When Alabama legislators revised the state’s anti-immigrant law in 2012, they passed a law requiring the state to maintain an online list of immigrants who are detained by law enforcement, who appear in court for any violation of state law, and who unable to prove they are not “unlawfully present aliens.” It provided no means for people to be removed from this “black list” if the listing is an error or if their immigration status changes. The Southern Poverty Law Center and its allies filed a federal lawsuit to stop this state-sanctioned “blacklisting” of immigrants, which could encourage harassment and violence.
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Alabama has made a costly and ill-advised decision to go all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court to criminalize Alabamians for providing shelter – or even a ride – to a person unable to prove his immigration status, the Southern Poverty Law Center said today after the state appealed a lower court’s ruling against its anti-immigrant law, also known as HB 56.
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The Southern Poverty Law Center today demanded that Alabama’s Autauga County Schools end policies and practices that have excluded immigrant students from extracurricular activities.
After Alabama’s anti-immigrant law took effect, the U.S. Department of Justice obtained public school attendance records and found a decline in Latino student attendance. The Southern Poverty Law Center requested the same data to determine the law’s impact on Latino students’ access to a public education. The SPLC filed a lawsuit against the Alabama Department of Education after being denied the public records.
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A federal judge has denied a request by the Birmingham Police Department in Alabama to dismiss a lawsuit the Southern Poverty Law Center filed against the department for its brutal use of pepper spray against the city’s public school students.
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A federal appeals court today blocked key provisions of Alabama and Georgia's anti-immigrant laws sending a strong message to Alabama and other states that they cannot enact hate-filled laws to try to drive people from their borders.
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More than a year ago, the Southern Poverty Law Center described in a federal lawsuit how students in Alabama’s Mobile County public schools are suspended for minor infractions for months at a time without the constitutionally required notice and hearing.
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The Southern Poverty Law Center and its allies are demanding that Alabama’s attorney general ensure the state adheres to last week’s ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that struck down most of Arizona’s anti-immigrant law.
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The Southern Poverty Law Center announced today that Alabama’s Jefferson County Board of Education abolished its unlawful policy banning male students from wearing earrings – a policy that discriminated on the basis of sex and violated students’ free-speech rights.
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The Southern Poverty Law Center re-launched a hotline today for people to report problems and abuses they have experienced as a result of Alabama’s draconian anti-immigrant law. Alabamians are urged to share their stories about the state’s anti-immigrant law and learn more about changes to the law by calling 1-800-982-1620.
