2017 kept us on our toes and brought many new challenges for the ACLUNV staff and supporters. As soon as the inauguration ended, President Trump ushered in discriminatory policies against multiple minority communities. With his first Muslim Ban, we rallied at Nevada’s major airports to assist families caught up in the mess and tell the administration that we will not tolerate the hate they were sowing. We appeared at numerous community events to educate nervous constituents about standing up for their rights.
Then, starting in February, we successfully fought for the civil rights and liberties of all Nevadans at the 2017 Legislature, securing wins for women, LGBTQ youth, and juveniles in the criminal justice system. We tracked over 250 bills, providing testimony and educational materials, recruited volunteer speakers, and negotiated with opponents on laws we didn’t support. We defeated the discriminatory voucher bill. We had hoped to update Nevada’s public records law with our Silver State Sunshine Act, but we will try again in 2019.
We took on a number of important cases over the last year. We sued the state of Nevada over the deficient, unconstitutional public defense system in 11 rural counties, and we challenged an anti-immigrant ballot petition that would separate families and imperil public safety.
When the White House announced it was going to sunset the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, the ACLU of Nevada organized public information meetings and assisted eligible Dreamers with their DACA applications. We also advocated for police accountability by expanding the state body camera law, and urging Clark County to update its Use of Force Matrix, and for transgender-inclusive school policies in Clark County.
While we faced new and overwhelming challenges in 2017, we managed to achieve meaningful changes in public policy, and defend the rights of Nevadans throughout the state. None of these wins would be possible without the contributions of our membership and supporters, which quadrupled to meet these new challenges. We look forward to continuing our fights against discriminatory policies no matter who initiates them.
READ THE FULL REPORT
Date
Monday, February 12, 2018 - 2:30pm
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2019 IMPACT REPORT HIGHLIGHTS
Automatic Voter Registration
The ACLU of Nevada joined the campaign to pass Nevada Ballot Question 5, also known as the Automatic Voter Registration (AVR) Initiative. Under AVR, eligible Nevada residents will be automatically registered to vote and voters will have their registration updated automatically at the DMV. In Oregon, the first state to adopt Automatic Voter Registration, this policy lead to an increase in participation and helped many people cast a ballot who may not have done so otherwise.
Election Protection
ACLU of Nevada’s Legal, Advocacy, and Communications departments, in collaboration with Silver State Voices, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil rights, Common Cause, and the AFL/CIO, ran a nonpartisan voter protection program for the midterm elections, similar to the program we ran for the presidential election in 2016.
Defeating the Anti-Sanctuary Cities Initiative
The ACLU of Nevada Legal Department successfully sued to stop an anti-immigrant ballot initiative that would have created a constitutional amendment banning “sanctuary cities.” ACLU of Nevada staff had little doubt such a measure would have made immigrant communities more vulnerable to victimization, eroded trust in law enforcement and harmed children and families.
Fighting for Transparency About Lethal Injections
The news that Nevada prisoner Scott Dozier was actively seeking his own execution sent shockwaves through the state. This would have been the first execution in over a decade, and the state had long ran out of the drugs required to carry out a lethal injection and had publicly stated they were unable to get more.
READ THE FULL REPORT
Date
Monday, February 11, 2019 - 2:00pm
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History was made in 2019, with new laws being enacted that start correcting the past criminal injustices imposed on minority communities and the formerly incarcerated. We restored the right to vote for formerly incarcerated individuals with AB 431, and incarcerated individuals will now be counted in the decennial Census as residents in their home districts. AB 236 made our criminal justice system more reform-focused than punitive and will impose new requirements on the courts to provide alternatives to incarceration.
With the passage of our study bill regarding juveniles being housed in adult facilities, we are continuing our work to move juveniles out of adult prison facilities in Nevada. Adult institutions are unequipped to meet the educational, medical, and physical needs of minors. Neglecting to provide meaningful programming at a critical stage of development fails to properly prepare an individual for life after incarceration.
Working with the Right to Know Nevada coalition, we successfully updated and expanded the state’s public records law. State agencies must now work with constituents to find the records they seek, and if they do not, they will be held accountable. We will likely seek to further improve this law for the public in the next legislative session.
READ THE FULL REPORT
Date
Tuesday, February 11, 2020 - 1:15pm
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