Civil Rights & Immigration

Attorneys spar over Georgia’s voting law after federal judge temporarily blocks some provisions

BY: - September 26, 2023

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit will determine whether to continue blocking provisions of Georgia’s 2021 election law overhaul that civil rights groups say discriminates against Black and disabled voters. The Georgia Republican Party and national GOP political committees are backing state officials in their request that the appellate court overturn the […]

Menendez, other U.S. Senate Democrats vent frustrations after new ruling against DACA

BY: - September 14, 2023

WASHINGTON — A federal judge Wednesday declared illegal the Biden administration’s revised version of a program that protects hundreds of thousands of people brought into the country as children from deportation, and U.S. Senate Democrats, advocates and the White House on Thursday decried the decision. “I think that Congress should act, but it has been incapable of […]

A men’s movement takes reins in a nationwide quest to end abortion

BY: - September 14, 2023

Wendell Shrock doesn’t believe in condoms. “We should leave the uterus to God,” the street preacher from Tennessee tells States Newsroom, in front of an abortion clinic outside of Atlanta, mid-morning in late July. Sweat drips from his cowboy hat into his salt-and-pepper beard that stretches halfway down his red-plaid shirt. The retired police officer […]

Challenge to political maps to proceed with state’s claim Black voting power isn’t diluted

BY: - September 11, 2023

A federal trial that could force state lawmakers to redraw Georgia’s political maps ahead of next year’s election will enter its second week Monday. Five lawsuits have been filed challenging the GOP-drawn maps that came out of a special session in 2021, but this trial features three of them, including challenges from Alpha Phi Alpha […]

Georgia behavioral health officials push for more workers and beds as people languish in jail

BY: - September 1, 2023

This story was updated at 1:20 p.m. Friday, Sept. 1, 2023, with additional information.   Georgia will need to build five more behavioral health crisis centers and free up about 120 additional beds in the state hospital network for people in the criminal justice system – all by 2025. But the state must also shore up […]

‘Hate will not prevail in America’: Biden marks 60 years since March on Washington

BY: - August 28, 2023

The U.S. still hasn’t met the goals of the Civil Rights Movement, President Joe Biden said Monday, the 60th anniversary of one of the movement’s most iconic events. Six decades to the day after the 1963 March on Washington, where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech, Biden urged Americans not […]

Afghan refugees who aided the U.S. stuck in legal limbo, two years after Kabul’s fall

BY: - August 19, 2023

WASHINGTON —  Two years ago, Farzana Jamalzada and her husband made the difficult decision to separately flee Afghanistan, after U.S. troops withdrew from the country and the Taliban took over. It took days for the couple to be reunited at an airport in Qatar, where Jamalzada would show people a picture of her husband on […]

This American Idol novelty singer was present for major civil rights events

BY: and - August 7, 2023

Nearly thirteen years ago, Larry Platt, dubbed the “General,” shook up the TV world, becoming an “American Idol” sensation at 64 years old with his song “Pants on the Ground,” but many do not know there is more to his story. Decades before his viral performance, Georgia’s most famous pants puller-upper championed a much different […]

Biden border policies ripped by U.S. House GOP as impeachment threats ramp up

BY: - July 26, 2023

WASHINGTON — U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Wednesday faced off with Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee, who did not directly call for his impeachment but strongly criticized his oversight of the agency. “I know that today Secretary Mayorkas is going to try to paint a rosy picture of this disastrous […]

Decrying attempts to ‘bury history,’ Biden designates Emmett Till national monument

BY: - July 25, 2023

WASHINGTON — On what would have been the 82nd birthday of Emmett Till, a Black boy kidnapped and murdered by two white men in Mississippi, President Joe Biden on Tuesday designated a new national monument at sites connected to the lynching that became a catalyst for the civil rights movement. “Telling the truth and the […]

Public schools banned from sheltering migrants under bill passed by U.S. House

BY: - July 20, 2023

WASHINGTON — The U.S. House on Wednesday night passed a bill to bar the use of public K-12 school facilities to provide shelter for migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. The bill, approved 222-201, is known as the “Schools Not Shelters Act” and is a rebuke of the Biden administration’s immigration policy. If enacted into […]

U.S. Supreme Court turns down push by states to challenge Biden deportation policy

BY: - June 23, 2023

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday overwhelmingly ruled that Texas and Louisiana lacked the legal standing to challenge the Biden administration’s deportation guidelines, granting a win to the White House on immigration policy. The states objected to the White House’s directive to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to prioritize arresting and deporting […]