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As the right to abortion hangs in the balance, so too does access to abortion care—nowhere more pronounced than in Texas.
We’re working around the clock after the state passed the most extreme and unconstitutional abortion ban in the country, S.B. abortions illegal after six weeks, before most people even realize they’re pregnant.
S.B. also authorizes anyone—anywhere—to sue a person who performed or aided an abortion in the state, leaving clinics and workers vulnerable to tens of thousands of dollars in liability.
The ACLU filed an emergency request imploring the Supreme Court to block the law before it went into effect—a request that was ignored.
The ACLU is fighting back against a deluge of extreme abortion bans in the states, while working relentlessly to expand abortion access on all levels.
As history has taught us, abortion restrictions don’t end abortion.
And it will be people of color, lowincome people, and people in rural areas who are impacted most.
For example, in Texas, the poverty rate for Black and Latinx women is disproportionately high: and 20% of Latinx women live in poverty.
When clinic doors close, it makes abortion care available only to people who can afford to travel out of state and—if they face state laws that require at least two days to get a procedure— stay overnight.
The ACLU is defending the right to abortion care for everyone, everywhere.
In Arkansas, the ACLU and Planned Parenthood successfully challenged a six-week abortion ban In Guam, an ACLU-mounted challenge has cleared the way to restore abortion access on the island by allowing the use of medication abortion In North Carolina, we’re fighting to block a law that prohibits medical professionals from providing abortion, a ban on telehealth for medication abortions, and a mandatory waiting period for patients seeking an abortion In Tennessee, we blocked a six-week ban and a ban based on a fetal diagnosis In an ACLU victory for medication abortion, the FDA will review its outdated, medically unnecessary restrictions on mifepristone Abortion is health care.
No matter where or when the threats arise, the ACLU will remain resolute in our battle to ensure people can exercise their right to reproductive care.
Then: Roe v. Wade S.B. fought for reproductive freedom in Texas.
In action challenging the constitutionality of the Texas criminal abortion law, which prohibited all but lifesaving abortions.
ACLU general counsel Norman Dorsen was part of the team representing her in Roe v. Wade.
The Supreme Court famously invalidated the law in to privacy encompasses a woman’s decision whether or not to continue her pregnancy.
That same year, the ACLU would argue Doe v. Bolton, the companion case to Roe.
The United States has always been a beacon for those seeking refuge.
But the past few years have done visceral damage to our asylum system— damage that the ACLU is striving to repair.
We are in comprehensive settlement negotiations with the Biden administration in our lawsuit over the thousands of families separated at the U.S. southern border.
As one result of those negotiations, in September, the Biden administration’s Family Reunification Task Force launched a new program to help separated family members return to the United States.
The program includes a new website to allow people to register to return, and a contract with the International Organization for Migration to handle the logistical end, such as obtaining passports.
Once in the United States, these individuals will receive three-year residency visas, work permits, and supportive services.
These families deserve more, including permanent legal status, and hundreds of parents of separated children have yet to be located.
But this is a positive step that could potentially help more than a thousand families start to rebuild their lives—and that would not have come about without years of ACLU work on behalf of these families.
In another step forward, an ACLU legal challenge resulted in a federal court prohibiting the expulsion of families from the United States under the inhumane Title 42 policy.
This policy restricted immigration at the border and denied asylum-seekers a fair trial under the guise of protecting public health.
It was started under President Trump, but the Biden administration has continued to deploy it within its border strategy.
After a whirlwind of court actions in August, the Supreme Court refused to block a ruling from a federal judge in Texas requiring the Biden administration restart Remain in Mexico, a Trump-era border policy that has trapped tens of thousands of asylum-seekers in dangerous conditions in Mexico while they await their court dates.
This policy has been the subject of ACLU lawsuits since it was instituted in its termination.
We also successfully pressured the Biden administration to stop using two of our country’s worst Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities.
We will keep working to get the administration to close more of these facilities, continuing to focus on those that fall in remote locations with compromised access to legal counsel and external medical care, and those that have documented patterns of inhumane treatment and conditions.
Four years of the Trump administration effectively dismantled asylum in the United States.
We continue to fight to protect asylum-seekers and reunite separated families.
For the first time in a really long time, Sabrina feels happy.
After years of struggling with mental health challenges, the thriving, finally able to fully experience the joys of girlhood.
But the life that Sabrina and her parents fought so hard for her to have in their native Arkansas was almost snatched away.
Arkansas legislators passed H.B. bans gender-affirming health care for trans minors, meaning doctors can’t perform surgery or prescribe hormones to anyone under 18.
It also bans the use of health insurance or state funds in paying for any of this type of care.
TRANSGENDER YOUTH We mounted successful legal challenges across the country this year to ensure transgender youth can access life-saving medical care and participate in school sports. continued Brooke Dennis (above), were plaintiffs in the ACLU’s successful case against Arkansas’ ban on gender-affirming health care.
and placed it in the hands of politicians.
The passage of the law, which happened this April, drew outrage and disgust from advocacy groups as well as medical associations.
If enacted, Sabrina would have lost access to the treatment she needed along with other vulnerable trans youth across the state.
“Before I started getting care, I had a really rough time.
I know first-hand that genderaffirming care is life-saving care.
I can’t imagine going back, or being denied care that my doctors and parents agree that I need,” said Sabrina.
The ACLU moved swiftly to sue the state of Arkansas over the ban, challenging its constitutionality on the grounds that it violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Amendment.
Amanda and Shayne Dennis, the parents of families confronting the possibility of uprooting their lives to get appropriate care for their child.
Brooke has known she was a girl since she was Brooke in her desire to undergo pubertydelaying treatment.
With the law in place, she no longer would have been able to access gender-affirming care.
In a major triumph for transgender rights, a federal court blocked the Arkansas ban from moving forward with the judge citing it would bring “irreparable harm” to pull care from patients.
The Arkansas law may have been shocking in its cruelty, but unfortunately, it is not unique.
This year will go down as a record-breaking one for anti-transgender legislation.
In what has been perceived as a backlash against the gains in marriage equality for same-sex couples, an alarming forth more than 100 discriminatory bills.
And many of the restrictions take sharp aim at the rights of transgender kids across the country, endangering their well-being and their lives.
When trans youth are denied proper healthcare, they suffer from significantly increased rates of anxiety, depression, and thoughts of suicide.
These bans are putting trans lives at risk.
“ I know first-hand that gender-affirming care is life-saving care.
I can’t imagine going back, or being denied care that my doctors and parents agree that I need.” Dylan Brandt (left), plaintiff families that challenged Arkansas’ trans health care ban.
foster care agency after discovering it would not approve same-sex couples solely based on their sexual orientation, in violation of the city’s nondiscrimination requirement.
But, importantly, the court declined to create a constitutional license to discriminate, ruling that the city violated the rights of the religious foster care agency for reasons specific to its contract with the agency.
In the face of restrictive, harmful laws, the ACLU will never stop fighting for the rights of LGBTQ people to be fully and freely themselves.
Then: Sir Lady Java For many trans and non-binary people, particularly Black trans women, they aren’t safe in their homes, at their workplaces, or on the street.
There have been more than trans people killed in America in 2021 alone.
The ACLU is fighting alongside trans and nonbinary communities to ensure they can live without fear of discrimination.
This movement is stronger than ever, but it certainly isn’t new.
The Los Angeles nightclub scene was vibrant and glitzy.
And one star shone the brightest: Sir Lady Java.
A fixture at the Redd Foxx Club, the drag queen, dancer, and comedian dazzled audiences—and became a living legend.
Sir Lady Java was also a Black trans woman, a facet of her identity the LAPD would use to harass her and shut down her performances.
The law was meant to target the LGBTQ community and was used as cover to terrorize them in places they gathered.
with Sir Lady Java to fight Rule No. in a massive victory, the law was declared unconstitutional two years later.
No. the Redd Foxx Club, where she performed.
Photo courtesy of transascity.org Ph ot o by S yd ne y Ra sc h Since February, Miranda McLaurin has appreciated the comforts of her Mississippi hometown.
She’s making up for lost time with her grandson and started working at a manufacturing plant.
Miranda is a participant in a program referred to as home confinement, which was encouraged under the CARES Act passed by Congress to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Through this program, more than released from overcrowded prisons to finish their sentences at home.
But on January the Department of Justice under the Trump administration issued a memo stating that the Bureau of Prisons would be legally obligated to return thousands of these participants back to prisons while the pandemic still ravages correctional facilities.
to make our country’s overcrowded prisons and jails hotbeds for the virus.
The ACLU is urging the Biden administration to rescind the order that will take the still in home confinement—like Miranda—away from their families yet again.
It has not done so despite a promise the president made to the ACLU to cut federal prison populations in half.
What’s more, if President Biden allows them to be sent back to federal prison, he would be presiding over the fastest expansion of the federal prison population in history.
The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world, with bars.
This problem has been exacerbated by discriminatory policy decisions that targeted communities of color like the failed War on Drugs, which had its 50th anniversary this year.
The decarceration movement would help not only those in home confinement, but also those who are still in federal prison.
Building on our analysis of how each state can cut the number of people behind bars by half—the ACLU has now filed 83 legal actions to secure the release of more than 48,000 people from prisons and jails (and 750 people from immigration detention) during the ongoing pandemic.
And we’re pursuing our Redemption Campaign, which aims to release the next five years.
push to rein in the power of prosecutors and decrease incarceration, we reached a historic settlement in our then-Orleans Parish District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro and 10 assistant district attorneys.
Our suit challenged the office’s illegal scheme of fabricating subpoenas to coerce crime victims and witnesses of crimes into submitting to interrogations, as well as presenting fraudulent information in court to persuade judges to issue arrest warrants.
UNDOING HARMFUL POLICIES Rectifying the damage done by over-incarceration and over-policing also means fighting to end the death penalty, ban solitary confinement, and hold racist law enforcement accountable, all fronts on which we made gains in this year.
that complicate successful re-entry for the formerly incarcerated.
Black, Brown, and poor people at a disproportionate rate at almost every level.
The ACLU has now filed legal actions to secure the release of more than 48,000 people from prisons and jails.
oversight of the firms tasked with investing on the ACLU’s behalf.
in asset management—and by that definition alone, a trailblazer.
Lew, who grew up in fair housing in the Bronx, says the privilege of having moved among such contrasting sectors of society has informed her approach to investing.
“It’s very important for the investment arm of any institution to be aligned with the values of an institution,” she says.
Lew has been advising the ACLU in a volunteer capacity for nearly 14 years.
She is particularly proud of steering the ACLU’s asset management from a large corporate bank to a smaller firm The ACLU community is made up of members; 4.6 million online activists; 2,000 volunteer attorneys; and hundreds of coalition, foundation, and corporate partners.
Then and now, these families have ensured that the fight for justice and equality rests in extraordinary hands.

As the right to abortion hangs in the balance, so too does access to abortion care—nowhere more pronounced than in Texas.

We’re working around the clock after the state passed the most extreme and unconstitutional abortion ban in the country, S.B. abortions illegal after six weeks, before most people even realize they’re pregnant.

S.B. also authorizes anyone—anywhere—to sue a person who performed or aided an abortion in the state, leaving clinics and workers vulnerable to tens of thousands of dollars in liability.

The ACLU filed an emergency request imploring the Supreme Court to block the law before it went into effect—a request that was ignored.

The ACLU is fighting back against a deluge of extreme abortion bans in the states, while working relentlessly to expand abortion access on all levels.

As history has taught us, abortion restrictions don’t end abortion.

And it will be people of color, lowincome people, and people in rural areas who are impacted most.

For example, in Texas, the poverty rate for Black and Latinx women is disproportionately high: and 20% of Latinx women live in poverty.

When clinic doors close, it makes abortion care available only to people who can afford to travel out of state and—if they face state laws that require at least two days to get a procedure— stay overnight.

The ACLU is defending the right to abortion care for everyone, everywhere.

In Arkansas, the ACLU and Planned Parenthood successfully challenged a six-week abortion ban In Guam, an ACLU-mounted challenge has cleared the way to restore abortion access on the island by allowing the use of medication abortion In North Carolina, we’re fighting to block a law that prohibits medical professionals from providing abortion, a ban on telehealth for medication abortions, and a mandatory waiting period for patients seeking an abortion In Tennessee, we blocked a six-week ban and a ban based on a fetal diagnosis In an ACLU victory for medication abortion, the FDA will review its outdated, medically unnecessary restrictions on mifepristone Abortion is health care.

No matter where or when the threats arise, the ACLU will remain resolute in our battle to ensure people can exercise their right to reproductive care.

Then: Roe v. Wade S.B. fought for reproductive freedom in Texas.

In action challenging the constitutionality of the Texas criminal abortion law, which prohibited all but lifesaving abortions.

ACLU general counsel Norman Dorsen was part of the team representing her in Roe v. Wade.

The Supreme Court famously invalidated the law in to privacy encompasses a woman’s decision whether or not to continue her pregnancy.

That same year, the ACLU would argue Doe v. Bolton, the companion case to Roe.

The United States has always been a beacon for those seeking refuge.

But the past few years have done visceral damage to our asylum system— damage that the ACLU is striving to repair.

We are in comprehensive settlement negotiations with the Biden administration in our lawsuit over the thousands of families separated at the U.S. southern border.

As one result of those negotiations, in September, the Biden administration’s Family Reunification Task Force launched a new program to help separated family members return to the United States.

The program includes a new website to allow people to register to return, and a contract with the International Organization for Migration to handle the logistical end, such as obtaining passports.

Once in the United States, these individuals will receive three-year residency visas, work permits, and supportive services.

These families deserve more, including permanent legal status, and hundreds of parents of separated children have yet to be located.

But this is a positive step that could potentially help more than a thousand families start to rebuild their lives—and that would not have come about without years of ACLU work on behalf of these families.

In another step forward, an ACLU legal challenge resulted in a federal court prohibiting the expulsion of families from the United States under the inhumane Title 42 policy.

This policy restricted immigration at the border and denied asylum-seekers a fair trial under the guise of protecting public health.

It was started under President Trump, but the Biden administration has continued to deploy it within its border strategy.

After a whirlwind of court actions in August, the Supreme Court refused to block a ruling from a federal judge in Texas requiring the Biden administration restart Remain in Mexico, a Trump-era border policy that has trapped tens of thousands of asylum-seekers in dangerous conditions in Mexico while they await their court dates.

This policy has been the subject of ACLU lawsuits since it was instituted in its termination.

We also successfully pressured the Biden administration to stop using two of our country’s worst Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities.

We will keep working to get the administration to close more of these facilities, continuing to focus on those that fall in remote locations with compromised access to legal counsel and external medical care, and those that have documented patterns of inhumane treatment and conditions.

Four years of the Trump administration effectively dismantled asylum in the United States.

We continue to fight to protect asylum-seekers and reunite separated families.

For the first time in a really long time, Sabrina feels happy.

After years of struggling with mental health challenges, the thriving, finally able to fully experience the joys of girlhood.

But the life that Sabrina and her parents fought so hard for her to have in their native Arkansas was almost snatched away.

Arkansas legislators passed H.B. bans gender-affirming health care for trans minors, meaning doctors can’t perform surgery or prescribe hormones to anyone under 18.

It also bans the use of health insurance or state funds in paying for any of this type of care.

TRANSGENDER YOUTH We mounted successful legal challenges across the country this year to ensure transgender youth can access life-saving medical care and participate in school sports. continued Brooke Dennis (above), were plaintiffs in the ACLU’s successful case against Arkansas’ ban on gender-affirming health care.

and placed it in the hands of politicians.

The passage of the law, which happened this April, drew outrage and disgust from advocacy groups as well as medical associations.

If enacted, Sabrina would have lost access to the treatment she needed along with other vulnerable trans youth across the state.

“Before I started getting care, I had a really rough time.

I know first-hand that genderaffirming care is life-saving care.

I can’t imagine going back, or being denied care that my doctors and parents agree that I need,” said Sabrina.

The ACLU moved swiftly to sue the state of Arkansas over the ban, challenging its constitutionality on the grounds that it violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Amendment.

Amanda and Shayne Dennis, the parents of families confronting the possibility of uprooting their lives to get appropriate care for their child.

Brooke has known she was a girl since she was Brooke in her desire to undergo pubertydelaying treatment.

With the law in place, she no longer would have been able to access gender-affirming care.

In a major triumph for transgender rights, a federal court blocked the Arkansas ban from moving forward with the judge citing it would bring “irreparable harm” to pull care from patients.

The Arkansas law may have been shocking in its cruelty, but unfortunately, it is not unique.

This year will go down as a record-breaking one for anti-transgender legislation.

In what has been perceived as a backlash against the gains in marriage equality for same-sex couples, an alarming forth more than 100 discriminatory bills.

And many of the restrictions take sharp aim at the rights of transgender kids across the country, endangering their well-being and their lives.

When trans youth are denied proper healthcare, they suffer from significantly increased rates of anxiety, depression, and thoughts of suicide.

These bans are putting trans lives at risk.

“ I know first-hand that gender-affirming care is life-saving care.

I can’t imagine going back, or being denied care that my doctors and parents agree that I need.” Dylan Brandt (left), plaintiff families that challenged Arkansas’ trans health care ban.

foster care agency after discovering it would not approve same-sex couples solely based on their sexual orientation, in violation of the city’s nondiscrimination requirement.

But, importantly, the court declined to create a constitutional license to discriminate, ruling that the city violated the rights of the religious foster care agency for reasons specific to its contract with the agency.

In the face of restrictive, harmful laws, the ACLU will never stop fighting for the rights of LGBTQ people to be fully and freely themselves.

Then: Sir Lady Java For many trans and non-binary people, particularly Black trans women, they aren’t safe in their homes, at their workplaces, or on the street.

There have been more than trans people killed in America in 2021 alone.

The ACLU is fighting alongside trans and nonbinary communities to ensure they can live without fear of discrimination.

This movement is stronger than ever, but it certainly isn’t new.

The Los Angeles nightclub scene was vibrant and glitzy.

And one star shone the brightest: Sir Lady Java.

A fixture at the Redd Foxx Club, the drag queen, dancer, and comedian dazzled audiences—and became a living legend.

Sir Lady Java was also a Black trans woman, a facet of her identity the LAPD would use to harass her and shut down her performances.

The law was meant to target the LGBTQ community and was used as cover to terrorize them in places they gathered.

with Sir Lady Java to fight Rule No. in a massive victory, the law was declared unconstitutional two years later.

No. the Redd Foxx Club, where she performed.

Photo courtesy of transascity.org Ph ot o by S yd ne y Ra sc h Since February, Miranda McLaurin has appreciated the comforts of her Mississippi hometown.

She’s making up for lost time with her grandson and started working at a manufacturing plant.

Miranda is a participant in a program referred to as home confinement, which was encouraged under the CARES Act passed by Congress to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Through this program, more than released from overcrowded prisons to finish their sentences at home.

But on January the Department of Justice under the Trump administration issued a memo stating that the Bureau of Prisons would be legally obligated to return thousands of these participants back to prisons while the pandemic still ravages correctional facilities.

to make our country’s overcrowded prisons and jails hotbeds for the virus.

The ACLU is urging the Biden administration to rescind the order that will take the still in home confinement—like Miranda—away from their families yet again.

It has not done so despite a promise the president made to the ACLU to cut federal prison populations in half.

What’s more, if President Biden allows them to be sent back to federal prison, he would be presiding over the fastest expansion of the federal prison population in history.

The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world, with bars.

This problem has been exacerbated by discriminatory policy decisions that targeted communities of color like the failed War on Drugs, which had its 50th anniversary this year.

The decarceration movement would help not only those in home confinement, but also those who are still in federal prison.

Building on our analysis of how each state can cut the number of people behind bars by half—the ACLU has now filed 83 legal actions to secure the release of more than 48,000 people from prisons and jails (and 750 people from immigration detention) during the ongoing pandemic.

And we’re pursuing our Redemption Campaign, which aims to release the next five years.

push to rein in the power of prosecutors and decrease incarceration, we reached a historic settlement in our then-Orleans Parish District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro and 10 assistant district attorneys.

Our suit challenged the office’s illegal scheme of fabricating subpoenas to coerce crime victims and witnesses of crimes into submitting to interrogations, as well as presenting fraudulent information in court to persuade judges to issue arrest warrants.

UNDOING HARMFUL POLICIES Rectifying the damage done by over-incarceration and over-policing also means fighting to end the death penalty, ban solitary confinement, and hold racist law enforcement accountable, all fronts on which we made gains in this year.

that complicate successful re-entry for the formerly incarcerated.

Black, Brown, and poor people at a disproportionate rate at almost every level.

The ACLU has now filed legal actions to secure the release of more than 48,000 people from prisons and jails.

oversight of the firms tasked with investing on the ACLU’s behalf.

in asset management—and by that definition alone, a trailblazer.

Lew, who grew up in fair housing in the Bronx, says the privilege of having moved among such contrasting sectors of society has informed her approach to investing.

“It’s very important for the investment arm of any institution to be aligned with the values of an institution,” she says.

Lew has been advising the ACLU in a volunteer capacity for nearly 14 years.

She is particularly proud of steering the ACLU’s asset management from a large corporate bank to a smaller firm The ACLU community is made up of members; 4.6 million online activists; 2,000 volunteer attorneys; and hundreds of coalition, foundation, and corporate partners.

Then and now, these families have ensured that the fight for justice and equality rests in extraordinary hands.