Decided
June 24, 2022
Roe v. Wade Overturned
Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization

The Supreme Court issued a shameful ruling overturning Roe v. Wade — the landmark decision recognizing the constitutional right to abortion nearly 50 years ago. The impact will be devastating. Here’s what comes next.
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Featured

Privacy & Technology
FBI v. Fazaga
Status: Decided
In a case scheduled to be argued before the U.S. Supreme Court on November 8, 2021, three Muslim Americans are challenging the FBI’s secret spying on them and their communities based on their religion, in violation of the Constitution and federal law. In what will likely be a landmark case, the plaintiffs — Yassir Fazaga, Ali Uddin Malik, and Yasser Abdelrahim — insist that the FBI cannot escape accountability for violating their religious freedom by invoking “state secrets.” The plaintiffs are represented by the Center for Immigration Law and Policy at UCLA School of Law, the ACLU of Southern California, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Council for American Islamic Relations, and the law firm of Hadsell Stormer Renick & Dai.
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Reproductive Freedom
Cameron v. EMW Women’s Surgical Center
Status: Decided
In 2018, the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Kentucky filed a suit on behalf of Kentucky abortion providers and their patients challenging a state law banning physicians from providing a safe and medically proven abortion method called dilation and evacuation, or “D&E.” If it were to take effect, this law would prevent many patients from being able to obtain an abortion altogether. After two courts held that the law is unconstitutional, the Supreme Court ruled in March 2022 that Kentucky Attorney General Cameron can continue his pursuit to push abortion out of reach by intervening in the underlying challenge to an abortion ban, which is proceeding in a lower court.
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Reproductive Freedom
Whole Woman's Health v. Jackson
Status: Decided
The American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Texas, and coalition partners filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of abortion providers and funds on July 13, 2021, challenging S.B. 8, a Texas law allowing private citizens to enforce a ban on abortion as early as six weeks in pregnancy—before many know they are pregnant. The ACLU’s challenge made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court three times in as many months. After hearing oral arguments in the case, the Court issued a decision on December 10, 2021, that ended the most promising pathways to blocking the ban. The Supreme Court’s decision makes it more difficult to obtain adequate relief from the courts and gives states the green light to ban abortion using bounty-hunting schemes. Texas’ abortion ban will remain in effect until relief can be secured from a court.
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LGBTQ Rights
Fulton v. City of Philadelphia
Status: Decided
On November 4, the Supreme Court heard a case that could allow private agencies that receive taxpayer-funding to provide government services — such as foster care providers, food banks, homeless shelters, and more — to deny services to people who are LGBTQ, Jewish, Muslim, or Mormon.
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LGBTQ Rights
Stone v. Trump
Status: Heard
The ACLU, ACLU of Maryland, and Covington & Burling LLP filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration on behalf of six members of the armed forces who are transgender and the ACLU of Maryland. The lawsuit challenges the president’s directive banning transgender service members from continuing to serve in the military, banning transgender service members from receiving certain medically necessary health care, and banning transgender individuals from enlisting in the armed forces.
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Immigrants' Rights
Innovation Law Lab v. Wolf
Status: Filed
The American Civil Liberties Union, Southern Poverty Law Center, and Center for Gender & Refugee Studies filed a federal lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s new policy forcing asylum seekers to return to Mexico and remain there while their cases are considered.
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Immigrants' Rights
Sierra Club v. Trump — Challenge to Trump’s National Emergency Declaration to Construct a Border Wall
Status: Filed
In February 2019, the ACLU filed a lawsuit challenging President Trump’s emergency powers declaration to secure funds to build a wall along the southern border. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of the Sierra Club and the Southern Border Communities Coalition. The lawsuit argues that the president is usurping Congress’s appropriations power and threatening the clearly defined separation of powers inscribed in the Constitution. On January 20, 2021, President Biden halted further border wall construction. Litigation in this and subsequent related challenges has been paused or deadlines extended while the ACLU’s clients and the Biden administration determine next steps.
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Prisoners' Rights
Sanchez et al v. Dallas County Sheriff et al
Status: Filed
Decarceration has always been an emergency, a life and death proposition, but COVID-19 makes this effort intensely urgent. The ACLU has been working with our partners to litigate for the rights of those who are incarcerated and cannot protect themselves because of the policies of the institutions in which they are jailed.
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All Cases
Jun 27, 2022


Jun 27, 2022
Whole Woman's Health v. Paxton
Reproductive Freedom
On June 24, 2022, abortion provision in Texas entirely stopped due to confusion over whether the state’s century-old criminal abortion ban could be enforced after the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, ending the federal constitutional right to abortion and 50 years of precedent. On June 27, 2022, abortion providers in Texas filed a lawsuit in state court seeking to block officials from enforcing the state’s antiquated pre-Roe abortion ban. If successful, the lawsuit would restore early abortion access in Texas for two months or longer.
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Jun 27, 2022


Jun 27, 2022
EMW Women's Surgical Center, P.S.C., et al. v. Daniel Cameron, et. al.
Reproductive Freedom
On June 24, 2022, abortion provision in Kentucky effectively stopped after the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, ending the federal constitutional right to abortion and 50 years of precedent.
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Jun 27, 2022

Jun 27, 2022
Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization
Reproductive Freedom
Status: Decided
The case concerns the constitutionality of a Mississippi law prohibiting abortions after the fifteenth week of pregnancy. The state used the case as a vehicle to ask the Supreme Court to take away the federal constitutional right to abortion it first recognized 50 years before in Roe v. Wade. On June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court of the United States accepted the state’s invitation and overturned Roe eliminating the federal constitutional right to abortion.
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Jun 22, 2022

Jun 22, 2022
Virginia Obscenity Proceedings Against Two Books
Free Speech
Status: Filed
On June 22, 2022, our clients—local bookstores Prince Books, Read Books, One More Page Books, and bbgb tales for kids, as well as American Booksellers for Free Expression, Association of American Publishers, Inc., Authors Guild, Inc., American Library Association, Virginia Library Association, and Freedom to Read Foundation—filed motions seeking to dismiss obscenity proceedings against two books, highlighting the unconstitutional nature of the proceedings and noting that the books are not obscene as a matter of law.
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