News & Commentary

Treating the map like a ball of Silly Putty meant to be stretched and pulled apart was an obvious and “deliberate attempt to silence the political voices of Democratic and minority Kansans,” Sharon Brett, legal director for the ACLU of Kansas, said amidst a failed 2022 lawsuit challenging the new maps.

A federal judge once called Leavenworth Detention Center “an absolute hell hole.” In a 2021 letter to federal officials, the ACLU of Kansas pointed to stabbings, suicides and homicides that occurred with “alarming frequency.”

Led by D.C. Hiegert, a legal fellow at ACLU Kansas, and Donnavan Dillon, senior organizer with Loud Light, the evening’s discussion addressed developments in changing gender markers and gender-affirming health care for minors, as well as resources for the local community.

The state is asking a Douglas County judge to dismiss a lawsuit challenging a new state law banning surgery and the use of puberty blockers for treating transgender children in Kansas.

Earlier this week, the ACLU of Kansas called on the Lenexa Police Department to release the body camera footage from that morning. In a Facebook post, the ACLU said it stood with the community wanting justice for the young man.

On Wednesday, the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas urged the Lenexa Police Department to release footage of Chacon’s killing.

More than two weeks after a Grandview man was shot and killed by Lenexa police, the ACLU of Kansas is calling for transparency and accountability.

“We’ve known for a long time that the KHP is not the only law enforcement agency in Kansas that conducts pretextual traffic stops on interstate highways in the name of ‘drug interdiction,” Ching said in a statement to 12 News.

A key finding from a recently released report from the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas revealed that the county’s bail system “penalizes poverty, perpetuates racial disparities, and undermines the presumption of innocence.”