News & Commentary

Ahilan T. Arulanantham is director of immigrant rights and national security for the ACLU/SC. He wrote this piece for the American Constitution Society.

LOS ANGELES, Calif. – The City of Costa Mesa today halted enforcement of its anti-solicitation ordinance in response to a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, MALDEF and the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. The suit was brought on behalf of day laborers represented by the Asociacion de Jornaleros de Costa Mesa and the Colectivo Tonantzin.

Massive teacher layoffs at three Los Angeles Unified School District middle schools have deprived thousands of low-income students and students of color of their legal right to an education consistent with prevailing statewide standards, a team of civil rights attorneys said in a class-action lawsuit filed today.

LOS ANGELES, Calif. – ACLU/SC Executive Director Ramona Ripston, for decades one of the region’s most respected and outspoken voices on civil rights and civil liberties issues ranging from education and police reform to privacy, freedom of speech, and the rights of immigrants and homeless people, announced today that she will step down from the post she has held for 38 years.

LOS ANGELES, Calif. – The following statement is from Ramona Ripston, executive director of the ACLU of Southern California:

On Feb. 2, MALDEF, the ACLU of Southern California and the National Day Laborer’s Organizing Network (NDLON) announced a lawsuit challenging the City of Costa Mesa’s anti-solicitation ordinance as unconstitutional.

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LOS ANGELES, Calif. – The ACLU of Southern California welcomes the civil rights probe being conducted by the Department of Justice into the polices and practices of the Inglewood Police Department in the wake of a series of officer-involved shootings, and we applaud U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters for calling for an investigation. Use of force by law enforcement has been a persistent problem in Inglewood and has sparked well-founded community outrage. We agree that reforms are necessary and call for an overhaul of the Inglewood civilian review board.

LOS ANGELES, Calif. – The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California is deeply disturbed by the Los Angeles County district attorney's decision not to prosecute an El Monte police officer who clearly violated the law by brutally kicking a suspect in the head even though the suspect posed no physical threat.