Tag Archives: civil liberties

“Extreme majority:” Impact of the most conservative Supreme Court in a century

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“We have a far-right extreme majority on the Supreme Court,” asserts James Lyall, executive director of the Vermont ACLU. “At no point in our lifetime has the Supreme Court been so far out of step with where most of the country is.”

This week, just days before a national election, the Republican-led Senate confirmed Amy Coney Barrett to be a justice on the U.S. Supreme Court. The confirmation was rammed through in record time just four years after Republicans refused to give a hearing to President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, because they insisted that eight months before an election was too soon. Barrett is now part of a 6-3 conservative majority, the most conservative court since the 1930s.

We examine the implications of the new Supreme Court in key areas: reproductive rights, civil liberties and immigrant rights, and how this could affect Vermont.

Lynn Paltrow, executive director, National Advocates for Pregnant Women

Ghita Schwarz, senior attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights

James Lyall, executive director, Vermont ACLU

“Now is not the time to be complacent:” James Lyall of ACLU Vermont on defending civil liberties in the Trump era

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More than 8,000 Vemonters are under some form of correctional control. One in four people incarcerated in Vermont have not been convicted of a crime. A new bipartisan consensus is emerging for criminal justice reform. A poll released this week by the ACLU of Vermont shows that two in three Vermonters want to reduce the prison population by investing in community-based alternatives, and four in five Vermonters support alternatives for offenses resulting from substance misuse, mental health conditions and poverty. James Lyall discusses efforts to cut Vermont’s prison population in half, other criminal justice reform legislation, as well as recent court decisions around immigrant rights. He also talks about his greatest concerns about civil liberties in the Trump era. (January 29, 2020 broadcast)

James Lyall, executive director, American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont

See you in court: Vt ACLU prepares to take on Pres. Trump

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In President Trump’s first week in office, the American Civil Liberties Union handed him his first defeat: successfully challenging his refugee and Muslim ban in court and winning a stay in multiple federal courts. Now the Vermont chapter of the ACLU prepares to defend immigrant rights, privacy, LGBTQ rights, press freedom and other civil liberties in Vermont. We discuss the road ahead.

James Lyall, executive director, Vermont ACLU

Is your privacy protected?

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Drones. Computer hacking. Cell phone location services. These are just some of the threats to privacy that citizens face on a daily basis. Allen Gilbert, executive director of the Vermont chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, discusses new legislation aimed at protecting privacy, and why he feels that Act 46, Vermont’s new education law, violates the Vermont constitution and will likely result in a lawsuit from the ACLU.

Allen Gilbert, executive director, Vermont chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union

Inequalities: Civil Liberties Under Fire in Vt; Ending Inequality & Poverty

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Does Vermont have a racial profiling problem? Is your privacy at risk? Are your civil liberties being violated by drones, license plate readers, and other new electronic surveillance?

Allen Gilbert, executive director of the Vermont chapter of the ACLU, talks about the state of civil liberties in the Green Mountain State

Today, 47 million Americans live in poverty, while middle class incomes are in decline. The top 20 percent now controls 89 percent of all wealth. Can poverty be ended?

Scott Myers-Lipton, author of Ending Extreme Inequality: An Economic Bill of Rights to Eliminate Poverty and professor of sociology at San Jose State University

Is Vermont a surveillance state?; Alternatives to capitalism, 5/29/2013

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Allen Gilbert, executive director of the Vermont ACLU, discusses threats to privacy and civil liberties and the ways that Vermont is becoming “a surveillance state.” And Gar Alperovitz talks about practical alternatives to capitalism in the U.S. and his new book, What Then Must We Do? Straight Talk About the Next American Revolution.