News & Commentary

Atlanta – Yesterday President Trump met with a small group of Senate Republicans to discuss a potential legislative fix for the 800,000 young people who are living in limbo since the politicians canceled the Dream Act almost two months ago. These politicians ruled out fixing the problem that they themselves had created unnecessarily.

“As a nation based on laws, we must move forward, not backwards. I remember the signs that said ‘whites only’ and ‘colored only.’ I remember when businesses open to the public engaged in blatant discrimination against people based on religion, race, and gender.

The ACLU of Georgia and ACLU Disability Rights Project have filed an administrative complaint with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development charging that Cumming Home Ministries, a Christian transitional housing shelter, violated the federal Fair Housing Act when it denied housing to Jeremy Jay Woody, 47, simply because he is deaf. The federal Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination in housing on the basis of disability. Cumming Home Ministries’ homepage states that it has been “Serving Men Needing Transitional Housing since 2010.”

The American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia brought its Freedom School volunteer training to Douglas County at the Dog River Public Library on Saturday, August 26. The Douglas Women Unite hosted the event which is part of a series of volunteer trainings the ACLU of Georgia organizes around the state. Fallon Traylor, ACLU of Georgia’s Policy Advocate, equipped local participants with practical skills needed to advance civil rights and defend the Constitution in their communities.

Fifty-two years ago this week, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act, prohibiting racial discrimination in voting. It was a defining moment for the Civil Rights Movement and for all of us who had marched in Selma

On April 10, 2017 the ACLU of Georgia and the American Civil Liberties Union filed a friend-of-the-court brief arguing that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act clearly prohibits workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

Defending voting rights in the state of Georgia is like playing a game of whack-a-mole. When you defeat one threat to voting rights, another one inevitably pops up in its place. Recent actions by state and local lawmakers, including a bill on Gov. Nathan Deal’s desk (House Bill 268), show how these attacks on eligible voters just keep on coming.

The 2017 legislative session ended after midnight on Thursday, and we were there until the bitter end — fighting for the Constitution and for the civil rights of all Georgians.

This past Saturday, the ACLU of Georgia joined the people of Macon to send a powerful message: that all Georgians deserve to be treated equally under the law — regardless of their color, creed, sexual orientation or gender identity. The March on Macon, organized by local college students and endorsed by the Macon-Bibb County Commission, raised awareness about the need to strengthen Georgia’s currently weak civil rights protections so that they protect all people, including LGBT Georgians, from discrimination in housing, employment and public accommodations.