SOCIAL JUSTICE BLOG
Read and share the extraordinary stories from the frontlines of social change
LGBTQ+ Veterans Still Suffer Harms From “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” Ten Years After Repeal
The repeal of DADT was a cause for celebration, but those service members subject to it still must contend with a loss of valuable benefits, bureaucratic intransigence, and stigmatization. Today, tens of thousands of LGBTQ-identifying veterans are still foreclosed from receiving the benefits they deserve. As the tenth anniversary of DADT’s repeal approaches, there is new movement to address these harms. If you or someone you know is a former service member who served in any branch of the U.S. armed forces, were separated from service for being openly LGBTQ—or because others thought you were—and received anything less than an honorable discharge, please contact us.
Just Earth Celebrates Three Years of Success Championing Environmental Justice
In the three years since the creation of Just Earth , the need for funding for environmental justice has only increased. After receiving generous seed funding from the Mosaic collaborative, Just Earth is poised for the next chapter. As of today, Just Earth has awarded more than $500,000 by way of 26 recoverable grants. With each of our grants, we aim to effect positive change by funding environmental justice litigation: environmental cases that dually aim to empower and cultivate justice for Indigenous and other underserved communities. All too often, environmental racism and discrimination on the basis of class and race are linked with significant ecological harm.
Can Britney Vote?
The plight of Britney Spears, the pop star who has been under a conservatorship for the past 13 years, has plastered the news headlines recently. While even a quick skimmer of the Britney saga suggests the potential for financial abuse, like how much she pays the people who continue to benefit from her conservatorship, and restrictions on her reproductive rights such as whether she can stop using birth control, we don’t know if Ms. Spears can vote. If she is like thousands of other people whose voting rights are curtailed through a court-ordered guardianship (called conservatorship in California), she may have been disenfranchised without any consideration of whether she in fact remains capable of voting. Categorical bans on voting by people subject to guardianship or conservatorship exist in at least a dozen states and may be ripe for legal challenge.
After Years of Suffering By Low-Income and BIPOC Communities, Court Orders Houston to Obey Clean Water Act and Invest $2BN on Major Upgrades to Sewer System
The Houston Chronicle reported lower-income communities and communities of color are “most likely to feel the consequences of Houston’s long-running struggle with sewer overflows.” We identified thousands of illegal overflows that had occurred across the City’s massive sanitary sewer system and had polluted our local bayous and creeks, as well as neighborhood parks and school playgrounds. This led us to serve the City of Houston with a notice of intent to sue under the Clean Water Act.
Who Buys 87 Guns At Once? Brady Holds Gun Manufacturer, Distributor, and Dealer Accountable!
Who buys 87 guns at once, or 180 guns in a few months? Traffickers who intend to resell guns on the criminal market. No one should have been surprised when a gun trafficker drove these Saturday night specials into New York--a state with much stronger gun laws than Ohio--and sold them to criminals. One of these guns was later used to shoot Daniel.
Combatting COVID-19 In Psychiatric Hospitals: When The Only Thing You Can Do Is Go To Court
Some might ask what business civil rights lawyers had bringing litigation against the state when the entire world was trying to contend with a novel coronavirus. My response is this: our clients, afraid of dying, called us and asked us to help. We approached the state on behalf of our clients asking them to change their ordinary course of business when the first positive tests were announced. When the Department announced the first death of a patient in its custody, the press release included their “thoughts and prayers.” Our clients needed more: they needed infection control and prevention, including PPE used properly; they needed reduction in census so that social distancing measures could be implemented; they needed isolation and quarantine protocols.
Fighting to Protect Residents From an Industrial Animal Agriculture Giant’s Wasteful Water Use
While residents face water shortages that adversely impact their quality of life, Foster Farms’ Livingston chicken slaughterhouse and processing plant use vast amounts of water for a particularly wasteful and inhumane method of slaughter that also results in diminished water quality in the region. The Impact Fund is standing up for Livingston residents by providing critical funding to the Animal Legal Defense Fund in support of its groundbreaking lawsuit challenging Foster Farms’ excessive water use. The lawsuit seeks to enjoin the company from using its current water-wasting slaughter method, based on a provision in the California Constitution that states that the right to water “shall not extend to the waste or unreasonable use or unreasonable method of use.”
Civil Rights Hero, Artie Lashbrook, Posthumously Inducted to Impact Fund Class Action Hall of Fame
Artie fulfilled his duty as a class representative despite tremendous adversity in his personal life. During the course of the negotiation, Artie experienced periods of homelessness, living with his partner in their minivan. He also faced serious health problems requiring hospitalization, the amputation of his other leg, and extended stays at rehabilitation facilities. Artie could have easily given up on the case. But he didn’t.
I Wanted Them To Have Justice, To Be Heard And Healed
I thought no one would believe me if I told anyone what happened that day. He was a doctor, I was a 22-year-old student. My real horror that day was guilt. After he assaulted me, over the next 25 years, he assaulted thousands of other women.
Nationwide Class Action Affirms Immigrants’ Rights to their A-Files
This litigation has yielded an unprecedented victory. On December 17, 2020, Judge Orrick issued an order vindicating immigrants’ right to timely receive their A-Files. Finding an “unmistakable history of failing to make timely determinations on A-File FOIA requests,” the court granted declaratory relief that USCIS, ICE, and DHS have a pattern or practice of violating FOIA’s statutory deadlines. This violation, the court wrote, “undermines the fairness of immigration proceedings, particularly for the vast number of noncitizens who navigate our immigration system without assistance of counsel.” Recognizing the need for enforceable and longstanding relief, the court permanently enjoined USCIS, ICE, and DHS from further violations, and ordered defendants to reduce the backlog of A-File FOIA requests within sixty days and release quarterly compliance reports.
Broken Promises and Shattered Dreams - Seeking Economic Justice for the St. Clare’s Pensioners
on July 15, 2020 the Hon. Vincent Versaci of Schenectady Supreme Court denied the motion, holding that the pensioners had sufficiently shown both that the corporation had breached its duties to the plaintiffs and that that the diocese might be liable. Based on the judge’s ruling, we are moving forward with discovery, bringing the St. Clare’s pensioners one step closer to their day in court. We recognize that this is only the first battle and that there is a long road ahead, but we are honored and privileged to be fighting for justice for the St. Clare’s pensioners.
Being convicted of a crime has thousands of consequences besides incarceration – and some last a lifetime
One thing I’ve learned while researching criminal justice reform and teaching college classes in prisons is that the reason the transition to life outside the corrections system is so hard is that there are more than 44,000 indirect consequences of a criminal conviction. These restrictions, which the Council of State Governments tracks in great detail, can include everything like making it impossible to get a license to work as a barber, manicurist, plumber, driver, interior designer or midwife, to restricting where the formerly incarcerated can live, study and volunteer.
Impact Fund Grant Program: COVID-19 Response
To best help grantees and applicants adapt to the evolving legal landscape with COVID-19 related cases, we will; increase availability of rapid response grants, fast track urgent requests and streamline requests for expense type adjustments.
Martin County Kentucky Residents Say "Enough" To Expensive Unsafe Drinking Water
Here’s the real kicker: Despite continued lack of access to safe drinking water, Nina and her fellow Martin Countians pay some of the highest water bills in Kentucky. This is in a county where 40% of the population makes less than $25,000 per year. Many residents simply cannot afford their water bills. Frustrated at the lack of action around water issues in her community, Nina founded the Martin County Concerned Citizens (MCCC) to hold local and state leaders accountable.
Systems Not Symptoms - Impact Fund Grant Program Tackles Racial Injustice Head On
“While we are a small funder, we are in complete solidarity with the movement to end the killing of unarmed Black men by police, as well as all other police brutality. That the list of names of men who have been so killed is so long that it would take up more than a whole page is a commentary on how police have been protected from accountability, at least until now. They have been protected by police unions who block the imposition of discipline. They have been protected by politicians who want to be seen as ‘tough on crime’ and pass laws that make it next to impossible for the public to find out which officers are engaging in brutality against people. And they are protected by the courts that make up rules like ‘qualified immunity’ that let police off the hook when brought to court. We recognize that the police function as part of the system that has been called the criminal justice system, they are but one part. That whole system is what gave us mass incarceration. And the whole system now must come down.”
Civil Rights Class Action Challenges Broken Criminal Justice System in Louisiana
Under Louisiana law, confining any person without legal authority to do so is false imprisonment. And the United States Supreme Court has said that, while some extra time to process paperwork may be necessary, it is unreasonable to imprison a person any longer than 48 hours after they are entitled to release. Louisiana’s imprisonment of people for months after they are entitled to release flagrantly violates the laws of Louisiana and the United States.
Impact Fund Joins Fight Against Transgender Discrimination at Starbucks
Most of Maddie’s coworkers were supportive of her transition and easily adjusted to her new name and pronouns. Over the following weeks, however, Dustin became cold and distant. He started avoiding her, cut her hours, and stopped talking to her about further career advancement. For months, Dustin insisted on calling Maddie by her former name or male nicknames, deliberating misgendering her. Outside of work, Dustin was a regular poster of anti-transgender memes and messages on Facebook and Twitter. When Maddie tried to discuss Guthrie’s hostile behavior with him, he ignored her. When she reached out to other Starbucks managers, she received no meaningful response. Experiencing significant anxiety and depression, Maddie had no choice but to leave Starbucks in June 2018.
Environmental Justice Appeals Court Victory in Minnesota Paves The Way To Hold PolyMet Accountable.
The proposed PolyMet mine project, located at the headwaters of the St. Louis River, the largest U.S. tributary to Lake Superior, would destroy or impair more than 1,000 acres of wetlands and leach toxic metals like mercury, lead and arsenic into our waters. PolyMet’s tailings waste dam uses the same cheap design as the tailings dam that catastrophically failed in Brazil in early 2019, killing over 250 people.
Stunned by the Wall Street culture of harassment, one brave woman says "no" and becomes a Class Action Hero.
Overnight, I was locked out of my accounts, stripped of my livelihood and my office was relocated to the deep hinterlands of the building where I was isolated from coworkers who no longer acknowledged me, left with only a small box of belongings and my dignity. At that moment I decided I would never, ever let them see me cry. I had two choices, put my tail between my legs and run or stand my ground. I didn’t have anything more to lose; there was only one choice, stand back up.
Indiscriminate Use of Psychotropics among Children in Foster Care Is a National Disgrace
Because of the success of our lawsuit, Missouri will now begin implementing reforms to protect these children: medical records will be monitored; doctors and caregivers, with real input from youth, will vet the risks and the benefits of medication before it is administered; and an independent child psychiatrist will be available to provide secondary review of prescriptions for efficacy and safety.