News & Commentary

The following post was originally published on Giving In LA.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) rolled out a new immigration enforcement program this month that it bills as an improved approach to using city and county police and jails for immigration enforcement.

By Joey Hernández and Zara Lockshin

The news on Mother’s Day left her elated: she was pregnant with her first child. But Monserrat Ruiz Cuevas’ celebration was short lived.When she learned she was pregnant, she was in custody at the Mesa Verde Detention Center, an immigration facility in Bakersfield operated by GEO Group, Inc. Within days Monserrat became ill and was taken to a hospital for urgent medical care.

By Zara Lockshin

 There is no “transgender exception” to the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution—the provision that prohibits “cruel and unusual” punishment. That prohibition obligates prisons to treat inmates’ serious medical needs regardless of their sexual orientation. And that treatment

By Melissa Goodman and Zara Lockshin

The Los Angeles City Council is to be congratulated on passing an ordinance raising the minimum wage in the city to $15 by 2020. That historic action is an important step in achieving economic justice for so many workers who are forced to hold down two jobs or more and even then find it increasingly difficult to make ends meet. A living wage is a basic economic right, and it is inextricably linked to the full exercise of civil rights and liberties. No one working a full-time job should be paid a wage that leaves them living in poverty.