Law and Liberty

Event Criticized as Shocking

Mix of Church and State

    (FFRF) -- May 13, 2026 -- The White House’s “Rededicate 250: A National Jubilee of Prayer, Praise & Thanksgiving” on May 17 is an unprecedented and shocking mix of church and state.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation is sounding the alarm over the prayer fest’s sponsor, “Freedom 250,” a public/private initiative aligned with the White House to mark the nation’s 250th anniversary with explicitly Christian nationalist programming.
    President Trump promoted the all-day prayer fest on the National Mall during his remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast: “On May 17, 2026, we are inviting Americans from all across the country to come together on our National Mall to pray, to give thanks, and to rededicate America as one nation under God.”
    The all-day spectacle of prayer, testimony, Scripture and worship calls on Americans to gather for “Scripture, testimony, prayer, and rededication of our country as One Nation to God.” The overtly sectarian gathering is dominated by Christian nationalist figures and promoted with government involvement. FFRF’s Freedom of Information Act request seeking information on public funding is on appeal, so financial details are murky.
    The event overwhelmingly features Christian leaders and activists, including those among the Trump cabinet, with token non-Christian representation. Besides House Speaker Mike Johnson and cabinet members Pete Hegseth and Mark Rubio, they include a long list of pastors and religious figures, including Rev. Franklin Graham, Eric Metaxas (a vocal proponent of Christian nationalist ideology), White House Faith Adviser Paula White and Rev. Robert Jeffress, who has repeatedly argued that the United States was founded as a Christian nation. All but one of the 15 religious leaders are Christian.
    Military and other governmental bands will perform alongside religious choirs, such as with the extremist Christian Hillsdale College.
    “This is not a celebration of America’s founding principles — but an overtly sectarian, exclusionary event catering to evangelicals and other conservative Christians, with participation and the full blessing of the federal government,” says FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor. “Our Constitution is godless by design. The government has no authority to organize religious revivals, much less use them to promote a Christian nationalist agenda.”
    FFRF Co-President Dan Barker adds, “This isn’t subtle. They are openly declaring a goal of redefining America as a Christian nation and using the machinery of government to do it.”
    Major corporations — including Mastercard, Deloitte, SAP and Lockheed Martin — have signed on as sponsors of Freedom 250, even as questions mount about the initiative’s sectarian agenda and lack of transparency. Critics have called out the companies for potentially enabling what amounts to a government-backed religious campaign.
    The United States belongs to all of us — not just conservative Christians, FFRF points out. Our government was founded on secular principles to ensure freedom of conscience for everyone.
    FFRF is calling on federal officials to immediately cease any involvement in sectarian events, and on corporate sponsors to reconsider their support.
    “The 250th anniversary of our nation should celebrate liberty, equality and the constitutional separation of church and state,” Gaylor concludes. “Anything less betrays the very ideals the Declaration of Independence set in motion.”

    Original date of release: May 5/26

Voting Rights

New Florida Congressional 

Map Called Unconstitutional;

Groups File Lawsuit To Stop It

    TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (SPLC) -- 5/6/2026 -- Common Cause, the League of Women Voters of Florida (LWVFL) and the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), represented by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), Southern Coalition for Social Justice (SCSJ) and Democracy Defenders Fund, filed a lawsuit on May 5 in the 2nd Judicial Circuit Court in Leon County to stop the new Florida congressional map.

    You can view the lawsuit here.

    The lawsuit argues the new map specifically violates the Fair Districts Amendments, which prohibit the state Legislature from drawing maps that favor one political party. More than 60% of Florida voters approved the amendments in 2010.

    Gov. Ron DeSantis signed the new congressional map into law after the Legislature passed it in a special session. Common Cause, LWVFL and LULAC immediately filed suit.

    “The fact that this is a partisan gerrymander is as obvious as it is unconstitutional,” said Bradley Heard, deputy legal director, SPLC. “And while this unnecessary map is egregious in how it advantages Republicans and disadvantages Democrats, the people who will suffer the most if it is allowed to stand are once again Black and Brown communities, whose voices are consistently silenced in these redistricting battles. The SPLC will not allow this governor to turn back the clock on voting rights in Florida.”

    “The governor’s ploy to impose maps for an unfair partisan advantage is exactly why voters made it illegal in 2010 — and why we’re going to court,” said Amy Keith, executive director, Common Cause Florida. “This governor and Republican lawmakers will stop at nothing to put their finger on the scale because they are afraid of being held accountable by the people. We expect the courts to be the adults in the room and honor the Florida Constitution and the will of Florida voters.”

    The new congressional map was engineered by DeSantis and rammed through a hastily convened special session of the Florida Legislature with no meaningful opportunity for public input. DeSantis personally directed its drawing, releasing a color-coded version of the map to Fox News with proposed districts shaded red and blue. Notably, the Governor’s own mapmaker admitted to using partisan data to create the map.

    “When a map is distributed in a red/blue format to the media before being transmitted to the Legislature, and when the governor’s staff openly acknowledges in committee that there is no new Census data being used to justify a new map, Florida voters can’t help but suspect that this is a partisan gerrymander,” said Jessica Lowe-Minor, President, League of Women Voters of Florida. “Floridians have consistently said they are not interested in political gamesmanship within redistricting, which is why they passed the Fair Districts standards overwhelmingly in 2010. We hope the courts restore the rule of law and uphold the Florida Constitution’s explicit prohibition against partisan gerrymandering.”

    “Gov. DeSantis and lawmakers think they’re above the Florida Constitution and above the people,” said Adrianne Spoto, counsel for voting rights, SCSJ. “We’re here to say otherwise.”

    “More than 60% of Florida voters made partisan gerrymandering illegal in 2010, but Governor DeSantis just stamped his name on an electoral map that does exactly what voters forbade. We’re litigating on behalf of Floridians because this dangerous playbook ends in a democracy where your voice only counts if you agree with the president and his allies,” said Amb. Norm Eisen (ret.), co-founder and executive chair, Democracy Defenders Fund. “Even the Roberts Court’s shockingly wrong decision in the Callais case does not allow this. This gerrymander violates state law and the will of the Florida voters, and we are asking the court to strike it down.”

    “For decades, the Voting Rights Act protected Black communities from the legacy of Jim Crow, and those same federal protections safeguarded Latino communities. Governor DeSantis and the state legislature wasted no time thumbing their noses at these communities after the Court’s devastating decision in Callais,” said Juan Proaño, chief executive officer, LULAC. “This gerrymander intends to marginalize and silence Black and brown communities. We will not sit idly by while the people we elected to represent us abuse that power and try to silence us.”

    For more information, visit www.splcenter.org.

Founding Principles

President's 'Religious Liberty 

Commission' Tramples on Constitution,

Separation of Church and State

   

     (FFRF) -- 4/20/26 -- The Freedom From Religion Foundation is castigating the recently held final hearing of President Trump’s so-called Religious Liberty Commission.
    At the seventh and concluding hearing held at the Museum of the Bible (a privately owned facility underwritten by Hobby Lobby) recently, commissioners and witnesses repeatedly denigrated the foundational constitutional principle of state/church separation. Commission Chair and Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick called it “the biggest lie that’s been told in America since our founding.” Helen Alvaré, a professor at Antonin Scalia Law School, described the principle as “unfortunate, historically and culturally inaccurate” while openly advocating for greater integration of religion into public schools, government policy and civic life.
    FFRF is putting the commission on notice that it will contest any unconstitutional proposals.
    “This commission has once again made its agenda unmistakably clear,” FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor said. “It is not about protecting religious liberty. It’s about dismantling it. But we don’t intend to let that happen.”
    Patrick boasted that Texas has passed legislation requiring the posting of the Ten Commandments in every public school classroom, a mandate FFRF is actively challenging in court with our allies. Dismissing the constitutional concerns, he remarked, “Of course we’re being sued, but that’s okay. That comes with the territory.” On that point, he’s right: When government officials flout the Constitution, legal challenges are not only expected, they are necessary. FFRF is proud to be holding Texas accountable for this clear violation of the First Amendment and the right of a captive audience of schoolchildren and their parents to be free from state interference and coercion over private religious beliefs.
    Over nearly five hours, commission members and witnesses advanced a series of deeply troubling ideas rooted in Christian nationalism rather than constitutional principles. Among the most egregious to undermine the wall of separation:

• A proposal to engineer a legal challenge, by encouraging the IRS to deliberately penalize a church for political activity, to the Johnson Amendment, which bars electioneering with tax-exempt funds by churches and other nonprofits. 
• Claims that religious liberty originates exclusively from Christianity and that not all faiths are equal under the law. 
• Suggestions to expand government funding pipelines to religious organizations without sufficient safeguards. 
• Advocacy to teach children a distorted, sectarian version of American history that would erase the nation’s commitment to secular governance.

    The commission, established by executive order in 2025, is expected to deliver a final report to the president next month. Based on the rhetoric and recommendations previewed at the final hearing, FFRF warns that the report will serve as a roadmap for advancing Christian nationalist policies at the federal level.
    FFRF notes that these proposals are not about religious freedom, but privileging Christianity via its elevation above all other beliefs. True religious liberty requires government neutrality — neither hostility nor favoritism. If the administration attempts to implement any of these unconstitutional recommendations, FFRF will fight them, and vigorously defend the right of Americans to believe, or not believe, without government encroachment or compulsion.

    The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to defending the constitutional principle of separation between state and church and educating the public on matters relating to nontheism. With more than 41,000 members, FFRF is the largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and humanists) in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

Peaceful Protests

Peaceful Protestors Respond

To Deadly ICE Shooting

    WASHINGTON — (ACLU) -- 1/11/2026 --Peaceful protests and vigils kicked off the ICE Out For Good Weekend of Action July 10 to honor the lives lost at the hands of ICE, demand accountability, and make visible the human cost of this administration’s actions. The nonviolent, lawful, and community-led actions continued on Sunday, January 11, culminating in more than 1,000 events over the weekend. 

    ICE Out For Good is a broad, national coalition, including Indivisible, MoveOn Civic Action, the American Civil Liberties Union, Voto Latino, United We Dream, 50501, the Disappeared in America Campaign of the Not Above the Law coalition, and partner organizations across the country. All actions under the ICE Out For Good banner are grounded in moral witness, public accountability, and collective care. We remain committed to nonviolent organizing.

See coverage below from across the country on the first day of the ICE Out For Good Weekend of Action:

• The Guardian: More than 1,000 events planned in US after ICE shootings in Minneapolis and Portland

• USA Today: Where are ICE protests taking place this weekend? Here's what to know

• Axios: ICE and Border Patrol shootings spark hundreds of weekend vigils and protests

• CT Insider: Connecticut holds ICE protests Saturday in response to Renee Good shooting death

• Knoxville News Sentinel: Hundreds gather in Knoxville to protest ICE shooting in Minneapolis

• CBS Philadelphia: Philadelphia protesters want "ICE out for Good" after videos show agent killing woman in Minnesota

• ABC11: North Carolina cities join nationwide anti-ICE protests after Minneapolis, Portland shootings

• ABC7: ICE Out For Good rally in Sarasota

• FOX5: Virginia protest against ICE as new video of MN shooting emerges

• TCPalm: Group gathers in Stuart, Florida for 'ICE Out For Good' protest

• AZ Central: Renee Good Nicole shooting spurs nationwide 'ICE out for Good' protests

-------------------------------

Leaders from the partner organizations issued the following statements:

AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION

    “The shootings in Minneapolis and Portland weren’t the beginning of ICE’s cruelty, but they must be the end. Today, we saw communities across the country gather peacefully to mourn the lives lost at the hands of ICE and to demand accountability. These protests are further proof that public opposition to ICE and this administration’s abuses is growing by the minute. Whether it's by joining a protest, attending a know your rights training, or demanding that our Congresspeople stop funding these out-of-control agencies, Americans across the country are saying “NO. Not on our watch.”

– Deirdre Schifeling, Chief Political and Advocacy Officer, ACLU

INDIVISIBLE

    “Renee Nicole Good should be alive today. Her death has sparked grief and outrage across the country as the latest horrific incident in a mounting toll of enormous harm and horror caused by ICE. This weekend, people all over are coming together not just to mourn the lives lost to ICE violence, but to confront a pattern of harm that has torn families apart and terrorized our communities. We demand justice for Renee, ICE out of our communities, and action from our elected leaders. Enough is enough."

– Leah Greenberg, Co-Executive Director of Indivisible

POPULAR DEMOCRACY

    “Every person ICE has killed had a family, a community, and a life that mattered. Pouring billions of public dollars into a rogue enforcement agency that terrorizes our communities while denying people health care, housing, food security, and education is morally indefensible and profoundly reckless. This cruelty flows directly from the agenda of fear and punishment pushed by extremists like ​​Homeland Security Advisor Stephen Miller and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, embraced and strengthened by the President himself. We demand accountability for the killing of Renee Nicole Good and for the countless lives lost at the hands of ICE. The lesson is clear: this violence will not stop until ICE is abolished.”

— DaMareo Cooper, Executive Director, Popular Democracy

50501

    "This weekend's actions are prompted most immediately by the tragic death of Renee Good in Minneapolis, and her murder at the hands of ICE is unspeakable. We will uplift her this weekend, and we will uplift all those in our communities whom ICE has targeted and brutalized, from Silverio Gonzales to Marimar Martinez to all of those people in marginalized communities whose names must not be forgotten. This is our moment. We must conjure the souls of our brave ancestors and remember we stand on the shoulders of giants."

– Sarah Parker, 50501 Spokesperson and Executive Director, Voices of Florida Fund

MOVEON CIVIC ACTION

    “For a full year, Trump’s masked agents have been abducting people off the streets, raiding schools, libraries, and churches. As ICE’s unnecessary, reckless, and escalatory deployment goes unchecked, the killing of civilians will only continue. None of us want to live in a country where federal agents with guns are lurking and inciting violence at schools and in our communities. This is why MoveOn members will be uniting once again this weekend in peaceful, nonviolent, powerful protests in stark contrast to the unrepentant, ruthless violence of this administration.”

– Katie Bethell, MoveOn Civic Action Executive Director

PUBLIC CITIZEN, NOT ABOVE THE LAW COALITION

    “Masked, power-hungry federal agents are treating the streets of America like the Wild West. The intimidation tactics, the deadly attacks against our communities and the brazen lawlessness by immigration enforcement must stop now. As ICE and border patrol agents commandeer neighborhoods, people in detention centers, in ICE custody or simply in their own personal vehicles fear for their lives. This militarization of immigration enforcement is endangering everyone. What’s more alarming is the Department of Homeland Security, the vice president and president of the United States are endorsing ICE and CBP’s violent behavior. The Trump Administration must stop ICE deployment now, we must deeply investigate this unjust killing, and the American people must file peacefully into the streets to resist this illegal, overreaching use of government power. We must stand together to effectively defend ourselves.”

– Lisa Gilbert, co-president of Public Citizen and co-chair of the Not Above the Law Coalition which formed the Disappeared in America Campaign.

NDLON

    “We immigrants know what authoritarian violence is. Many of us come from countries where we had to endure the kind of hatred and terror we saw in Minneapolis. Many of us fled brutal regimes to seek survival here.”

    “We grieve for Renee Nicole Good and all the victims of this Administration's shameful and senseless brutality — the growing list of the dead and injured. But we are not just sorrowful. We are defiant. We, the people, will stand together against all efforts to dehumanize us, polarize us, terrorize us and kill us.”

    “They want to provoke us into responding to violence with violence, to meet hate with hate. They are desperate to justify their cruelty with ever more brutality.”

    “But we immigrants know how to confront authoritarianism. We will resist the government's attacks by building community, by documenting atrocities, by protesting nonviolently, by showing kindness and solidarity at all times. We will meet them in the streets, in the courts, at the day labor corners. We will meet them everywhere. And we will win.”

    “We are not afraid or discouraged. And we will not be defeated. The more we stand together as a community of determination and love, the harder it will be for them to divide and destroy us.”

– Pablo Alvarado, Co-Executive Director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network

THE WORKERS CIRCLE

    “The tragic killing of Renee Good — a U.S. citizen exercising her fundamental rights — by a federal ICE agent is not just a catastrophic loss for her family and community; it is a stark warning to all of us about where unchecked power leads. This administration’s expanding use of force against our neighbors erodes the very rights and safety that define who we are as a nation. As a Jewish organization, we know what unchecked power has done in the past. We must not let that take root here, today. Now, more than ever, we must demand transparency, accountability, and policies that protect human life, human dignity and civil liberties for everyone. Allowing federal forces to act without independent oversight undermines justice and threatens the safety of us all.”

– Ann Toback, CEO, The Workers Circle

UNITED WE DREAM

    “Using your first amendment rights to speak out and show up for your neighbors during the growing anti-immigrant violence in our cities should be a protected constitutional right, not a death sentence. This brutal killing is a horrifying reminder of the threat armed forces pose to our collective safety, especially at a time when local, state and federal officials have consistently called on the federal government to invest in the resources working families truly need —health care, housing, access to food— instead of indiscriminate terror in our communities. Billions poured into immigration raids for the sake of ripping apart communities in cities like Los Angeles, Chicago and Minneapolis does nothing but lead to irreparable damage, violence and death. In 2025 alone, 32 people died in immigration detention. We demand an immediate end to this cruelty and for elected leaders at every level to speak out in defense of immigrant communities and our shared safety.”

– United We Dream

VOTO LATINO

    “Under Donald Trump’s leadership and Kristi Noem’s direction of the Department of Homeland Security, ICE has become more aggressive, more reckless, and more deadly — with 2025 marking its deadliest year in two decades. The killing of Renee Nicole Good, a U.S. citizen shot and killed by federal agents in Minneapolis, is not an isolated failure but the predictable outcome of a political agenda that rewards force and dehumanization.”

    “Trump and Noem have normalized the erosion of constitutional rights, framing brutality as enforcement and accountability as weakness. Their rhetoric and policies have sent a clear message down the chain of command: push limits, ignore safeguards, and expect protection from consequences. This is not about partisan politics — it is about defending human life and the rule of law. We stand with Renee Nicole Good’s family and with communities nationwide to demand accountability and to stop the unchecked enforcement born of Trump and Noem’s leadership before more lives are lost.”

– Voto Latino

Religon and State

FFRF Demands State Department

Remove Unconstitutional 

Christian Nationalist Posts

    (FFRF) - 9/13/2025 -- The Freedom From Religion Foundation is demanding that the State Department immediately remove unconstitutional Christian nationalist posts from its official social media accounts.

    In a letter sent to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, FFRF objects to recent posts on the Department’s official X account that falsely promote Christianity as the foundation of the government of the United States and promise to eradicate policies that “demean the Christian faith.”

    One post reads:

    “Our nation was founded on the recognition that moral virtue and a steadfast faith in God are necessary preconditions of freedom. Yet under the Biden Administration, U.S. foreign policy belittled Christianity and weaponized government against faith. That era has ended. Under @POTUS’s leadership, the State Department will eradicate practices that devalue and demean the Christian faith.”

    Another post vows that the department will “never apologize for our God-given rights”:

    “At @POTUS’s direction, @SecRubio is taking action to secure religious liberties both at home and abroad, including terminating unlawful State Department policies targeting Christians and addressing the violent repression of Christians overseas. We will never apologize for our God-given rights.”

    “These statements send a dangerous and unconstitutional message that the State Department serves Christians first and reduces millions of other Americans to second-class citizens,” writes FFRF Legal Counsel Chris Line. “U.S. foreign policy should defend human rights, not elevate one religion above all others.”

    FFRF’s letter points out that the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment requires strict government neutrality between religion and nonreligion. FFRF underscores that America’s Founders deliberately created a secular government — investing sovereignty in “We the People,” not a deity. The U.S. Constitution contains no reference to God and expressly prohibits religious tests for public office, religious oaths, and any establishment of religion by government.

    “America’s strength lies in its secular Constitution,” the letter emphasizes. “True religious freedom requires a government free from sectarian favoritism.”

    With nearly 37 percent of Americans now identifying as non-Christian — including almost 29 percent who are religiously unaffiliated — FFRF stresses that the State Department is obligated to represent all citizens equally, not to promote Christian nationalism.

    FFRF is urging the State Department to delete the unconstitutional posts and confirm in writing what steps it will take to ensure compliance with the U.S. Constitution.

    

    Date of original press release: 9/10/2025

    The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to promoting the constitutional principle of separation between state and church and educating the public on matters of nontheism. With more than 42,000 members, FFRF advocates for freethinkers’ rights across the globe. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

Church and State

New Florida Education Standards

 Promote White Christian

 Nationalism, Teacher Says

 

Americans United Files Brief with  

Florida Department of Education Seeking Documents

    WASHINGTON - (AU) - 7/1/2022 - Americans United for Separation of Church and State is launching an investigation into new Florida educational standards that reportedly promote white Christian Nationalism.

    Gov. Ron DeSantis launched a Civics Literacy Excellence Initiative (CLEI) and Florida educators recently attended a three-day training session to learn how to teach students the new material. “There was this Christian nationalism philosophy that was just baked into everything,” one teacher told the Miami Herald, which broke the story.

    The billion-dollar shadow network Americans United has been fighting in court and around the country seems to be involved in promoting the standards. Americans United’s investigation seeks to uncover the extent to which the training sessions were developed by the conservative Christian groups like Hillsdale College and the Koch-founded Bill of Rights Institute.

    During the training, slides shown to teachers describing the new curriculum called facts about our nation’s history “misconceptions,” including that “The Founders desired strict separation of church and state and the Founders only want to protect Freedom of worship” and “The American colonies were characterized by religious intolerance … and there was no religious liberty in America until the First Amendment.” During breakout sessions, the state’s presenters reportedly highlighted the influence of Jesus Christ and the Bible in the country’s foundation. The training also whitewashed the role of slavery in American history.

    In a public records request filed today with the Florida Department of Education, Americans United is demanding all documents, materials, contracts and audio or video recordings related to the CLEI trainings, and all department correspondence relating to the trainings, including communications with Hillsdale College.

    Americans United President and CEO Rachel Laser said: “Americans United is considering all options. We’re not going to sit by while politicians smuggle white Christian Nationalism into public school curriculums under the guise of good citizenship. This is another attack in the long war religious extremists and their lawmaker allies have launched on our public schools, as is the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill, which shamefully takes effect in Florida today.

    “Our public schools suffered devastating blows at the Supreme Court over the last few weeks. First, the court forced Maine taxpayers to fund private religious education. Then, the court falsely described a coach’s coercive prayer as ‘personal’ and stopped public schools from protecting their students. In both cases, the court redefined the constitutional promise of religious freedom for all as religious privilege for a select few.

    “The state shouldn’t be indoctrinating students into Christian nationalism, but educating them about the separation of church and state, which is embedded in our Constitution because the founders recognized it is the only guarantee of religious freedom for all. What we need right now is a national recommitment to the separation of church and state.”

Reproductive Rights

Overturning Roe v. Wade 

is an Assault on Free, Fair, 

and Fundamental Rights

Statement of Common Cause President Karen Hobert Flynn

 

    June 24, 2022 -- Today’s opinion overturning Roe v. Wade threatens the fundamental rights of every American. The ruling is the culmination of a decades-long strategy to take the Constitution, our Court, and our country backwards on issues of reproductive freedom, and it has profound implications for every other right that could be next on the chopping block. The ruling also exposes the disingenuous sworn testimony of conservative justices during their Senate confirmation hearings when they assured Senators that Roe was established precedent, leaving unsaid their agenda to reverse it.

    Today’s decision shakes confidence in whatever was left of trust and confidence in the Court’s independence and integrity. The ruling is the latest in a long string of recent right-wing activist rulings from this Court. Its ideological agenda has repeatedly preferenced the rights of politicians, corporations, and those in power over women’s rights, the rights of people of color, and everyday people. This Court has trampled on precedent and on commonsense campaign finance laws in Citizens United v. FEC, McCutcheon v. FEC, FEC v. Cruz for Senate, and numerous other cases – encouraging pay-to-play and silencing the voices of everyday Americans. The Court gutted the Voting Rights Act in Shelby County v. Holder. The Court ducked the responsibility to protect North Carolina voters against partisan gerrymandering in Rucho v. Common Cause, allowing politicians to cherry pick their voters instead of voters choosing politicians.

    The damage done to this nation by this Court is not over, and today’s ruling is just the latest reminder that who we elect to the presidency and to the United States Senate has very real and long-lasting consequences, including for the wealthy special interests that think they have captured our democracy and the Court. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) engineered an unprecedented attack on judicial independence with his refusal in 2016 to allow so much as a hearing for President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee in an election year, only to reverse course days before the 2020 election to seat Justice Barrett after abolishing the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees three years before.

    Today’s decision also sends a signal to lower courts and state courts to do their part in rolling back fundamental rights. This is perilous nationwide, and especially in places that elect judges and where campaign contributions pollute notions of fair play and equal justice under law.

    We know exactly who nominated and confirmed the ideological Justices sitting on the Court today, and many of those Senators are still in office. Our recourse is the ballot box, and we must hold our elected officials accountable for the actions of the Justices they nominate and confirm to the Supreme Court. 

 

Source: Common Cause

Impeachment

ACLU Again Calls for 

Impeachment of President Trump

    NEW YORK (ACLU) — Jan. 10, 2021 - The American Civil Liberties Union’s national board of directors unanimously passed a second resolution Jan. 10 calling for the impeachment of President Donald J. Trump.

    As a matter of organizational policy, the ACLU does not regularly call for the removal of public officials. Such a move requires action by the ACLU National Board of Directors. The full resolution states:

    “Having considered the ACLU’s mission to preserve, protect, and advance civil liberties and civil rights, its commitment to nonpartisanship, and its policy permitting it to take a position on impeachment only where an official’s acts pose a ‘grave and imminent threat to civil liberties,’

    “The National Board of Directors of the ACLU previously resolved, on Dec. 19, 2019, that President Trump committed impeachable offenses and violated his oath to preserve, protect, and advance the Constitution.

    “The Board now resolves by a unanimous vote that President Trump has committed additional impeachable offenses, violated his oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution, and poses a ‘grave and imminent threat to civil liberties’ by engaging in an extended pattern of bad-faith conduct designed to subvert the results of a democratic election, thereby violating the core principles of our constitutional democracy: the right of the people to choose their representatives, and the obligation of officials to abide by the results of free and fair elections, and ensure the peaceful transition of power.

    “The pattern includes:

•     Repeatedly making knowingly false statements about voter fraud and improprieties designed to undermine the legitimacy of the election results, including in a series of frivolous lawsuits, without evidence to support the claims;
•     Pressuring election officials in several states, including Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia, to interfere with the results of the election, including a Jan. 2 taped phone call in which he abused the power of the presidency by demanding that the Georgia secretary of state ‘find 11,780 votes,’ and threatened criminal liability if the secretary of state did not do so;
•     Seeking to disenfranchise people of color by targeting many of these efforts at counties and jurisdictions, such as in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin, with predominantly Black or Brown populations;
•     Directing Vice President Pence to block Congress’ certification of the Electoral College results, where the vice president had neither the authority nor the grounds to do so; and
•     Urging an unruly mob to riot at the United States Capitol on Jan. 6, in an effort to prevent the certification of the Electoral College results and to intimidate members of Congress from carrying out their constitutional duties.

    “The Board recognizes that officials have a right to pursue good-faith challenges to election results, where there is an arguable basis for doing so, including through public statements, outreach to government officials, filing lawsuits, and encouraging one’s supporters. But the pattern of conduct engaged in by President Trump displayed an unfounded, unconstitutional, and bad-faith effort to undermine the election results merely because the president lost in order to maintain himself in office. 

    “Because our democracy rests on a commitment by representatives to let the people decide, these unprecedented acts constitute high crimes and misdemeanors that pose a grave and imminent threat to civil liberties, and to the foundations of our Republic, warranting President Trump’s impeachment.

    “The Board, therefore, supports the impeachment of President Donald Trump a second time on the aforementioned grounds.”

    Calling for the impeachment of President Trump in December 2019 was the second instance in the organization’s history that the ACLU National Board of Directors voted to support impeachment of a president. This is the first time the ACLU is calling for a second impeachment. The organization also supported the impeachment of President Richard Nixon.

Politics and Democracy

Democracy in an Age of

Anti-Majoritarian Doublespeak

 

By Steve Rensberry
Opinion/Analysis

________________

 

   

Lincoln in Springfield, Ill./  RP News Photo

(RP News) - 8/15/2020 - “America is a republic, not a democracy.” How often have you heard that phrase?
    I've heard it on and off my whole life, but most recently came across it as the title of a work by Assumption College Professor Bernard Dobski, described as a visiting scholar with the Simon Center for American Studies by The Heritage Foundation (First Principles No. 80: Foundational Concepts to Guide Politics and Policy, June 2020)
    The publication is too predictable. There is little disagreement that America is not a pure democracy. Neither are there a lot of voices arguing that it should be. The founding documents themselves, particularly the Federalist Papers, explicitly limited public and collective control of government in favor of elected representatives--gatekeepers of sorts--who could temper the citizenry's excessive impulses.
    Such representatives, however, are ultimately chosen through an electoral process set up to operate democratically with fixed regularity --- in effect turning the majoritarian public into gatekeepers for the gatekeepers. Our Constitutionally mandated system of laws and precedent is meant to guide the boundaries of acceptable behavior further still. The Electoral College, arguably, performs a similar gate-keeping function.
    Some people prefer the term “Constitutional republic,” but the best term in my view is “representative democracy,” which fairly well describes a country that is of the people, by the people, and for the people, yet incorporates a system of representation that guards against mob impulses. Are we splitting hairs? Possibly.
    Neither the Heritage Foundation nor Dr. Dobski seem too keen on the democracy part of it though, as this published summary of the article shows. (reference) To quote:

   America is a republic and not a pure democracy. The contemporary efforts to weaken our republican customs and institutions in the name of greater equality thus run against the efforts by America’s Founders to defend our country from the potential excesses of democratic majorities. American republicanism and the ordered liberty it makes possible are grounded in the Federalists’ recognition that non-majoritarian parts of the community make legitimate contributions to the community’s welfare, and that preserving these contributions is the hallmark of political justice. But, the careful balance produced by our mixed republic is threatened by an egalitarianism that undermines the social, familial, religious, and economic distinctions and inequalities that undergird our political liberty. Preserving the republican freedoms we cherish requires tempering egalitarian zeal and moderating the hope for a perfectly just democracy.

   I'll try to keep my argument short but have four points to make:
   1) Protecting one's country from the excesses of anything sounds eminently reasonable, especially if such excesses are of a negative nature, whether due to a tyrannical minority or a misguided majority.
   2) It is entirely understandable how modern efforts toward greater equality might weaken “republican customs and institutions” -- especially if those customs and institutions have helped to perpetuate discriminatory and abusive or socially harmful behavior, which is kind of the point.
   3) While we are not a pure democracy, neither are we a pure republic. The authority and power of ordinary citizens, or the collective population, is limited, as is the power of representatives who have a sworn duty to do what is in the best interests of the people who elected them.
   4) Read this sentence from Dobski carefully: “American republicanism and the ordered liberty it makes possible are grounded in the Federalists’ recognition that non-majoritarian parts of the community make legitimate contributions to the community’s welfare, and that preserving these contributions is the hallmark of political justice.” Now ask yourself, what does “ordered liberty,” “non-majoritarian parts,” and “political justice,” mean? They can and do mean a whole lot of things. “Ordered liberty” could just as well mean a jail cell as it does traffic laws, and Dobski's use of the term “non-majoritarian parts” is disturbingly open-ended, contrary to the concept of non-majoritarian institutions, which I don't think he means. 
    It's clear from this quote and others that the concepts of equality and egalitarianism are particularly loathsome to Dobski, and to others discontented with democracy. Is it because such ideas challenge established social hierarchies, or pose a challenge to groups or religious institutions who would rather not be held accountable? I would argue yes.
    Consider Dobski's own words:
   “As [Alex de] Tocqueville correctly foresaw, the limitless passion for equality—the root cause for seeking direct democracy—undermines respect for all of those social, familial, civic, and religious institutions that separate individuals from one another, establish hierarchies, dictate codes of behavior, and, most importantly, help us preserve our liberties,” he writes.
   In other words: Separation and division are good and natural, while things like unity, acceptance of diversity, and equality are bad and artificially imposed.
   Truth is, the society that Dobski defends is a society that works best when everyone knows their place, and where religious leaders, political leaders, and those who “know best” are given preference in all things, even science. One of many stretches in logic he makes is theorizing about a “democratic theory applied to minds,” with respect to the COVID-19 crisis. He writes: “The democratic theory of minds does not recognize a hierarchy of human knowledge in which scientific expertise is governed and regulated by prudential political judgments, themselves drawn from an understanding of the political good.”
   I think it's his way of saying that democratic minds just don't understand the big picture, because they're all about numbers, but republican minds do.
   The solvency of democratic governments around the world, and respect for democratic institutions in general, has definitely been a topic of concern in recent years, with our own anti-majoritarian political shift to the right mirrored by similar shifts in other parts of the world. It's not the first time we've seen this tug-of-war. Looking through an old copy of a 1955 book by famed political columnist Walter Lippman, The Public Philosophy, I came across this paragraph mid-way through: (reference)
   “The plight of the modern democracies is serious. They have suffered great disasters in this century and the consequences of these disasters are compounding themselves,” Lippman wrote. “The end is not yet clear. The world that is safe for democracy and is safely democratic is shrunken. It is still shrinking. For the disorder which has been incapacitating the democracies in this century is, if anything, becoming more virulent as time goes on.”
   He could have written it yesterday.

For further reading
America is a Republic, Not a Democracy

America is Not a Democracy

Is the United States a Republic or a Democracy?

Non-majoritarian Institutions and Representation

Majoritarianism

Why Conservatives Hate Democracy

NSA Faces New Lawsuit Over Mass Surveillance

By Steve Rensberry 

srensberry@rensberrypublishing.com
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    (RPC) - 3/11/2015 - The American Civil Liberties Union has filed a new lawsuit against the National Security Agency on behalf of multiple plaintiffs. At issue is the agency's practice of conducting "upstream surveillance," and the broad scope of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, which the ALCU says violates both the U.S. Constitution and the reasonable expectation of privacy that average citizens and others who rely on confidential, secure communications have.
   The suit asks that the practice of upstream surveillance be declared unlawful and stopped immediately, and that the government be required to purge all information from its databases with respect to the plaintiffs.
  Plaintiffs include the Wikimedia Foundation, The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International USA, PEN American Center, Global Fund for Women, The Nation Magazine, The Rutherford Institute, and The Washington Office on Latin America.
   “Upstream surveillance, which the government claims is authorized by the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, is designed to ensnare all of Americans’ international communications, including emails, web-browsing content, and search engine queries,” the ACLU states. “It is facilitated by devices installed, with the help of companies like Verizon and AT&T, directly on the internet 'backbone' – the network of high-capacity cables, switches, and routers across which Internet traffic travels.”
   The complaint, dated March 10, 2015, challenges what it says is “the suspicionless seizure and searching of internet traffic by the National Security Agency (NSA) on U.S. Soil,” putting in jeopardy billions of sensitive international communications conducted each year by various educational, legal, human rights and media organizations – effectively undermining their ability to conduct activities which are crucial to their missions.
   Defendants named in the suit include the Fort Meade, Maryland-based National Security Agency/Central Security Service, NSA Director Michael S. Rogers, the Defendant Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper, the Department of Justice, and U.S. Attorney General Eric H. Holder.
   While the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act was enacted in 1978, it has undergone numerous amendments over the years, one of the latest of which was the FISA Amendments Act (FAA) signed by former President George W. Bush on July 10, 2008.
   “The FAA radically revised the FISA regime that had been in place since 1978, by authorizing the acquisition without individualized suspicion of a wide swath of communications, including U.S. persons' international communications, from companies inside the United States,” the complaint states.
   The act prohibits the specific targeting of U.S. citizens, but is defined so broadly the plaintiff's say that just about any type of communication by citizens (corporations and associations included) outside the country is fair game.
   As stated in the suit: “Thus, though the FAA is nominally concerned with the surveillance of individuals and groups outside the United States, it has far-reaching implications for U.S. persons' privacy. The targets of FAA surveillance may include journalists, academic researchers, human rights defenders, aid workers, business persons, and others who are not suspected of any wrongdoing. In the course of FAA surveillance, the government may acquired the communications of U.S. citizens and residents with all of these persons.”
   Other concerns expressed in the complaint:
   -- Upstream surveillance does not share the same limitations as that of standard NSA targets, but essentially involves a fishing expedition by collecting and storing all international communications by everyone in order to filter them through a set of search terms for review and potentially further surveillance.
   -- Although so-called targeting and minimization procedures are in place to limit how data is used, those procedures are very permissive and filled with exceptions, that allow the NSA to retain anything it collects for a period of up to three years, or indefinitely if such communications are encrypted.
   “The interception, copying, and review of Plaintiffs' communications while in transit is a violation of plaintiffs' reasonable expectation of privacy in those communications. It is also a violation of plantiffs' right to control those communications and the information they reveal and contain,” the suit states.
   The complain cites action by the government in 2013, as noted by the director of national intelligence, where 89,138 individuals, groups and organizations were targeted for surveillance under a single court order; in addition to the collection of 150 million internet communications in 2011 alone under the FAA.
   ACLU Staff Attorney Patrick Toomey cites a quoted comment made by former NSA Director Michael Hayden, who stated: “Let me be really clear. NSA doesn't just listen to bad people. NSA listens to interesting people. People who are communicating information,” as evidence that there are  very few limitations on the agency's spying activities.
   “The fact that upstream surveillance is supposedly focused on international communications is hardly a saving grace. Americans spend more and more of their lives communicating over the Internet – and more and more of those communications are global in nature, whether we realize it or not,” Toomey writes. “An email from a woman in Philadelphia to her mother in Phoenix might be routed through Canada without either one knowing it. Similarly, companies like Microsoft and Google often store backup copies of their U.S. customers' emails on servers overseas, again with hardly anyone the wiser. The NSA is peeking inside virtually all of these.”
   Toomey criticizes the practice of upstream intelligence gathering as something that flips the Constitution on its head.
   “It allows the government to search everything first and ask questions later, making us less free in the process,” Toomey writes. “Our suit aims to stop this kind of surveillance.”

Court strikes down 'No Fly List' procedures

  (ACLU) - 6/24/2014 - In a landmark ruling, a federal judge struck down as unconstitutional the government’s procedures for people on the No Fly List to challenge their inclusion. The decision came in an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit brought on behalf of 13 Americans who found themselves on the list without any notice, reasons, or meaningful way to get off it.
   The judge ordered the government to create a new process that remedies these shortcomings, calling the current process “wholly ineffective” and a violation of the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of due process. The ruling also granted a key request in the lawsuit, ordering the government to tell the ACLU’s clients why they are on the No Fly List and give them the opportunity to challenge their inclusion on the list before the judge.
   “For years, in the name of national security the government has argued for blanket secrecy and judicial deference to its profoundly unfair No Fly List procedures, and those arguments have now been resoundingly rejected by the court,” said ACLU National Security Project Director Hina Shamsi, one of the attorneys who argued the case.
   “Our clients will finally get the due process to which they are entitled under the Constitution. This excellent decision also benefits other people wrongly stuck on the No Fly List, with the promise of a way out from a Kafkaesque bureaucracy causing them no end of grief and hardship. We hope this serves as a wake-up call for the government to fix its broken watchlist system, which has swept up so many innocent people.”
   According to media reports, there are more than 20,000 people on the No Fly List. Their only recourse is to file a request with the Department of Homeland Security's Traveler Redress Inquiry Program (DHS TRIP), after which DHS responds with a letter that does not explain why they were denied boarding. The letter does not confirm or deny whether their names remain on the list, and does not indicate whether they can fly.
   The ruling from the U.S. District Court in Oregon found, “[W]ithout proper notice and an opportunity to be heard, an individual could be doomed to indefinite placement on the No-Fly List. … [T]he absence of any meaningful procedures to afford Plaintiffs the opportunity to contest their placement on the No-Fly List violates Plaintiffs’ rights to procedural due process.”
   One of the plaintiffs in the case is Sheikh Mohamed Abdirahman Kariye, who is the imam of Portland’s largest Mosque.
   “Finally I will be able to challenge whatever incorrect information the government has been using to stigmatize me and keep me from flying,” Imam Kariye said. “I have been prevented by the government from traveling to visit my family members and fulfill religious obligations for years, and it has had a devastating impact on all of us. After all this time, I look forward to a fair process that allows me to clear my name in court.”
   The national ACLU, along with its affiliates in Oregon, Southern California, Northern California, and New Mexico, filed the lawsuit in June 2010 on behalf of 13 U.S. citizens, including four military veterans. In July 2012, the 9th Circuit Appeals Court reversed the district court's dismissal of the case on jurisdictional grounds, allowing the district court to consider the case on its merits. In August 2013, the court found that constitutional rights are at stake when the government places Americans on the list.
   Source: American Civil Liberties Union

EFF Says Lavabit Subpoena Violates Constitution

   (EFF) - 10/27/2013 - Federal law enforcement officers compromised the backbone of the Internet and violated the Fourth Amendment when they demanded private encryption keys from the email provider Lavabit, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) argues in a brief submitted Thursday afternoon to the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. In the amicus brief, EFF asks the panel to overturn a contempt-of-court finding against Lavabit and its owner Ladar Levison for resisting a government subpoena and search warrant that would have put the private communications and data of Lavabit's 400,000 customers at risk of exposure to the government.
   For nearly two decades, secure Internet communication has relied on HTTPS, a encryption system in which there are two keys: A public key that anyone can use to encrypt communications to a service provider, and a private key that only the service provide can use to decrypt the messages.
   In July, the Department of Justice demanded Lavabit's private key—first with a subpoena, then with a search warrant. Although the government was investigating a single user, having access to the private key means the government would have the power to read all of Lavabit's customers' communications. The target of the investigation has not been named, but journalists have noted that the requests came shortly after reports that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden used a Lavabit email account to communicate.
   "Obtaining a warrant for a service's private key is no different than obtaining a warrant to search all the houses in a city to find the papers of one suspect," EFF Senior Staff Attorney Jennifer Lynch said. "This case represents an unprecedented use of subpoena power, with the government claiming it can compel a disclosure that would, in one fell swoop, expose the communications of every single one of Lavabit's users to government scrutiny."
   EFF's concerns reach beyond this individual case, since the integrity of HTTPS is employed almost universally over the Internet, including in commercial, medical and financial transactions.
   "When a private key has been discovered or disclosed to another party, all users' past and future communications are compromised," EFF Staff Technologist Dan Auerbach said. "If this was Facebook's private key, having it would mean unfettered access to the personal information of 20 percent of the earth's population. A private key not only protects communications on a given service; it also protects passwords, credit card information and a user's search engine query terms."
   Initially, Levison resisted the government request. In response, a district court found Lavabit in contempt of court and levied a $5,000-per-day fine until the company complied. After Levison was forced to turn over Lavabit's key, the certificate authority GoDaddy revoked the key per standard protocol, rendering the secure site effectively unavailable to users.
   Since Lavabit's business model is founded in protecting privacy, Levison shut down the service when it no longer could guarantee security to its customers.
   "The government's request to Lavabit not only disrupts the security model on which the Internet depends, but also violates our Constitutional protections against unreasonable searches and seizures," EFF Staff Attorney Hanni Fakhoury said. "By effectively destroying Lavabit's legitimate business model when it complied with the subpoena, the action was unreasonably burdensome and violated the Fourth Amendment."
   The deadline for the government's response brief is Nov. 12, 2013.
   For EFF's full amicus brief, see: https://www.eff.org/document/lavabit-amicus

   Source: Electronic Frontier Foundation