By Ronald Newman / Speak Freely ACLU
On Saturday night, people at more than 2,200 events around the nation tuned in for the inaugural event of People Power, a new platform harnessing nationwide grassroots resistance to the Trump administration’s assault on our Constitution and our values. At the event, we announced “Freedom Cities,” a campaign that provides a concrete plan for the People Power team to play offense in cities and towns across the country. [Read more…]
By Cody Wofsy, Skadden Fellow, ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project / ACLU San Diego & Imperial Counties
Today President Trump signed a new Muslim ban. The new executive order is a major retreat by the administration, reflecting that, as courts around the country have recognized, the original order was deeply flawed and totally unjustified. But the fundamental truth of this new order, like the old one, remains unchanged: The president promised to ban Muslims from the United States, and the ban is his attempt to make good on that unconstitutional and indefensible goal. [Read more…]
By Annamarya Scaccia / Yes! Magazine
The migraines came out of nowhere. Nanci Palacios, who lives in Tampa, Florida, had headaches before but never with the intensity she’s currently experiencing. The back of her head throbs with pain. Her neck and shoulders become stiff. The migraines happen all the time now, Palacios said. She’s sluggish and less efficient.
Palacios also can’t sleep. She’s often anxious and her mind tends to race. At least four times a week, she’s up through the night. Often, she’s twisting and turning in bed. Palacios wears a Fitbit at night to track her sleeping patterns.
“There were periods where I was awake and I don’t remember being awake,” Palacios said. “I would wake up, and I was really tired.” [Read more…]
By Norma Chavez-Peterson, Executive Director / ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties
The majority of the San Diego City Council demonstrated an inexcusable failure in leadership yesterday [February 27] in their decision to accept the 2-year independent study of police traffic stop data, but disregard its recommendations.
The Council had before them the results of an SDSU study, requested by former Councilmember Marti Emerald in 2015 to address community concerns about racial profiling by San Diego Police Department officers, wherein researchers independently examined more than 200,000 records of police traffic stops over two years. Among their findings was clear evidence of racial disparity in what happens after a driver is stopped. [Read more…]
Republicans on the San Diego City Council united yesterday to oppose an amicus brief in support of a lawsuit before the United States Supreme Court involving the rights of transgender students.
The brief supports Gavin Grimm, a transgender student suing a county district in Virginia for the right to use public facilities, including boys bathrooms, in public schools.
Support came from the council’s five Democrats. Council members Chris Cate and Mark Kersey abstained. Lori Zapf simply didn’t show up. Republican Scott Sherman, who is termed out, voted to oppose the motion. [Read more…]
There’s some kind of a sick and nefarious game being played out on national politics right now. It’s called, “Special Prosecutor, Special Prosecutor, Who’s Got the Special Prosecutor?”
Even as Congressman Darrel Issa walked back part of his solitary Republican call for a special prosecutor to look into Trump’s ties to Russia, White House press spokesguy Sean Spicer, was denying the need for one and that it would all be a waste of time. When pressed by a reporter to respond to Issa’s call for a special investigator, at a news briefing Monday, Feb. 27, Spicer said:
“A special prosecutor for what?” [Read more…]
We’re already seeing glimpses of what ‘empowered’ agencies charged with immigration enforcement will look like in the Trump era, and it’s not a pretty sight.
What seems to be clear at this point is that some enforcement personnel in Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol (two separate agencies, both in Homeland security) aren’t even waiting for the official go-ahead.
San Diego has been lucky–thus far– when it comes to the negative impact of recent executive orders on immigration and refugees. I suspect the reticence of the local ‘migra’ forces may have something to do with the potential for civil unrest as much as anything else. [Read more…]
By Scott Starbuck/ SanDiego350
Reuters reported that on October 11, activists in four states “shook the North American energy industry.” An appreciative audience at San Diego’s First Church of the Brethren greeted them Monday February 13 with $2,300 in donations for their legal funds, repeated applause, and a standing ovation honoring their vision and courage. A donation link has been set up for those who want to support Valve Turners.
Of the group of five, Emily Johnston, Annette Klapstein, Leonard Higgins, and Michael Foster were present and spoke at the event. Ken Ward, the fifth member and first to face trial, was unable to attend due to preparing for a retrial after a jury in Mt. Vernon, Washington, refused to convict him on February 1.
San Diego was the last California stop on this leg of the Valve Turners Speaking Tour that will take them from Pacific to Atlantic in effort to awaken consciences of citizens to respond to climate reality. [Read more…]
By ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties
The ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties (ACLU-SDIC) filed a lawsuit in California Superior Court against the City of San Diego. The long-standing civil rights organization seeks to change current San Diego Police Department policy allowing police officers to collect DNA samples from minors without a warrant or parental consent and challenge this unconstitutional stop.
The suit stems from a March 2016 incident during which a group of teenage boys walking in the Logan Heights neighborhood’s Memorial Community Park were unlawfully stopped and frisked by police officers. Without a warrant and without seeking their parents’ permission, the officers unlawfully detained the juveniles, including Jamie Wilson’s 16-year-old son, telling them they would be released only after they gave consent to collection of their DNA. [Read more…]
Mitch McConnell and his Republican friends in the United States Senate handed the resistance movement a gift on Tuesday night when they invoke an obscure rule to silence Sen. Elizabeth Warren as she read from a letter by Coretta Scott King concerning the record of Attorney General nominee Jeff Sessions.
The letter was addressed to then-Sen. Strom Thurmond in 1986. In it, King objected to Sessions nomination to be a federal judge due to his use of “the power of his office as United States Attorney to intimidate and chill the free exercise of the ballot by citizens.” King continued, “Mr. Sessions has used the awesome powers of this office in a shabby attempt to intimidate and frighten elderly black voters.” [Read more…]
By Susan Grigsby / Daily Kos
In Stephen King’s novel Under the Dome, the used car salesman/second selectman of Chester’s Mill, Maine, a guy called Big Jim Rennie, had to turn to local bullies to form his police force. For those unfamiliar with the novel, the people of Chester’s Mill woke one morning to find themselves under an impermeable dome and cut off from the outside world. Published in 2009, many took the power-hungry blowhard Big Jim to be a stand-in for Dick Cheney. But it doesn’t take much re-focusing to visualize the character as a Donald Trump or perhaps a Steve Bannon, if you can ignore the rampant incompetence and only focus on the takeover.
Donald Trump, however, will not have to rely on local bullies to make up his enforcement unit. He already has at his disposal some of the most troubled law enforcement agencies in the United States, not the least of which is the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) which falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), a behemoth agency that is supposed to make us think we are safer with it than without it. [Read more…]
Four years after the Bob Filner scandal, little has changed with the leadership culture in the centers of power on the left in San Diego–namely labor and the Democratic party.
The enablers and apologists for workplace sexual improprieties, gender discrimination, and retaliation continue to use the political clout and cash flow of their organizations as a shield, preventing them from answering for their behavior or learning from their mistakes.
Engaged women are leading the resistance to what portends to be an era of oppression and repression. They can’t fight the good fight locally or nationally if women within this movement are subjugated by abusive men in powerful positions. They cannot be expected to roll up their sleeves to make changes only to realize the institutional power they need amounts to more of the same. [Read more…]
