Southern Poverty Law Center - Alabama

Alabama State Conference of the NAACP, et al. v. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, et al.

rudy.isaza_2663 — Fri, 31 May 2024 15:22:36 +0000

In March 2024, Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey signed Senate Bill 1 (SB 1), a sweeping new voter suppression law that targets, restricts and severely punishes civic engagement efforts that encourage voting and enable access to the ballot box.

The following month, a coalition of civil rights, voting rights and disability rights organizations filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block the law, naming as defendants the Alabama attorney general, the secretary of state and the state’s 42 district attorneys.

SB 1 is among the most extreme law of its kind ever enacted and was the latest development in Alabama’s long history of restricting the political engagement of Black voters and other marginalized communities.

Among other provisions, it would criminalize most forms of helping voters apply for absentee ballots, with felony penalties ranging up to 20 years in prison. The law’s restrictions harm voters who need assistance with their absentee ballot applications – particularly Black voters, elderly voters, incarcerated voters, voters with disabilities and low-literacy voters – as well as nonpartisan civic engagement groups, including churches, that work to help Alabamians participate in the political process.

The lawsuit contends that SB 1 violates the First and 14th amendments, the Voting Rights Act and the Help America Vote Act of 2002. It was filed on behalf of the Alabama State Conference of the NAACP, Greater Birmingham Ministries, the League of Women Voters of Alabama and the Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program.

Date Filed

April 04, 2024

Issue Area

Voting Rights

Voting Rights - AL

Co-Counsel

Campaign Legal Center, Legal Defense Fund, American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama and Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program

Active Case

Alabama State Conference of the NAACP, et al. v. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, et al.

Case Number

2:24-cv-00420-RDP

Rissling, et al. v. Bobo, et al.

rudy.isaza_2663 — Thu, 30 May 2024 21:35:58 +0000

The Southern Poverty Law Center and its co-counsel filed a federal lawsuit against three Alabama counties for their failure to provide an accessible option for absentee voting by blind and print-disabled voters.

Filed on behalf of the National Federation of the Blind in Alabama and four individuals, the lawsuit alleges that Jefferson, Mobile and Tuscaloosa counties violate the rights of blind and print-disabled voters under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 by failing to provide an accessible means to mark and return absentee ballots.

Blind and print-disabled voters rely on accessible technology, such as screen readers or magnification programs, to vote independently and privately. However, the defendants have not implemented remote accessible vote-by-mail (RAVBM) systems that allow the use of such technology, making it impossible for blind and print-disabled voters to mark and return their ballots without assistance and thereby denying them their right to a secret ballot.

Technology allowing blind and print-disabled voters to read, mark and return absentee ballots electronically is readily available and being used in other states for these voters. Alabama makes an RAVBM system available to military and overseas voters but has denied its use to voters with disabilities.

By failing to implement accessible absentee voting options, the plaintiffs argue, the defendants are effectively disenfranchising blind and print-disabled voters.

The plaintiffs seek injunctive relief to compel the defendants to provide an accessible option for absentee voting.

Date Filed

October 03, 2023

Status

Active

Issue Area

Voting Rights

Voting Rights - AL

Co-Counsel

Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program and Brown, Goldstein & Levy LLP.

Active Case

Rissling, et al. v. Bobo, et al.

Case Number

7:23-cv-01326-LSC

Hester, et al. v. Gentry, et al.

rudy.isaza_2663 — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 17:42:05 +0000

In Cullman County, Alabama, hundreds of people are routinely jailed before trial due to their inability to pay a bail bond for their release. The Southern Poverty Law Center and its partners intervened in a federal class action lawsuit to end the practice.

The lawsuit describes how the county operates a wealth-based justice system where conditions of release were determined by a person’s wealth. For example, plaintiff Bradley Hester, who was arrested in 2017 on a misdemeanor charge, could not pay a $1,000 bond because he was indigent. He was held in the Cullman County Jail simply because he could not afford his freedom. The ��Ҵ�ý and its partners sought to end this practice, alleging that Cullman County’s practices deprived indigent defendants of due process and equal protection and their fundamental right to pretrial liberty.

The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama issued a preliminary injunction in September 2018, which temporarily stopped Cullman County from relying on a secured bail schedule. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit later reversed that preliminary injunction and found that changes that Cullman County made to its bail policies after the ��Ҵ�ý filed its litigation were facially constitutional. A request that the U.S. Supreme Court review the 11th Circuit decision – also known as a writ of certiorari – was denied.

Despite the 11th Circuit’s decision, the preliminary injunction allowed thousands of people to return home to their families rather than languish in jail because they could not afford a bail bond.

Although the circuit court reversed the preliminary injunction, there has not been a final ruling on the merits. The case continues in the trial court.

Date Filed

March 09, 2018

Status

Active

Issue Area

Economic Justice

Co-Counsel

American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama, American Civil Liberties Union Criminal Law Reform Project and Civil Rights Corps

Active Case

Hester, et al. v. Gentry, et al.

Yellowhammer Fund v. Attorney General of Alabama Steve Marshall

rudy.isaza_2663 — Thu, 10 Aug 2023 13:56:23 +0000

After Alabama’s attorney general threatened to criminalize people helping pregnant Alabamians access legal abortion care in other states, The Lawyering Project, joined by the Southern Poverty Law Center, filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block the attorney general from making good on his threat.

The attorney general threatened organizations such as the plaintiff, the Yellowhammer Fund, an organization that provides funding and support to pregnant Alabamians forced to leave the state for legal abortion care. While abortion is banned in Alabama, the state has no power to criminalize people engaging in lawful activity in other states. However, the fear of prosecution forced the Yellowhammer Fund to cease operation of its abortion fund.

The lawsuit describes how the attorney general’s threats violate the Yellowhammer Fund’s rights to free expression, association, travel and due process guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. The threats also violate the sovereignty of states that allow abortion. The lawsuit seeks an injunction blocking the attorney general from prosecuting individuals and organizations helping pregnant Alabamians access legal abortion care in other states.

Almost 2,000 people traveled from Alabama to other states to obtain abortion care in 2021 – before abortion was banned in Alabama. The burden of such travel significantly impacts Black people and other communities of color, who are already at a greater risk of criminalization.

Date Filed

July 31, 2023

Status

Active

Issue Area

Criminal Justice Reform

Co-Counsel

The Lawyering Project

Active Case

Yellowhammer Fund v. Attorney General of Alabama Steve Marshall

Case Number

2:23-cv-00450

Hudson v. Ivey

rudy.isaza_2663 — Mon, 18 Jul 2022 14:15:35 +0000

After a state commission moved a judgeship from a diverse Jefferson County community to majority-white Madison County, the Southern Poverty Law Center and the American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the move.

The lawsuit was filed by voting rights groups on behalf of Tiara Young Hudson, an attorney seeking to serve on the bench for the 10th Judicial Circuit Court, Place 14 in Birmingham. Hudson won the Democratic nomination for that judgeship and would have faced no opposition in the general election. Shortly after her primary victory, Judge Clyde Jones announced his retirement from the position, effective immediately, creating a vacancy. Hudson has applied to the Jefferson County Judicial Commission to fill the vacancy.

However, the Alabama Judicial Resources Allocation Commission voted to relocate the judgeship to Madison County. The commission’s vote to transfer the judgeship broke along racial lines, with all white members voting for the move and all the Black members voting against it. The decision could prevent Hudson from seeking to fill the Jefferson County vacancy. It also would strip the county of a critical resource.

During a meeting before the commission’s vote, members of the public overwhelmingly voiced their opposition to the move. What’s more, testimony at the meeting noted that the Legislature had the funds to create 20 new judgeships, which would render a transfer from one county to another unnecessary.

The commission was created by the Legislature as an agency with purported authority to alter the number of judgeships in each district and circuit. However, the Alabama Constitution states that only the Legislature, incorporating recommendations of the Alabama Supreme Court, may change the number of judges allocated to a circuit or district. The lawsuit describes how the commission violated the constitution by usurping the Legislature’s role.

Date Filed

July 19, 2022

Status

Dismissed

Issue Area

Voting Rights

Voting Rights - AL

Co-Counsel

American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama

Hudson v. Ivey

Case Number

SC-2022-0836

National Federation of the Blind of Alabama, et al. v. Wes Allen

sam.alefsen@splcenter.org — Mon, 06 Jun 2022 18:51:39 +0000

Alabama’s absentee ballot program is inaccessible to blind voters and voters with print disabilities. It requires those voters to secure another person’s assistance to complete their absentee ballot – forfeiting their right to vote privately and independently.

The ��Ҵ�ý and its co-counsel filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of the National Federation of the Blind of Alabama and individual Alabamians asserting that Alabama’s inaccessible absentee voting system violates the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act.

Alabama excludes blind and print disabled Alabamians from its absentee voting system because its absentee ballots are transmitted, marked and returned entirely on paper. To comply with federal law and to provide Alabamians who are blind or have a print disability an equal chance to vote privately and independently by absentee ballot, Alabama must offer accessible electronic ballots that voters can read and mark on their own computers or smart devices using their own assistive technology.

Date Filed

June 08, 2022

Issue Area

Voting Rights

Voting Rights - AL

Co-Counsel

Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program and Brown Goldstein & Levy

National Federation of the Blind of Alabama, et al. v. Wes Allen

Case Number

2:22-cv-721-CLM

Boe, et al., v. Marshall, et al.

rudy.isaza_2663 — Thu, 21 Apr 2022 15:19:20 +0000

After Alabama legislators passed a law criminalizing healthcare for transgender children and adolescents, the Southern Poverty Law Center joined a coalition of civil rights advocates to file a federal lawsuit challenging the law on behalf of a group of families, a reverend and two health care providers affected by it.

The law, known as SB 184, prohibits parents from obtaining essential medical care for their transgender children by imposing criminal penalties on them and their children’s doctors for providing that care. It also punishes parents for making important decisions about their children’s health care and health care providers for even suggesting well-established medically necessary care. The punishment can include up to 10 years in prison.

The complaint, previously known as Eknes-Tucker, et al. v. Ivey, et al., describes how the law violates the U.S. Constitution’s guarantees of equal protection and due process by impermissibly intruding into parents’ fundamental right to obtain safe, effective and medically necessary care for their children. It also details how the law violates Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, including gender identity, by health care providers that receive federal funding. Additionally, the law violates the First Amendment by restricting the speech of health care providers, a spiritual adviser or a parent, if it resulted in gender dysphoria treatment for transgender children.

The family plaintiffs, who come from various communities in Alabama, would be subject to criminal prosecution if they sought and obtained appropriate medical care for their children. Plaintiffs also include two health care providers who would be subjected to criminal penalties for providing medical care for transgender children.

Another plaintiff, the Rev. Paul A. Eknes-Tucker, provides pastoral counseling for parents raising transgender children. Eknes-Tucker is concerned he will face criminal penalties for his pastoral work with transgender minors who begin medical treatments for gender dysphoria.

Plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed the claims by Eknes-Tucker after Alabama represented to the court that “a person cannot violate the Act simply by advising a minor to take transitioning medications” and a new lead plaintiff was named.

Date Filed

April 19, 2022

Issue Area

LGBTQ Rights

Co-Counsel

GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders, Human Rights Campaign Foundation, National Center for Lesbian Rights, King & Spalding LLP and Lightfoot, Franklin & White LLC.

Active Case

Boe, et al., v. Marshall, et al.

Khadidah Stone, et al. v. Wes Allen, et al.

rudy.isaza_2663 — Wed, 22 Dec 2021 14:26:00 +0000

In 2021, Alabama lawmakers enacted a new district map for the Alabama state Senate that significantly diminishes the power of the state’s Black voters. The Southern Poverty Law Center and its co-counsel filed a federal lawsuit challenging the state’s discriminatory Senate map.

The lawsuit seeks two additional majority-Black state Senate districts. It describes how Alabama’s new state Senate map denies Black voters an equal opportunity to participate in the political process, which violates Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Plaintiffs include Greater Birmingham Ministries, Alabama State Conference of the NAACP and voters Khadidah Stone and Evan Milligan.

The plaintiffs argue that the map impermissibly dilutes the voting strength of Alabama’s Black voters by unnecessarily packing them into state Senate District 26 in Montgomery to avoid drawing another reasonably configured majority Black district. The lawsuit also describes how the state unnecessarily “cracked” and diluted the strength of Black voters in Huntsville by dispersing them among three districts instead of drawing them into one reasonably configured majority-Black district.

The plaintiffs argue that myriad factors – including Alabama’s racially polarized voting patterns and Alabama’s history of discrimination in voting – establish that the new map violates Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act by preventing Alabama’s Black voters from having an equal opportunity to elect their preferred candidates.

Legislative districts – drawn as part of a once-in-a-decade redistricting process triggered by the 2020 census data – determine the allocation of political power and access to resources at every level of government for the next 10 years. The lawsuit describes Alabama’s “sordid record” when it comes to redistricting. In five of the six redistricting cycles since 1960, the U.S. Department of Justice or federal courts found that Alabama’s political districts – congressional, state legislative or both – violated the rights of voters under the U.S. Constitution or the Voting Rights Act. After the last redistricting in 2010, a federal court struck down 12 legislative districts as unconstitutional racial gerrymanders.

On Feb. 13, 2024, a federal district court judge denied a motion to dismiss the lawsuit. The denial was noteworthy because it rejected an emerging legal argument threatening voting rights: the belief that private citizens cannot sue under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. The court’s order roundly rejected the argument, preserving an important tool for citizens to defend voting rights. A trial date has been set for late 2024.

Date Filed

November 15, 2021

Issue Area

Voting Rights

Voting Rights - AL

Co-Counsel

American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Alabama, NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., Hogan Lovells LLP, and Wiggins, Childs, Pantazis, Fisher & Goldfarb

Active Case

Khadidah Stone, et al. v. Wes Allen, et al.

C.C. v. Buckner

catherine.valentine_1700 — Wed, 07 Jul 2021 16:58:56 +0000

The Alabama Department of Human Resources (DHR) discriminates against foster children and youth with mental impairments by unnecessarily segregating them in restrictive, psychiatric residential treatment facilities and by denying them an opportunity to grow up in loving homes and community-based settings.

Along with the Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program and Children’s Rights, the Southern Poverty Law Center filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of four teens with mental impairments placed in or at risk of placement in these restrictive settings. This population is disproportionately Black. DHR has left many children to languish in these facilities for years, despite a medical recommendation that they are ready to be placed in a home. Rather than developing an adequate network of supports and services, DHR often shuffles these children from facility to facility, further isolating them from their families, friends, schools and communities, according to the complaint.

The lawsuit targets these placements as violations of DHR’s obligation under federal laws to administer its services, programs and activities in the most integrated setting appropriate to meet the needs of the children in its care. Children segregated into these institutional settings are less likely to achieve permanency and are more likely to age out of the foster care system without the appropriate community-based care needed for a successful transition to adulthood.

In a 2020 letter, the groups urged state leaders to make sweeping changes to protect foster children placed in facilities run by Sequel Youth and Family Services, after documenting unsanitary conditions and widespread abuse of youth at these facilities. The complaint describes numerous reports of violence against children in facilities across the state, including staff slamming children against walls, punching and slapping children in the face, using chokeholds and laying on top of children who are being held face down on the ground, causing serious and life-threatening injuries. 

The lawsuit seeks a court order requiring DHR to immediately change its policies and practices to ensure that no foster child is unnecessarily placed in these draconian facilities. Advocates also want to ensure children in DHR custody have access to appropriate community-based services, supports and placements, including an adequate number of therapeutic foster homes, among other changes.

Date Filed

May 20, 2021

Status

Active

Issue Area

Children's Rights

Co-Counsel

Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program, Children’s Rights

Active Case

C.C. v. Buckner

Case Number

2:21-cv-367-ECM

Greater Birmingham Ministries v. Merrill

catherine.valentine_1700 — Thu, 20 May 2021 14:50:42 +0000

In 2011, Alabama lawmakers approved a law requiring voters to present a government-issued photo ID to cast a ballot in the state. Civil rights groups filed a lawsuit challenging the law as discriminatory, noting it targeted Black and Latinx voters who disproportionately lack such identification.

After a federal judge’s dismissal of the case in 2018 was appealed by the advocacy groups, the Southern Poverty Law Center filed an amicus brief on behalf of Alabama advocacy groups including the League of Women Voters of Alabama, Adelante Alabama Worker Center, Alabama Arise, Central Alabama Fair Housing Center, Low Income Housing Coalition of Alabama, and Montgomery Pride United in support of plaintiffs.

The brief noted the district court ignored Alabama’s long, violent history of disenfranchising people of color and – contrary to the court’s summary judgment – it is not “so easy to get a photo ID in Alabama, that no one is prevented from voting.”

The brief also highlighted the court’s failure to recognize the “growing body of social science research demonstrating that low-income voters, voters who lack access to transportation, voters experiencing homelessness, voters with felony convictions, and transgender voters – all of whom are disproportionately Black in Alabama – face significant barriers to obtaining a photo ID and using it to vote once obtained.”

In July 2020, a federal appeals court upheld the dismissal. An en banc hearing – a hearing before the entire panel of judges for the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals – resulted in the district court’s decision being upheld on June 1, 2021. The case is closed.

Date Filed

February 28, 2018

Status

Closed

Issue Area

Voting Rights

Voting Rights - AL

Greater Birmingham Ministries v. Merrill

Case Number

2:15-cv-02193-LSC

Southern Poverty Law Center - Alabama

Alabama State Conference of the NAACP, et al. v. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, et al.

Date Filed

Issue Area

Related Documents

Co-Counsel

Alabama State Conference of the NAACP, et al. v. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, et al.

Case Number

Rissling, et al. v. Bobo, et al.

Date Filed

Status

Issue Area

Related Documents

Co-Counsel

Rissling, et al. v. Bobo, et al.

Case Number

Hester, et al. v. Gentry, et al.

Date Filed

Status

Issue Area

Co-Counsel

Hester, et al. v. Gentry, et al.

Yellowhammer Fund v. Attorney General of Alabama Steve Marshall

Date Filed

Status

Issue Area

Related Documents

Co-Counsel

Yellowhammer Fund v. Attorney General of Alabama Steve Marshall

Case Number

Hudson v. Ivey

Date Filed

Status

Issue Area

Related Documents

Co-Counsel

Hudson v. Ivey

Case Number

National Federation of the Blind of Alabama, et al. v. Wes Allen

Date Filed

Issue Area

Related Documents

Co-Counsel

National Federation of the Blind of Alabama, et al. v. Wes Allen

Case Number

Boe, et al., v. Marshall, et al.

Date Filed

Issue Area

Related Documents

Co-Counsel

Boe, et al., v. Marshall, et al.

Khadidah Stone, et al. v. Wes Allen, et al.

Date Filed

Issue Area

Related Documents

Co-Counsel

Khadidah Stone, et al. v. Wes Allen, et al.

C.C. v. Buckner

Date Filed

Status

Issue Area

Related Documents

Co-Counsel

C.C. v. Buckner

Case Number

Greater Birmingham Ministries v. Merrill

Date Filed

Status

Issue Area

Related Documents

Greater Birmingham Ministries v. Merrill

Case Number