Welcome to the July issue of The Brief, the monthly email newsletter of the ACLU of Northern California. Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court wrapped up a truly disastrous term for civil rights. Although the court narrowly affirmed birthright citizenship and states' authority to set their mail ballot rules, it neutered the Voting Rights Act, and shredded protections for immigrants, trans girls and women. These decisions were a significant setback, but, as our Executive Director Abdi Soltani writes in his post-term analysis, our collective work to ensure this country lives up to its founding promise of equality continues.

ICE arrests barred at courthouses nationwide

In a major victory, a federal district court struck down the Trump administration's unlawful policy of arresting immigrants at courthouses and reinstated the 12-hour limit on detaining people in temporary holding cells. The ruling, which applies to every courthouse across the country, stems from the federal class-action lawsuit we filed with our partners last September. Beginning in May 2025, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents ambushed and arrested immigrants at mandatory court hearings and held them for days in squalid conditions inside rooms designed for short-term stays. With this ruling, people can pursue their asylum and immigration cases without fear that they will be detained when they show up for their day in court.

Vallejo releases sanitized report on police badge-bending scandal

After years of stonewalling, the city released its report on Vallejo police officers' perverse ritual of bending the tips of their badges to mark on-duty shootings. Our takeaways:

• High-ranking Vallejo officials hid evidence of the badge-bending from the public for years.
• Police officers who participated remain on the force, and none were disciplined.
• By waiting years to investigate, city and police leaders lost the opportunity to hold officers accountable.

The investigation was a farce. And we should not have had to sue to force the city to make the results public. Vallejo residents deserve better from their city leaders and police department.

Video: Modesto mask ban blocked

A federal court has blocked enforcement of a Modesto ordinance banning face coverings and protective gear at protests. While our lawsuit proceeds, people can now protest peacefully in the city without fear of arrest. Learn more on YouTube.

Please note: This link will take you to a third-party website, youtube.com.

Siskiyou County settles water discrimination claims

Nearly four years after we sued Siskiyou County for restricting water access to a mostly Asian American community, the county has agreed to stop enforcing local ordinances that curtailed water deliveries to the rural, largely undeveloped subdivision. The five-year agreement was the final chapter in our lawsuit challenging years of systemic racial discrimination and targeted harassment directed at Asian American residents.

Last December, we settled the lawsuit's racial profiling claims. That agreement requires Siskiyou County to adopt a policy prohibiting race-based traffic stops, remove illegal property liens, and establish independent oversight of the sheriff's office.

ACLU NorCal online archive brings history to life

History buffs rejoice – the online archive of the ACLU News, our print newsletter, is now fully searchable. The publication is a detailed record of our 92-year legacy of trailblazing litigation and civil rights advocacy, including the 1934 San Francisco general strike that spurred our founding and the landmark Supreme Court case challenging the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. Digging deeper reveals accounts of our lesser-known work, like a lawsuit to overturn a Bay Area school district's ban on Ms. Magazine in the 1980s.

This quote from a 1981 column could have been written today: "To protect our primary client, the Bill of Rights, we must prevent the government from yielding to reactionary pressure groups and their self-righteous campaigns against gay rights, reproductive choice, or anti-Communist hysteria." The archive is proof that history repeats itself. It's also a reminder that we know how to win.

In defense of the SF Public Defender

The chronically underfunded San Francisco Public Defender's Office has been so overwhelmed with defendants facing low-level drug charges that last year it stopped accepting some new cases. When Public Defender Mano Raju didn't comply with a court order to take on new assignments, a Superior Court judge found him in contempt and fined him $26,000. An appeals court suspended payment while Raju challenges the contempt order. In a brief, we argued that the lower court should have deferred to Raju when evaluating the claim that his office doesn't have the capacity to handle the volume of cases the district attorney is prosecuting.

SF public defenders' excessive caseloads undermine their ability to effectively represent their clients – who are predominantly Black, Brown, unhoused, and immigrant residents – and threaten the integrity of the entire criminal legal system.

Resentencing for people charged as minors

The California Supreme Court is considering whether a sentence of 50 years to life in prison is effectively life without parole. If the court concludes that it is, people who were sentenced to 50-to-life for an offense they committed as a minor could seek resentencing once they serve 15 years. We agree that 50-to-life functions as a life sentence. But the court must go even further. In a brief, we argued that equal protection requires that everyone sentenced as a minor must have the same opportunity to pursue resentencing after 15 years. While their brains are still developing, adolescents are impulsive and act irrationally, but they have a profound capacity to change as they mature. After 15 years behind bars, they deserve a chance to demonstrate that they can safely rejoin society.

Final Thought:

Check out the upcoming dates on ACLU NorCal's Defend Democracy Tour with Executive Director Abdi Soltani.

Thanks for reading this issue of The Brief! We'll see you back here next month.