News & Commentary

Today, the US Supreme Court reaffirmed that university admissions policies may take race into account as part of an individualized and holistic admissions process if “necessary” to create a diverse student body.

Earlier this week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released its analysis of the economic effects of comprehensive immigration reform. The report demonstrates that not only does immigration reform pay for itself, but it also gives a much needed boost to our economy.

“Each and every day, we have thousands of people who are deported from this country. We fight against deportations, because deportation destroys families,” said Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA), outside the Twin Towers Correctional Facility in Los Angeles on Thursday, June 13.

LOS ANGELES — UCLA Immigration Law professor Hiroshi Motomura led what he described as "a 42-hour immigration course compressed into two hours" at the ACLU of Southern California headquarters last Tuesday.

LOS ANGELES - Transgender students in California are one step closer to just treatment. Today, the California Senate Education Committee voted 5-2 to pass AB 1266 (the School Success and Opportunity Act), which would ensure that transgender students have equal access to facilities and activities like sports teams that match their gender identity. The bill passed the California Assembly in May, and now moves to the full Senate.

WEST HOLLYWOOD—Risqué costumes, boisterous after-parties and general debauchery usually dominate reportage on LA PRIDE festivities. To newcomers, the celebration’s essential mission is overshadowed by the pomp and circumstance.

President Obama's response to the troubling news of indiscriminate government collection of communication information is meant to be reassuring: the NSA is operating under supervision by all three branches of government. Even if this were true, and it is not, this purported defense should make us more nervous, not less, because it suggests that, in Washington, it has become business as usual to withhold basic information from the American public about what powers of surveillance the government claims it can lawfully use.

By Hector Villagra, Executive Director, ACLU/SC On Wednesday, June 5th, the ACLU of Southern California’s Ahilan Arulanantham took part in a public discussion concerning the Obama Administration’s targeted killing program. Speaking alongside Mr. Arulanantham was John Yoo, formerly with the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel during the Bush Administration.