Court Cases

The ACLU of Pennsylvania has filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of Sloane Wolfe, a high school student who has been advocating to end her school district’s use of its “Raider” mascot based on its stereotypical depiction of North American indigenous people.

The ACLU of Pennsylvania, the Public Interest Law Center, and ACLU’s Voting Rights Project have filed a motion to intervene in a federal lawsuit over the federal government’s demand that Pennsylvania turn over its entire voter registration rolls, including with voters’ sensitive personal data such as drivers’ license numbers and partial social security numbers. The motion to intervene was filed on behalf of seven Pennsylvania voters, many of whom were the target of baseless mass challenges to their mail ballots during the 2024 election cycle that resulted from faulty data-matching techniques. The voters’ experiences have heightened their concerns about the privacy of their voting data. Other plaintiffs are two non-partisan, good government organizations dedicated to voter engagement: the League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania and Common Cause. If intervention is granted, the civil rights groups will seek to prevent the federal government from forcing Pennsylvania to turn over the entirety of its voter registration database and to protect sensitive data within the voter rolls.

Seven voters, the Center for Coalfield Justice, and the Washington Branch NAACP sued the Washington County Board of Elections for concealing from voters errors they had made on their mail ballot return envelopes that meant their votes would not be counted in the 2024 primary election.

The ACLU of Pennsylvania and the Community Justice Project have filed a lawsuit on behalf of Make The Road Pennsylvania, NAACP Bucks County, the BuxMont Unitarian Universalists, and an impacted Bucks County resident in the Court of Common Pleas of Bucks County challenging a so-called 287(g) agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement that the Bucks County Sheriff entered into without authorization of the county’s governing body, the Bucks County Commissioners. ICE uses such agreements to deputize local law enforcement to act as immigration agents. The lawsuit argues that Sheriff Fred Harran illegally entered into the 287(g) because he failed to consult with and get approval from Bucks County Commissioners, the majority of whom oppose the agreement. By entering into this agreement over the County Board of Commissioners’ objection, the Sheriff violated both the Pennsylvania Constitution and the Pennsylvania Intergovernmental Cooperation Cooperation Act. The lawsuit asks the court to issue an injunction that would prevent the agreement from taking effect.

The ACLU of Pennsylvania has joined an amicus brief with media and free-speech organizations in Salaam v. Trump, a defamation case filed against then-candidate Donald Trump regarding comments he made about the Central Park Five during a Presidential-campaign debate in Philadelphia.