In its most recent report on hate groups in the U.S., the Southern Poverty Law Center documented a spike in the number of groups targeting LGBTQ people and promoting dangerous lies and misinformation, particularly about transgender people. Shockingly, the number of those groups rose from 49 in 2018 to 70 last year.
The Rev. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery, who died on Friday at 98 years old, was a longtime friend of the Southern Poverty Law Center and played a leading role in the SPLC’s first lawsuit against the Ku Klux Klan in 1980.
Alabama resident Lee Carroll Brooker garnered national attention in 2016 when the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the marijuana trafficking case that put Brooker, in his 70s at the time, in prison for life.
The SPLC and its allies asked a federal court today to issue a preliminary injunction requiring that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) take immediate steps to protect people in its custody, particularly those who have medical conditions making them more susceptible to serious illness and death from COVID-19.
Abdul Yaw Akachi was talking to his neighbors one sunny day in Florida when a voting rights advocate walked up to him.
Just as the authoritarian-tinged tenure of Donald Trump underscores the question, the coronavirus and near shut-down of public life in response highlight this defining time in our democracy.
Our work continues with fervor and is needed more now than ever.