery of occupation. The grief your mother and I feel is but one drop in a sea of sorrow that Palestinian families have drowned in for generations.
Deen, it was not a gap in the law that made me a political prisoner in Louisiana. It was my firm belief that our people deserve to be free, that their lives are worth more than the televised massacre we are witnessing in Gaza, and that the displacement that began in 1948 and culminated in the current genocide must finally end. This mere belief is what made the state scramble to detain me. No matter where I am when you read this – whether I’m in this country or another – I want to impress upon you one lesson:
The struggle for Palestinian liberation is not a burden; it is a duty and an honor we carry with pride. So at every turning point in my life, you will find me choosing Palestine. Palestine over ease. Palestine over comfort. Palestine over self. This struggle is sweeter than a life without dignity. The tyrants want us to submit, to obey, to be perfect victims. But we are free, and we will remain free. I hope you feel this as deeply as I do.
Deen, as a Palestinian refugee, I inherited a kind of exile that followed me to every border, every airport, every form. Borders mean something to me that they may not mean to you. Each crossing required me to prove my docility, my identity and my very right to exist. You were born an American citizen. You may never feel that weight. You may never have to translate your humanity through paperwork, countless visa applications and interview appointments. I hope you use this not to separate yourself from others, but to uplift those who live under the same circumstances that once constrained me. But I won’t pretend this citizenship protects you. Not completely. Not when you have my name. Not when those in power still see our people as threats.
One day, you might ask why people are punished for standing up for Palestine, why truth and compassion feel dangerous to power. These are hard questions, but I hope our story shows you this: the world needs more courage, not less. It needs people who choose justice over convenience.
It is nothing but the dehumanization and racist disregard for Palestinians that renders their lives forgettable and that dares describe Palestinian fathers who love their sons as “terrorists”. Perhaps that is why the world so quickly forgot the killing of four-month-old Iman Hijjo in Gaza in 2001. Why did Ahmed Abu Artema’s beloved son Abdullah die hungry for bread? Who recalls the children lost in the Flour Massacre? Where is the justice for the fathers in the West Bank who carefully dress their sons for prison? Why does liberty not visit the bodies of Palestinian children whose limbs are missing, whose ribs are exposed under thin skin and who are born lovingly only to die under an Israeli bomb?
On this first Mother’s Day for Noor, I dream of a world where all families are reunited to celebrate the incredible women in their lives. Many years ago, on one of our very first dates, I had asked your mother what she would change in the world if she could. Her simple response was: “I just want people to be nicer to each other.” Deen, you were born to a mother as gentle as she is fierce. I pray that you live in a world shaped by that kindness. I hope, with all my heart, that you will not witness the oppression that I’ve known. I hope that you never need to chant for Palestine, because it has long been free with dignity and prosperity for all. Should that day come, know that it was ushered in through the courage of those who came before you. I am certain that in this new world, you and I will visit Tiberias together, drink from the river and marvel at the sea. There, in a free and just Palestine, you will see the fruits of our struggle.
Deen, my love for you is deeper than anything I have ever known. Loving you is not separate from the struggle for liberation. It is liberation itself. I fight for you, and for every Palestinian child whose life deserves safety, tenderness and freedom. I hope one day you will stand tall knowing your father was not absent out of apathy, but out of conviction. And I will spend my life making up for the moments we lost – starting with this one, writing to you with all the love in my heart.
Published June 13, 2025 at 02:27PM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/rnW5syg
What the Marriage Equality Backlash Taught Me About the Fight for Trans Rights
On June 26, 2015, the Supreme Court ruled that excluding same-sex couples from civil marriage was unconstitutional. I was outside the Supreme Court that day, celebrating the advocacy achievement that seemed impossible a decade prior when bans on marriage for same-sex couples passed by wide margins in state after state. Couples, families, and advocates gathered on the steps outside the court, singing, crying, and embracing. I thought about my younger self who could not have imagined a life and future as a queer adult, and about the generations of LGBTQ people who came before me and faced so many more obstacles to realizing their own queer adulthoods.
Though the fight for legal recognition of marriage for same-sex couples spanned decades, the final stages of progress seemed lightning fast for many people outside of the LGBTQ legal movement.
In June of 2013, the Supreme Court held in United States v. Windsor that the federal law defining marriage as between one man and one woman violated the Constitution's equal protection and due process guarantees. That decision opened the door to immediate constitutional challenges to the remaining state-level bans on marriage for same-sex couples. Two years later, in 2015, the Supreme Court held in Obergefell v. Hodges that excluding same-sex couples from marriage violated the Constitution.
The Obergefell ruling was a defining moment in our country’s legal history that came after decades of hard work and setbacks. Today, my child’s generation cannot even fathom that same-sex couples could not marry in many states when they were born. That transformation in law and culture has been met with fierce backlash from opponents of LGBTQ equality.
Immediately following the court’s decision in Obergefell, the aggressive movement to prevent marriage equality trained its financial resources and advocacy efforts on curtailing legal equality for LGBTQ people under local, state and federal civil rights statutes. In November 2015, a ballot campaign in Houston, Texas became the testing ground for new anti-LGBT messaging. Houston voters were voting on a repeal of a municipal non-discrimination ordinance, HERO, that would have extended local civil rights protections to fifteen classes of people, including veterans, people of color, disabled people, women and LGBTQ people.
The campaign in favor of repealing the ordinance focused its messaging entirely on the false claim that passing the ordinance would allow men to enter women’s bathrooms and harm women and girls. Campaign ads depicted shadowy figures looming over young girls and the refrain “no men in women’s restrooms” became the tagline that ultimately drove voters to repeal the ordinance at the ballot that November. Hoping to redirect voters towards the many groups the ordinance would protect, the pro-HERO campaign did not engage with the opposition’s messaging directly. The strategy failed. Whether we wanted to or not, LGBTQ advocates needed to face our opposition’s messaging head-on, particularly when, in the months that followed, dozens of bills were introduced across the country to ban transgender people from using restrooms that aligned with their gender identity. We did not pick a fight over bathrooms, the fact that we exist and go to the bathroom became the focal point of efforts to undermine legal gains for all LGBTQ people.
Between 2016 and 2019, efforts to enact anti-trans legislation largely stalled. Ballot measures seeking to roll back trans-inclusive laws or codify anti-trans ones also failed. It was not until the introduction of the Equality Act in Congress, a bill that would add explicit protections for LGBT people into federal civil rights statutes, that a new anti-trans strategy gained momentum. As with previous efforts to stall local non-discrimination ordinances in 2015 and 2016, efforts to kill the Equality Act claimed that protecting transgender people would threaten others. This time, our opponents focused on sports. Once again, transgender people did not pick the fight, we just existed and became the focal point of efforts to stop civil rights legislation.
Just as equality opponents were building momentum coalescing around sports, in June 2020 the Supreme Court issued a decision in Bostock v. Clayton County, confirming that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act applied to LGBTQ people. In a 6-3 opinion authored by Justice Neil Gorsuch, the court found three LGBTQ workers fired because they were either gay or transgender – including American Civil Liberties Union client and transgender woman Aimee Stephens – were discriminated against on the basis of their sex in violation of the law. The court concluded that it is inherently a form of sex discrimination to discriminate against someone because of their sexual orientation or transgender status. This confirmed that LGBTQ workers were federally protected under our nation’s civil rights statutes.
Like Obergefell, Bostock sparked a fierce backlash from anti-equality advocates. Limiting the decision’s scope immediately became a top priority for anti-LGBTQ legislators. Between 2021 and 2023, lawmakers introduced hundreds of bills targeting LGBTQ people, the majority of which sought to limit rights for transgender adolescents.
At first, these bills focused on the very small number of transgender students participating in school sports, but soon lawmakers escalated their attacks and began to introduce bills targeting medical care. When the first categorical ban on medical care for transgender adolescents passed in Arkansas in 2021, then-Governor Asa Hutchinson vetoed the bill concerned that it allowed for vast government overreach into the private and vulnerable decisions of adolescents, their parents and their doctors.
That measured resistance to usurping the careful and aligned judgment of youth, their parents and their doctors quickly gave way to copycat legislation across the country that sought to categorically ban evidence-based medical care for transgender adolescents. In February 2022, Texas even threatened to investigate families for child abuse for simply following the advice of medical providers to treat their adolescent transgender children with gender affirming medical care. All of a sudden, families began to fear that they could lose custody of their children by following best practice medicine.
While transgender youth and their families desperately sought refuge from fights that kept arriving at their doorstep, the ACLU and other LGBTQ legal groups immediately went to court to try to stop the escalating harms of the health bans. Our timing was critical; each day these bans were allowed to be enforced was another day transgender youth were going without needed care. Thankfully, we were largely successful at first and, until July 2023, stopped every law from going into effect. District court judges ruled that, because these bans discriminated against transgender people on the basis of their sex and transgender status, as well as infringed upon the rights of parents to direct the medical care of their minor children, they were likely unconstitutional. These district court orders protected vulnerable adolescents from losing the medical care that had allowed them to thrive.
This protection changed when the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals allowed Tennessee’s ban to go into effect. That decision set off a chain reaction in the appellate courts and soon nearly every medical care ban went into effect, forcing families to uproot their lives to try to preserve care for their adolescent children. Compelled by the severity of harms facing our clients and transgender adolescents across the country, the ACLU and Lambda Legal asked the Supreme Court to review the Sixth Circuit’s harmful decision in November 2023. Not only did the appellate court’s decision upend the state of health care for transgender youth, it also began to undermine critical constitutional protections for everyone. For those of us who have dedicated our lives to fighting for our community, it was clear that the stakes were only getting higher and bringing our fight to the Supreme Court was a necessary step to slow catastrophic erosion of medical care and legal rights.
Ultimately, the LGBTQ movement did not pick a fight over restrooms or sports or health care for minors. Rather, opponents of LGBTQ equality strategically positioned transgender people as a threat to others as part of their decades-long goal to undermine LGBTQ equality movements overall.
For the people who now tell transgender people that instead of fighting these bills targeting our health care, our education, our history, we should have waited for a more opportune time to defend our rights and survival, the question is: what should we have done? Just accepted our wholesale exclusion from public life? Who would that have helped? Certainly not cisgender women in sports, or LGB people seeking to learn about their histories, or people hoping to form families with IVF.
We did not pick this fight, we simply existed. But not fighting to exist was never an option.
Published June 9, 2025 at 09:46PM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/jIs5bQt
What the Marriage Equality Backlash Taught Me About the Fight for Trans Rights
On June 26, 2015, the Supreme Court ruled that excluding same-sex couples from civil marriage was unconstitutional. I was outside the Supreme Court that day, celebrating the advocacy achievement that seemed impossible a decade prior when bans on marriage for same-sex couples passed by wide margins in state after state. Couples, families, and advocates gathered on the steps outside the court, singing, crying, and embracing. I thought about my younger self who could not have imagined a life and future as a queer adult, and about the generations of LGBTQ people who came before me and faced so many more obstacles to realizing their own queer adulthoods.
Though the fight for legal recognition of marriage for same-sex couples spanned decades, the final stages of progress seemed lightning fast for many people outside of the LGBTQ legal movement.
In June of 2013, the Supreme Court held in United States v. Windsor that the federal law defining marriage as between one man and one woman violated the Constitution's equal protection and due process guarantees. That decision opened the door to immediate constitutional challenges to the remaining state-level bans on marriage for same-sex couples. Two years later, in 2015, the Supreme Court held in Obergefell v. Hodges that excluding same-sex couples from marriage violated the Constitution.
The Obergefell ruling was a defining moment in our country’s legal history that came after decades of hard work and setbacks. Today, my child’s generation cannot even fathom that same-sex couples could not marry in many states when they were born. That transformation in law and culture has been met with fierce backlash from opponents of LGBTQ equality.
Immediately following the court’s decision in Obergefell, the aggressive movement to prevent marriage equality trained its financial resources and advocacy efforts on curtailing legal equality for LGBTQ people under local, state and federal civil rights statutes. In November 2015, a ballot campaign in Houston, Texas became the testing ground for new anti-LGBT messaging. Houston voters were voting on a repeal of a municipal non-discrimination ordinance, HERO, that would have extended local civil rights protections to fifteen classes of people, including veterans, people of color, disabled people, women and LGBTQ people.
The campaign in favor of repealing the ordinance focused its messaging entirely on the false claim that passing the ordinance would allow men to enter women’s bathrooms and harm women and girls. Campaign ads depicted shadowy figures looming over young girls and the refrain “no men in women’s restrooms” became the tagline that ultimately drove voters to repeal the ordinance at the ballot that November. Hoping to redirect voters towards the many groups the ordinance would protect, the pro-HERO campaign did not engage with the opposition’s messaging directly. The strategy failed. Whether we wanted to or not, LGBTQ advocates needed to face our opposition’s messaging head-on, particularly when, in the months that followed, dozens of bills were introduced across the country to ban transgender people from using restrooms that aligned with their gender identity. We did not pick a fight over bathrooms, the fact that we exist and go to the bathroom became the focal point of efforts to undermine legal gains for all LGBTQ people.
Between 2016 and 2019, efforts to enact anti-trans legislation largely stalled. Ballot measures seeking to roll back trans-inclusive laws or codify anti-trans ones also failed. It was not until the introduction of the Equality Act in Congress, a bill that would add explicit protections for LGBT people into federal civil rights statutes, that a new anti-trans strategy gained momentum. As with previous efforts to stall local non-discrimination ordinances in 2015 and 2016, efforts to kill the Equality Act claimed that protecting transgender people would threaten others. This time, our opponents focused on sports. Once again, transgender people did not pick the fight, we just existed and became the focal point of efforts to stop civil rights legislation.
Just as equality opponents were building momentum coalescing around sports, in June 2020 the Supreme Court issued a decision in Bostock v. Clayton County, confirming that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act applied to LGBTQ people. In a 6-3 opinion authored by Justice Neil Gorsuch, the court found three LGBTQ workers fired because they were either gay or transgender – including American Civil Liberties Union client and transgender woman Aimee Stephens – were discriminated against on the basis of their sex in violation of the law. The court concluded that it is inherently a form of sex discrimination to discriminate against someone because of their sexual orientation or transgender status. This confirmed that LGBTQ workers were federally protected under our nation’s civil rights statutes.
Like Obergefell, Bostock sparked a fierce backlash from anti-equality advocates. Limiting the decision’s scope immediately became a top priority for anti-LGBTQ legislators. Between 2021 and 2023, lawmakers introduced hundreds of bills targeting LGBTQ people, the majority of which sought to limit rights for transgender adolescents.
At first, these bills focused on the very small number of transgender students participating in school sports, but soon lawmakers escalated their attacks and began to introduce bills targeting medical care. When the first categorical ban on medical care for transgender adolescents passed in Arkansas in 2021, then-Governor Asa Hutchinson vetoed the bill concerned that it allowed for vast government overreach into the private and vulnerable decisions of adolescents, their parents and their doctors.
That measured resistance to usurping the careful and aligned judgment of youth, their parents and their doctors quickly gave way to copycat legislation across the country that sought to categorically ban evidence-based medical care for transgender adolescents. In February 2022, Texas even threatened to investigate families for child abuse for simply following the advice of medical providers to treat their adolescent transgender children with gender affirming medical care. All of a sudden, families began to fear that they could lose custody of their children by following best practice medicine.
While transgender youth and their families desperately sought refuge from fights that kept arriving at their doorstep, the ACLU and other LGBTQ legal groups immediately went to court to try to stop the escalating harms of the health bans. Our timing was critical; each day these bans were allowed to be enforced was another day transgender youth were going without needed care. Thankfully, we were largely successful at first and, until July 2023, stopped every law from going into effect. District court judges ruled that, because these bans discriminated against transgender people on the basis of their sex and transgender status, as well as infringed upon the rights of parents to direct the medical care of their minor children, they were likely unconstitutional. These district court orders protected vulnerable adolescents from losing the medical care that had allowed them to thrive.
This protection changed when the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals allowed Tennessee’s ban to go into effect. That decision set off a chain reaction in the appellate courts and soon nearly every medical care ban went into effect, forcing families to uproot their lives to try to preserve care for their adolescent children. Compelled by the severity of harms facing our clients and transgender adolescents across the country, the ACLU and Lambda Legal asked the Supreme Court to review the Sixth Circuit’s harmful decision in November 2023. Not only did the appellate court’s decision upend the state of health care for transgender youth, it also began to undermine critical constitutional protections for everyone. For those of us who have dedicated our lives to fighting for our community, it was clear that the stakes were only getting higher and bringing our fight to the Supreme Court was a necessary step to slow catastrophic erosion of medical care and legal rights.
Ultimately, the LGBTQ movement did not pick a fight over restrooms or sports or health care for minors. Rather, opponents of LGBTQ equality strategically positioned transgender people as a threat to others as part of their decades-long goal to undermine LGBTQ equality movements overall.
For the people who now tell transgender people that instead of fighting these bills targeting our health care, our education, our history, we should have waited for a more opportune time to defend our rights and survival, the question is: what should we have done? Just accepted our wholesale exclusion from public life? Who would that have helped? Certainly not cisgender women in sports, or LGB people seeking to learn about their histories, or people hoping to form families with IVF.
We did not pick this fight, we simply existed. But not fighting to exist was never an option.
Published June 10, 2025 at 02:16AM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/OqUhCBP
Books are disappearing from shelves again – this time at the more than 100 schools serving the children of active-duty and civilian military personnel.
This rampant censorship is the result of the Department of Defense’s new policies banning books, classroom discussions, events, and extracurriculars that relate to race and gender in military-run schools on bases around the world. At the American Civil Liberties Union, we know that all students deserve access to a diverse education and the DOD’s efforts to strip them of this right violates the First Amendment. So we took the DOD to court.
Below, find the books the DOD claims promotes allegedly “woke” ideologies. A list of 233 of the 555 books alleged to be banned can be found here.
Freckleface Strawberry, by Julianne Moore
Authored by actress Julianne Moore, this story follows a young girl with bright red hair and lots of freckles, which earns her the nickname Freckleface Strawberry. While she’s full of energy and loves to play, she feels self-conscious about her freckles because they make her look different from other kids.
To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
Set in the racially charged American South during the 1930s, this classic novel follows a young girl’s coming-of-age as her father, a principled lawyer, defends a man facing grave injustice. Through her innocent eyes, the story explores complex themes like morality, empathy, and social inequality. It’s been a part of school English curriculums since it was published in 1960.
Julián Is a Mermaid, by Jessica Love
This picture book tells the story of a boy named Julián who is inspired by beautiful mermaids he sees one day. As he explores his imagination and sense of identity, the book gently celebrates self-expression, acceptance, and the freedom to be oneself.
The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood
Set in a dystopian future where a theocratic regime strips women of their rights, this chilling narrative follows a woman forced into reproductive servitude. It examines themes of power, control, and resistance with eerie relevance and emotional depth.
I Kissed Shara Wheeler, by Casey McQuiston
In this contemporary young adult romance-mystery, a straight-laced high school girl finds herself unraveling clues left behind by her enigmatic classmate, Shara Wheeler. What follows is a playful yet meaningful journey through identity, love, and the unexpected connections we form.
The Color Purple, by Alice Walker
Told through deeply personal letters, this novel traces the life of a Black woman in early 20th-century rural America as she endures hardship and seeks empowerment. The story is a powerful portrait of resilience, sisterhood, and the journey toward self-worth that has been adapted for stage and screen.
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
A staple found in many college and late-high school classrooms, this nonfiction work exposes how mass incarceration functions as a contemporary system of racial control in the United States. Through clear analysis and compelling research, it challenges readers to confront the deep inequalities within the criminal justice system.
The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini
Spanning decades and continents, this emotional novel follows the intertwined lives of two boys from Kabul, exploring how choices made in youth can echo across time. This novel has been banned repeatedly for exploring Afghan culture, Islam, and the impact of sexual violence.
The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
This historical novel sheds light on the brutal realities of a reform school in the segregated American South. The book sheds light on the corruption within the criminal justice system and the cruelties faced by Black individuals, particularly during the Jim Crow era.
The Power of Style: How Fashion and Beauty Are Being Used to Reclaim Cultures by Christian Allaire
This nonfiction work highlights how marginalized communities are using fashion, beauty, and personal expression to reclaim narratives and celebrate cultural pride. It’s a visually rich celebration of identity and representation.
The Climate Book by Greta Thunberg
A comprehensive and urgent call to action edited by young activist Greta Thunberg, this book gathers insights from scientists, activists, and experts around the world to explain the climate crisis.
The Untold History of the United States by Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick
This expansive work reexamines major events in American history from a critical perspective, focusing on overlooked truths and lesser-known narratives. It challenges conventional interpretations and encourages readers to think more deeply about the nation’s past and future.
Rise: A Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now by Jeff Yang, Phil Yu, and Philip Wang
This cultural chronicle mixes personal stories, humor, and history to explore how Asian Americans have shaped—and been shaped by—pop culture. It celebrates milestones and moments of progress while examining the challenges of representation and identity.
Published June 7, 2025 at 01:58AM
via ACLU https://ift.tt/snC6ZXG
Books are disappearing from shelves again – this time at the more than 100 schools serving the children of active-duty and civilian military personnel.
This rampant censorship is the result of the Department of Defense’s new policies banning books, classroom discussions, events, and extracurriculars that relate to race and gender in military-run schools on bases around the world. At the American Civil Liberties Union, we know that all students deserve access to a diverse education and the DOD’s efforts to strip them of this right violates the First Amendment. So we took the DOD to court.
Below, find the books the DOD claims promotes allegedly “woke” ideologies. A list of 233 of the 555 books alleged to be banned can be found here.
Freckleface Strawberry, by Julianne Moore
Authored by actress Julianne Moore, this story follows a young girl with bright red hair and lots of freckles, which earns her the nickname Freckleface Strawberry. While she’s full of energy and loves to play, she feels self-conscious about her freckles because they make her look different from other kids.
To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
Set in the racially charged American South during the 1930s, this classic novel follows a young girl’s coming-of-age as her father, a principled lawyer, defends a man facing grave injustice. Through her innocent eyes, the story explores complex themes like morality, empathy, and social inequality. It’s been a part of school English curriculums since it was published in 1960.
Julián Is a Mermaid, by Jessica Love
This picture book tells the story of a boy named Julián who is inspired by beautiful mermaids he sees one day. As he explores his imagination and sense of identity, the book gently celebrates self-expression, acceptance, and the freedom to be oneself.
The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood
Set in a dystopian future where a theocratic regime strips women of their rights, this chilling narrative follows a woman forced into reproductive servitude. It examines themes of power, control, and resistance with eerie relevance and emotional depth.
I Kissed Shara Wheeler, by Casey McQuiston
In this contemporary young adult romance-mystery, a straight-laced high school girl finds herself unraveling clues left behind by her enigmatic classmate, Shara Wheeler. What follows is a playful yet meaningful journey through identity, love, and the unexpected connections we form.
The Color Purple, by Alice Walker
Told through deeply personal letters, this novel traces the life of a Black woman in early 20th-century rural America as she endures hardship and seeks empowerment. The story is a powerful portrait of resilience, sisterhood, and the journey toward self-worth that has been adapted for stage and screen.
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
A staple found in many college and late-high school classrooms, this nonfiction work exposes how mass incarceration functions as a contemporary system of racial control in the United States. Through clear analysis and compelling research, it challenges readers to confront the deep inequalities within the criminal justice system.
The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini
Spanning decades and continents, this emotional novel follows the intertwined lives of two boys from Kabul, exploring how choices made in youth can echo across time. This novel has been banned repeatedly for exploring Afghan culture, Islam, and the impact of sexual violence.
The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
This historical novel sheds light on the brutal realities of a reform school in the segregated American South. The book sheds light on the corruption within the criminal justice system and the cruelties faced by Black individuals, particularly during the Jim Crow era.
The Power of Style: How Fashion and Beauty Are Being Used to Reclaim Cultures by Christian Allaire
This nonfiction work highlights how marginalized communities are using fashion, beauty, and personal expression to reclaim narratives and celebrate cultural pride. It’s a visually rich celebration of identity and representation.
The Climate Book by Greta Thunberg
A comprehensive and urgent call to action edited by young activist Greta Thunberg, this book gathers insights from scientists, activists, and experts around the world to explain the climate crisis.
The Untold History of the United States by Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick
This expansive work reexamines major events in American history from a critical perspective, focusing on overlooked truths and lesser-known narratives. It challenges conventional interpretations and encourages readers to think more deeply about the nation’s past and future.
Rise: A Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now by Jeff Yang, Phil Yu, and Philip Wang
This cultural chronicle mixes personal stories, humor, and history to explore how Asian Americans have shaped—and been shaped by—pop culture. It celebrates milestones and moments of progress while examining the challenges of representation and identity.
Published June 6, 2025 at 09:28PM
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From Day One, Trump's Immigration Agenda Has Grown More Extreme
Four months into President Donald Trump’s second term, he has aggressively pursued efforts to strip entire communities of their rights and circumvent the rule of law
While many voters expected Trump to ramp up deportations, they did not foresee the hurricane of horrors he has unleashed. The president has attempted to assert war-time authorities to disappear people to foreign prisons without due process based on their tattoos and clothing. He has arbitrarily punished students who are non-citizens, jailing some and forcing others to flee the country. He put U.S. citizen children on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deportation flights, including those receiving cancer treatment. Trump’s ICE chief has said he wants to create a deportation system like “Amazon Prime for human beings” in a brutal and dehumanizing drive to deport as many people as quickly as possible, no matter the cost. Trump is now poised to turn the military, plus thousands of federal, state and local law enforcement agents, on entire communities in a hunt for our immigrant neighbors that will put all of our civil liberties in danger.
As we prepare for the fight ahead, here are three key areas to watch:
Watch: Trump’s team will continue to experiment with extreme legal “authorities” and enlist or threaten every agency he can to expand his deportation force.
The Trump administration has unlawfully used the Alien Enemies Act --- a wartime authority that had only been invoked three times in over 200 years and only during a declared war—to disappear people to CECOT, a brutal prison in El Salvador, without due process. The administration has shipped immigrants to the military prison at Guantanamo Bay. Trump is also attempting to swiftly deport people to dangerous countries to which they have no connection, like South Sudan, which is on the brink of civil war; and Libya, which is known for electrocuting and sexually assaulting migrants imprisoned in militia-run detention facilities. Some of those already deported to CECOT had protected status or pending asylum cases, including Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland father the government admits it sent erroneously, but now refuses any ability or responsibility to return to his family. The ACLU has filed more than 10 habeas corpus, arguing that the government must have a just cause for detaining or imprisoning someone, to stop these illegal deportations without due process.
Trump is reportedly seeking to use National Guard troops for immigration enforcement, opening a very dangerous chapter where troops would be patrolling our neighborhoods looking for families, children, and others who they think are undocumented. We have never experienced a moment like this in our lifetimes, when our troops are being turned against our communities, acting in the service of a military police state.
Watch: The president is creating a “Show Me Your Papers Nation,” with new criminal penalties—even for children—while using an increasingly aggressive and untrained set of immigration agents to enforce it.
Within weeks of taking control, the Trump administration initiated a new, nationwide registration system requiring that kids as young as 14 and adults who are non-citizens register. Now, millions of our neighbors and family members face a dangerous Catch-22: If they show up to “register” with ICE, they may be taken into custody and swiftly deported from their homes and families. If they don’t, they face criminal prosecution for failing to register. Any encounter with law enforcement – including when people report a crime or seek protection – could lead to police questioning a person about their immigration and registration status.
At the same time, the Trump administration is also seeking 20,000 federal, state and local law enforcement officers and at least 21,000 National Guard troops to join its deportation force. It is re-assigning thousands of federal law enforcement agents from serious crime investigation duties to immigration enforcement. This is straight out a dystopian novel: The president is amassing a massive internal police force under his command, with a mandate to execute a massive round-up of people in our country, who are cast as “criminals” because they have violated a law that makes failing to turn themselves into the government a crime.
Watch: Trump is using the immigration system to attack dissent among students, members of Congress and anyone who stands in his way.
Already, we have seen immigrants deported at airports for criticizing President Trump, and students have their visas revoked for expressing their views. We now know that the State Department is asserting that students and others, like ACLU client Mahmoud Khalil, can be expelled purely for their opinions. The administration is also threatening anyone who helps immigrants to defend their rights, including legal services groups, entire cities and states, and even members of Congress. These attacks are transparently about consolidating power, bringing critics to heel, and eliminating the space to fight back.
Communities Are Still Fighting Back
Still, there are stories of communities working to support their neighbors and loved ones. Communities are standing up for their neighbors and questioning ICE, and Congress, about abusive arrests and the lack of due process. Law enforcement leaders are declining to take part in the Trump deportation drive, knowing it will not make their communities. Elected officials at all levels are creating a firewall for freedom, enacting protections for their community members that counteract the Trump deportation agenda.
Members of Congress are also listening – and knocking on the doors of private prison operators in New Jersey, Louisiana and Colorado, to name a few. These visits, even when members of Congress are denied entry, are powerful rebukes to an administration claiming power to disappear people into prisons and lock the door behind them.
Courts are rejecting Trump’s authoritarian overreach and affirming that immigrants have rights and deserve due process. It’s no coincidence that some of the more outrageous proposals from this administration—suspending habeas corpus, sending U.S. citizens to CECOT—come when the administration is losing in court.
At the ACLU, working with community partners, through the courts, and through lobbying, our work to protect our communities from Trump’s dangerous deportation drive continues.
Published June 6, 2025 at 11:51PM
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