UPDATE: Despite calls to invest in parks, housing, and street repair instead of spending good money on bad policy, the Modesto council voted to commit nearly $350K to defend an ordinance that undermines free speech and endangers reporters. If the city won't stand up for residents' rights, we will.

We're among the many voices calling on California prisons to reverse its absurd ban on Dorsey Nunn's "What Kind of Bird Can’t Fly." The book is precisely the type of reflective and empowering literature that should be available to people in California’s prisons.

🚨TONIGHT: Modesto will consider allocating $250K more to defend an ordinance banning masks and safety gear at protests. The measure stifles free speech and puts reporters at risk. The city already spent $99,500. Concerned about this use of public funds? Speak up at the 5: 30 PM council meeting!

Remember when Border Patrol swarmed a Sacramento Home Depot parking lot last year and arrested day laborers? A federal judge ruled that the raid violated the court order in our Kern County immigration lawsuit that prohibits stops without reasonable suspicion. Score one for the Constitution.

We woke up early to hear our colleague Cecillia Wang defend birthright citizenship at the Supreme Court. ACLU NorCal’s Executive Director Abdi Soltani—a birthright citizen himself—reflects on today’s arguments and the Bay Area roots of a key chapter in the history of birthright citizenship.

Our legal director Cecillia Wang, a daughter of immigrants, is at the Supreme Court defending the bedrock American value of birthright citizenship. President Trump is no match for the 14th Amendment.

For years, the SF immigration court gave asylum seekers a fair shot at remaining in the U.S. Not under Trump. This year, judges are issuing removal orders in 80% of cases. The SF court is closing soon, but the damage is done. Bay Area immigrants face longer wait times, fewer favorable rulings.

Modesto’s ordinance banning face coverings and safety gear at protests is too broad and too vague. At a time when Trump is trying to crush dissent and muzzle the press, the ordinance undermines free speech rights and forces people to choose between speaking out and staying safe. We’re suing.

TSA is alerting ICE about travelers who have been ordered to leave the country. That’s what happened Sunday at SFO when ICE agents arrested a woman with no criminal history who was flying with her young daughter to Miami. Like immigration courthouses, airports are now potential deportation traps.

With a No Kings event happening in Modesto on Saturday, today we sued the city over its unconstitutional ordinance banning face coverings and safety gear at protests. The measure is a hodgepodge of absurd contradictions. A full frog suit is OK, but a bandana worn across the face would be a crime.

Last night, the Society of Professional Journalists honored our attorneys Avi Frey and Emi Young and paralegal Kassie Dibble with a prestigious James Madison Freedom of Information Attorney Award for their tenacious work to hold the Vallejo Police Department accountable for its shameful brutality.👏👏

Our latest monthly e-newsletter covers: • The legal strategy freeing immigrants arrested by ICE; • California's voter ID scam; • As feds try to punish online speech, our call to tech giants to protect their users; • And more! Read it and sign up at www.aclunorcal.org/newsletters/...

Modesto PD just admitted Border Patrol & other federal agencies had access to its license plate reader data — despite a CA law banning it. Their fix? Updated policies. That's not enough. @nickhidalgo.bsky.social

Your turn, @governor.ca.gov Newsom! California’s death row is an unjust, broken system riddled with racial bias. Black people are 8.7x more likely to be sentenced to death than other defendants. Urge Governor Newsom to commute every death row sentence in California before his term ends:

We urge Los Gatos to reconsider restrictions it imposed on a mosque seeking extended hours for evening prayers during Ramadan. The town granted a church less restrictive conditions. Los Gatos must treat all faith communities equally and take seriously religious freedom protections. Read our letter.

In California, attorneys are successfully filing emergency petitions to free immigrants from ICE custody. “ICE doesn’t have to operate this way. It’s clearly in violation of the law. They’re losing cases over and over again.” — Bree Bernwanger, ACLU NorCal

In Northern and Central California, many immigrants ICE arrested at courthouses and check-in appointments have been freed through emergency legal petitions. And, as NBC Bay Area reports, judges are overwhelmingly siding against ICE and “blasting” the federal government in their rulings.

California already verifies voter identity at every stage of the process. The voter ID measure isn’t about election security. It's voter suppression pure and simple — part of Trump’s agenda to create chaos in our elections and disenfranchise voters. Californians are way too smart to fall for it.

California's proposed voter ID ballot measure is a voter suppression scheme straight out of the Trump playbook. If it qualifies for the November ballot, we'll defeat it.

The proposed voter ID initiative is voter suppression, pure and simple. It would erect new barriers to keep eligible California voters from exercising their fundamental right to vote and expose voters' sensitive personal information. If it qualifies for the ballot, we will defeat it in November.

“With these subpoenas, the government is intimidating anonymous social media users who are documenting ICE in their communities. Companies are capitulating to demands instead of fighting illegal subpoenas in court,” said ACLU attorney @snowjake.bsky.social.

Automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) threaten civil liberties and have been used to target immigrants, protestors, and people seeking reproductive care. And Flock has proven itself incapable of securing ALPR location information against illegal sharing. www.kqed.org/news/1207446...

The Society of Professional Journalists has awarded the James Madison Freedom of Information Award to our attorneys Avi Frey, Emi Young and paralegal Kassandra Dibble for their tenacious work continuing to hold VPD accountable for its long and shameful record of brutality. Congratulations Team!

ALPRs are marketed to promote public safety, but many are waking up to the reality: they have high error rates and low efficacy for solving crimes — and worse, they can be weaponized against anyone the government chooses to target.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​ sanjosespotlight.com/op-ed-san-jo...

The government is running an unprecedented campaign to target protected speech, and some tech companies are complying without a fight. In one case, Google fulfilled a subpoena the same day it notified the user—giving them zero time to challenge it in court. www.nytimes.com/video/busine...

Today, the ACLU of Northern California mourns the passing of Rev. Jesse Jackson. It was our honor to work with him directly over the years on many civil rights issues in California. Through his life’s work, he articulated and advanced the vision for the multi-racial democracy that American must be.

The federal government is abusing its power by targeting people who speak out against Trump administration policies online. Alongside @eff.org we're calling on tech companies to resist DHS's lawless demands to turn over user data without a court order.

Once again, DHS withdraws an illegal and unconstitutional subpoena after the ACLU challenges it in court. This is the third time in about as many months.

Our legal director Shilpi Agarwal joins Monday's Commonwealth Club town hall on Bay Area immigration enforcement "After Minneapolis": what we've seen so far, what might be coming, and how we can prepare and respond. Tickets (in-person and live-streamed) at www.commonwealthclub.org/events/2026-...

Whatever the federal presence looks like in the Bay Area on Super Bowl Sunday, we won’t allow it to stop us from exercising our First Amendment right to protest ICE violence. Before you head out on Sunday, here’s what you need to know about your rights to help you stay safe.

This surveillance tech is a "threat to undocumented immigrants or anyone opposing federal immigration actions who travel[s] through Mountain View, a chilling prospect as the U.S. is rattled by images of federal agents snatching people off the streets, brutalizing protesters and even killing..."

We will not be silenced by ICE or anyone else in uniform. But knowing your rights — and knowing when to de-escalate at a time when federal agents are routinely violating people's civil liberties — can help you stay safe.

For months, immigrants faced an impossible choice: show up at court and risk detention or skip it and receive a deportation order. With our partners, we stopped ICE arrests at immigration courthouses in Northern and Central California. Now we’re pushing to end this cruel policy nationwide.

The government’s position would have allowed police to conduct searches based on the presence of small amounts of marijuana, effectively re-criminalizing marijuana use by giving law enforcement broad authority to search whenever they spotted even trace amounts. www.sfchronicle.com/politics/art...

After firings and retirements, just four judges are left to hear a backlog of 120,000 cases at the SF immigration court. And the SF court’s primary office is slated to close by the end of the year, meaning most cases will be heard in Concord, which has its own roster of pending cases.

Of the six million households that rent in the state, about one million are paying more than half of their income toward rent. Tell your California State Assemblymember it’s time to fund solutions.

We the people have the power. Join us tomorrow, January 26, for a virtual training on how to exercise your right to document ICE abuses in your community. RSVP using the link below. When using that link, Indivisible will know you came from us; their privacy policy applies.

Following the latest killing of a civilian by federal agents in Minneapolis, Californians are out on the streets today to demand ICE and CBP withdraw from our communities. Use this link to call on Congress to rein in ICE’s abuses: action.aclu.org/send-message...

BREAKING: Federal agents just shot and killed a man in Minneapolis after brutally beating him in front of witnesses. We condemn this killing and demand ICE and CBP agents withdraw from Minneapolis immediately.

ICE continues to terrorize our communities, including detaining preschoolers and violently attacking people in the streets. Enough is enough. No matter the weather, we’re not letting up. Tell Congress to stop increasing funds to ICE now at aclu.org/stop_ice_attacks-

Despite an order barring unlawful stops and warrantless arrests stemming from our lawsuit over raids in Kern County, Border Patrol brazenly used the same tactics to target Latinos near a Sacramento Home Depot last summer. We’ll be back in court next month to ask a judge to enforce the order.

A federal district court has stopped ICE arrests at immigration courthouses in Northern and Central CA while our class-action lawsuit proceeds. Meanwhile, as federal agents escalate violent, racist attacks against POC, our friends at Sacramento-based NorCal Resist are fighting back on the ground.

One down, three to go. The promise of this country — equality, freedom, and justice for all — has never been self-executing. It’s been carried forward, generation after generation, by the many people willing to defend it and turn its principle into practice. We will never back down.

“Justice is never advanced in the taking of a human life." - Corretta Scott King. This #MLKDay, we call on @GavinNewsom to #CommuteTheRow. actionnetwork.org/letters/gov-...

Doing what is right isn’t always easy when people in power want us scared and divided. On this #MLKDay, the words and example of Dr. King remind us of our duty to keep showing up for one another in the pursuit of racial and economic justice.

Victory for Voting Rights! A federal judge has thrown out the U.S. Department of Justice's lawsuit aimed at forcing California to turn over sensitive voter data. People should never have to chose between their privacy and their fundamental right to vote. www.nbcnews.com/politics/jus...

You have a constitutional right to record law enforcement in public. Our Know Your Rights guide explains it all, including what to do if you are stopped or detained for taking photographs, and what to do if you believe your rights have been violated: www.aclunorcal.org/know-your-ri...

Asian drivers in Siskiyou were stopped at nearly 12x their share of the population. The community fought back against this discrimination and won a settlement agreement that prohibits race-based stops, and ushers in major traffic stop reforms. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

Come work with us! We’re hiring a Human Resources Coordinator for our San Francisco office. Learn more about this position and apply at grnh.se/qv321mr02us.

Enough is enough. Reckless federal agents don’t belong in our communities. We’re protesting this weekend because our rights and lives are on the line. Find an event near you: www.mobilize.us?tag_ids=2913...