In March 2018, the city of Philadelphia learned that two of the agencies it contracted with to provide foster care services would not, based on religious objection, accept same-sex couples as foster parents. The city told the agencies their contracts with the city were in jeopardy unless they complied with basic nondiscrimination requirements.

While one of the agencies agreed to comply, the other — Catholic Social Services (CSS) — refused. Instead, CSS sued the city, claiming the Constitution gives it the right to opt out of the nondiscrimination requirement. After a lower court and a federal circuit court ruled in the city’s favor, CSS appealed to the Supreme Court. The case, Fulton v City of Philadelphia, has implications not only for the future of foster care, but for the protection of all people from discrimination in the alleged name of religion. Arguments are set for November 4th.

Louise Melling, Deputy Legal Director of the ACLU, joined the podcast this week to discuss what’s at stake in Fulton.

“The ACLU has no question about the right of people and organizations to have their beliefs and to practice their beliefs, but it’s to practice your beliefs as long as they don’t hurt others,” said Melling. “And in this context, if Catholic Social Services can practice its beliefs in terms of turning away families because they’re same-sex, it is hurting others.”

The Supreme Court Case That Could Jeopardize LGBTQ Rights

The Supreme Court Case That Could Jeopardize LGBTQ Rights

The city of Philadelphia learned in March 2018 that two of the agencies it had hired to provide foster care services would not, based on religious objection, accept same-sex couples as foster parents. The city then told the agencies their contract...

The city of Philadelphia learned in March 2018 that two of the agencies it had hired to provide foster care services would not, based on religious objection, accept same-sex couples as foster parents. The city then told the agencies their contract...

Listen to this episode

When we launched the podcast miniseries, At the Polls, we asked listeners to send us their questions about voting this year. While over 44 million people have already cast their ballots, some questions remain about our rights and options as voters. Listen to the full podcast for your most frequent voter questions, answered.

At the Polls: You Asked, We Answered

At the Polls: You Asked, We Answered

For the last few months, we've been gathering your voting questions. Hundreds of you have sent in voice messages, videos and emails with your most pressing concerns. These submissions have informed our At the Polls episodes, but we couldn't answer...

For the last few months, we've been gathering your voting questions. Hundreds of you have sent in voice messages, videos and emails with your most pressing concerns. These submissions have informed our At the Polls episodes, but we couldn't answer...

Listen to this episode

Should I deliver my ballot by hand or by mail?

All voters should make a voting plan that works best for them, whether that means mailing their ballot, putting it in a drop box, or delivering it by hand. First, voters should make sure they know the deadlines in their state. Some states require all ballots to be back in the hands of election officials on Election Day. In others, your ballot must be postmarked by a certain date. Rules vary across states, so look up deadlines in your state as you decide how to cast your ballot — and return it early.

How do I make sure my mail-in ballot is counted?

In 45 states, voters can track their ballots online to see if it has been received. In other states — Texas, Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, and Mississippi — some local election officials track ballots. To see if your state offers ballot tracking, check out aclu.org/voter under “voting tips.”

If I use a voting machine, how can I confirm that my vote has not been altered?

There have never been any occurrences of widespread fraud in American elections. Elections are administered at the county and municipal level throughout the country, and polling places are staffed by professional election administrators whose job is to make sure your ballot is counted and your voice is heard. Further, most jurisdictions in the U.S. use paper ballots, ballot marking devices, or machines that provide a voter with a verified paper trail that they can use to make sure their vote was recorded properly.

I’ve requested an absentee ballot. Can I change my mind and vote in person?

The answer depends on where you live. In some states, including California, Michigan, and Florida, you must bring your absentee ballot with you when you vote in person. If you haven’t received your mail-in ballot, you will have to cast a provisional ballot at the polls.

Besides presidential candidates, what else can I expect on my ballot?

There are important and impactful races up and down the ballot this year, from the U.S. House of Representatives to the U.S. Senate and state and local elections. While advocates can’t go around knocking on doors this year due to COVID-19, we can all get involved online. Local ballot measures can impact civil rights and civil liberties nationwide.

Oklahoma’s State Question 805 is an example. Oklahoma one of the biggest incarcerators in the country — and in the world — in part because of unjust policies that can land you in prison for decades or even life for low-level offenses like drug possession and shoplifting. There are similar policies across the country, so what happens in Oklahoma this year could help to start the conversation in other states.

Nebraska’s Initiative 428 is another example of a critical economic justice policy that could have nationwide implications. Measure 428 would put a cap on interest rates from predatory payday lenders at 36 percent. Currently, interest rates can be as high as 400 percent — often trapping individuals into a vicious cycle of debt. Payday lending is a predatory practice that has historically targeted communities of color across the country, so all voters should pay attention to Nebraska’s outcome on Initiative 428.

If members of my family can’t speak English, can they vote?

English is not a requirement to cast your ballot. Many jurisdictions provide resources to accommodate multilingual voting and to ensure that everybody can exercise their right to vote regardless of which language they speak.

If you have run into issues when voting, call the non-partisan Election Protection Hotline.

• English: 1-866-OUR-VOTE / 1-866-687-8683
• Spanish: 1-888-VE-Y-VOTA / 1-888-839-8682
• Arabic: 1-844-YALLA-US / 1-844-925-5287
• For Bengali, Cantonese, Hindi, Urdu, Korean, Mandarin, Tagalog, or Vietnamese: 1-888-274-8683

What should I do if I encounter intimidation at the polls?

Voter intimidation can take many forms, but voters should not expect to encounter it when they go to the polls. The ACLU and the broader voting rights community remain vigilant and are working to make sure that no voters face intimidation while exercising their right to vote.
No one has the right to take your vote from you. But if you do experience intimidation, there are ways to get help. Call 1-866-OUR-VOTE to report occurrences of voter intimidation.

At the end of the day, what everybody should know is that they can get help. The ACLU and other voting rights advocates are ready to jump into action should problems arise. Your job is to vote.

For information on voting in your state, see the Let People Vote guide. If you want to volunteer from home, visit peoplepower.org to learn how.

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In early June, as people around the globe joined in massive protests against the police brutality and racism that killed him, George Floyd was laid to rest at the same Pearland, Texas cemetery where his mother is buried. Led by a horse-drawn carriage containing his body, George Floyd’s grieving family and hundreds of supporters walked slowly from the church to the burial ceremony. 
 
What they did not know is that on the rooftops above them, six teams of snipers were positioned to fire on the crowd of mourners. Manned surveillance aircraft and drones circled in the sky above. And hundreds of local and state police, federal agents including Border Patrol, and National Guard personnel were prepared to descend upon the mourners with extreme violence at even the slightest provocation.  
 
All of this was revealed in police records that the ACLU of Texas obtained earlier this month. The records also show the federal tactical teams were authorized to get “geared up” and “ready to deploy” in view of the crowd in response to as little as “verbal aggressive language” against police officers or throwing empty water bottles. And their instructions permitted rapid escalation, including the use of gas munitions and even “use of deadly force anytime under Ch. 9 Texas Penal Code” against the mourners if the federal agents, police officers, or soldiers believed it necessary.  
 
A Powerpoint briefing deck created in preparation for these deployments describes the “mission” of this multi-agency force as “provid[ing] security for Pearland Police Department, Dawson High School, and the surrounding area with officers stationed for a quick response to rioting and looting.” The only apparent factual basis for these fears were social media posts and messages that a handful of Pearland residents shared with the police department, in many cases expressing their fears that the burial would lead to looting and other property damage.  
 
There is a peculiar kind of racist imagination at play in these messages and the broader discourse on “looting”: the notion that rather than paying their respects to the dead and watching in anguish as George Floyd is lowered into the ground, Black mourners will use the funeral and burial as a reason to fan out across a small Texas town and steal goods from its stores. In this warped framework, any gathering of Black people expressing sadness or anger is a threat to be surveilled, and something that must be neutralized if its participants show the smallest sign of organized resistance. This results in heavily armed police and federal agents being given full permission to wield violence, including deadly violence, against Black people even in times of grief. In this framework, no corner of Black life is free from the threat of police violence — including mourning the people whose lives were taken by that same violence.  
 
This same racist, harmful role for policing — planning violence against Black people in order to deter real or imagined threats to white property ownership — dates back to slavery. Such white fears were common during slavery, because systems of white supremacy require force to maintain themselves. Indeed, the first municipally-funded police department in America was the Charleston City Watch and Guard, a specialized form of slave patrol that monitored Black social gatherings, shut down underground meetings, and sought to block enslaved Black people from organizing resistance to or escape from bondage. 
 
After the end of the Civil War, slavery ended but the mission of police departments and local sheriffs did not change much. Across the former Confederacy, these agencies enforced the Black Codes: an arbitrary set of restrictions that made it hard for newly-freed Black people to organize politically or move to new places in search of better opportunities. Texas was no exception; the Texas Rangers in particular were widely known in the nineteenth century for extrajudicial killings of Mexican Americans and bounty hunting of Black people who escaped from slavery. Meanwhile, their investigation of a 1919 race riot focused less on the Ku Klux Klan than on civil rights groups that they blamed for inciting the riot (at the height of this riot, a mob of nearly 1,000 white people burned down multiple Black-owned houses and killed Black people without law enforcement intervening). It was more than a century after the end of the Civil War, in 1988, that a Black person was first appointed to join the Texas Rangers. And this was not confined to the South: Police in northern cities adopted similar racist practices as more Black people arrived as part of the Great Migration. 
 
Targeting George Floyd’s burial march with snipers and aerial surveillance fits all too comfortably into this history. Not only are the white fears the same, but the weapons and agencies being used to placate those fears and maintain white supremacy are the same. Now, they’re just upgraded with 21st century technology and assisted by Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which has grown to become the country’s largest federal law enforcement agency and claimed broad powers in communities across the nation. 
 
As a result, George Floyd’s family and community cannot even mourn his death at the hands of police without being surveilled by aircraft and drones, under the watch of snipers, federal tactical teams, and National Guard members ready to unleash tear gas and bullets on them at a moment’s notice.  
 
It would be both lazy and wrong to blame this on “bad apples.” Multiple officials at the local, state, and federal levels approved this militarized and potentially lethal response to George Floyd’s burial ceremony. This is about the rot at the core of American policing. 
 
It is time for us to fundamentally rethink the role of policing in American society. While crime has been trending downward for decades and violent crime and property crime have fallen significantly since the early 1990s, over the past four decades, the cost of policing in the United States has almost tripled, resulting in further lethal violence and harm against Black communities. Until we address how white supremacy so easily uses policing as a weapon against Black communities, and until we concretely reduce the role, power, and responsibilities of the police in American life, Black mourners of the next victim of police violence will be forced to wonder whether a sniper on a nearby rooftop is awaiting orders to interrupt their mourning with yet more violence.

Carl Takei, Senior Staff Attorney, ACLU’s Trone Center for Justice and Equality