News & Commentary

As the Democratic National Convention concludes, the nation’s focus came to not only the City of Milwaukee, but also Wisconsin, a place where racial segregation, economic inequality and police brutality against people of color has long since been a problem.

As the Democratic National Convention thrusts Milwaukee onto the national stage, America’s reckoning with police violence and racial injustice will be brought to bear on a city marked by profound racial inequality and oppression. During a time in which Americans are being forced to confront how centuries of white supremacy has shaped virtually every aspect of our lives, there may be no better case study for the present-day impact of systemic racism than the City of Milwaukee. 

The ACLU of Wisconsin has a team of legal observers who are trained to keep an eye on protests that happen outside the Democratic National Convention. The objective of our legal observers is to keep demonstrators and community members safe by documenting what happens between protestors and police and other law enforcement personnel. 

MILWAUKEE – All Voting is Local Wisconsin and the ACLU of Wisconsin today released a Ballots for All Toolkit that supplements their recently released report “Ballots for All: Ensuring Eligible Wisconsin Voters in Jail Have Equal Access to the Ballot”. The toolkit offers voting advocates strategies for urging county officials to adopt policies so every eligible voter in jail can vote. 

The state of Wisconsin has become ground zero for voter disenfranchisement in the United States. The last decade has seen the integrity of our democracy and elections tarnished by onerous voter ID laws, intense partisan gerrymandering, and an agenda deliberately designed to make voting more difficult and less accessible — one that specifically targets marginalized communities. 

If you have a negative interaction with a law enforcement agency or officer, you may want to make a complaint against that agency or officer. Here are some ways to do so.

After recent protests against social distancing requirements designed to combat the spread of COVID-19, some of our supporters have asked where the ACLU of Wisconsin stands on these demonstrations. 

Voters should never have been forced to choose between their health and safety and their ability to participate in the election.

Tuesday’s election was hard. It was hard for all of us who care about democracy, and it was especially hard for disenfranchised communities and individual people who couldn’t vote or who had to take risks and put up with long lines just to vote. While we wait for the results, I wanted to bring you up to date on what we’ve done—and what we see going forward.