News & Commentary

Indigenous students often face barriers when schools deny them the right to wear traditional regalia at graduation. This issue highlights a broader conflict between cultural identity and institutional policies. The blog advocates for respecting and celebrating Indigenous heritage during graduation ceremonies.

Christine Hong, Professor of Critical Race and Ethnic Studies, and Laaila, an undergraduate in Critical Race and Ethnic Studies and Environmental Studies, offer their firsthand accounts of the protests and their aftermath at UC Santa Cruz.

Our new report corroborates what people detained immigrant have been saying for years: ICE is committing widespread human rights violations across its immigration detention facilities in California.

For the third time in five years, California rejected a bill that would have greenlit government use of facial recognition across the state.

John Do is the ACLU of Northern California’s lead counsel for a lawsuit challenging the city’s costly and ineffective practice of destroying unhoused individuals’ belongings, and citing, arresting, and moving them without offering shelter. For Do, who grew up poor in subsidized public housing, ending homelessness is personal. “I’ve always seen homelessness as a direct result of decades of poor policymaking and a lack of investment in affordable housing,” said Do, a senior attorney with the Racial and Economic Justice Program. “Without it, I know with one hundred percent certainty that my family would have been homeless.”

Dozens of mentally ill people have died in California jails when they should have been in state hospitals receiving treatment. An ACLU lawsuit demands answers.

The ACLU of Northern California is closely monitoring the campus protests and the university and law enforcement responses in our region, particularly at California Polytechnic Humboldt. We are receiving and reviewing legal intakes from campuses across the region, including Stanford University and UC Berkeley.