News & Commentary

Today I testified against three bills that would severely, and unconstitutionally, restrict welfare benefits for some of Maine's most vulnerable families. Two of the bills seek to limit the number of people who can receive state aid by creating unconstitutional residency requirements and automatically terminating benefits for anyone convicted of a drug crime. The third bill would allow random, suspicionless drug testing of public benefit recipients in violation of the Fourth Amendment.

It's not every day that the ACLU of Maine contributes to saving lives, but today we did.  We supported LD 1046, a bill that would allow for the administration of naloxone in cases of opiate overdose.  The testimony at the public hearing was poignant.  Kenneth Miller of the Maine Harm Reduction Alliance testified that drug overdose deaths in Maine more than doubled from 60 in 2000 to 167 in 2010.  Naloxone helps to prevent the overdose long enough for emergency treatment to be secured. 

Today, I spent an emotional afternoon in our Health and Human Services Committee room up in Augusta. Our legislators were listening patiently to several people who were testifying on LD 1065, "An Act Regarding Patient-directed Care at the End of Life".  This bill would allow a patient who is terminally ill to make decisions regarding the care she receives at the end of her life. Together with her physician or the medical director of the hospice care provider, the patient will sign documents that will carefully instruct the provision of health care she wishes to receive and the provision of care at the end of life.  The ACLU of Maine believes that each of us should have the right to die in a humane and dignified manner. The exercise of this right is central to personal autonomy and bodily integrity, and this includes refusal or termination of life-saving medical treatment. You'll hear about this bill in the media as an "assisted suicide" bill. Much of the testimony this afternoon focused on this point. Obviously, no one should be coerced into making decisions about their care at their most vulnerable time, when they are approaching certain death. But there is a difference between suicide and making the decision to hasten death when it is near and suffering is great. It is hard to know how any of us would handle the death of a loved one until we are in that moment ourselves. The subject of death and dying is intensely personal and even more intensely emotional. I often wish I will die a peaceful death in my sleep after a life well lived --- but my life thus far has included witnessing people I love die due to suicide, illness and old age. Hard as it is sometimes, I understand that we all make choices in life and in death that not everyone understands or accepts.  I was proud to deliver this testimony today to support this legislation's intent. 

Each Friday, we’ll bring you updates on the latest civil liberties news from Maine and the nation. Guantanamo Prisoners in Guantanamo are now in their third month of a hunger strike. This past Wednesday’s New York Times article gives more details. One prisoner’s Op-Ed (here) describes being painfully force-fed with a feeding tube. In his words for the Op-Ed, “I’ve been detained at Guantánamo for 11 years and three months. I have never been charged with any crime. I have never received a trial. I could have been home years ago — no one seriously thinks I am a threat — but still I am here.”   Privacy and Technology The ACLU of Maine is currently supporting a package of privacy bills. Three of five of those bills will have their public hearings this coming Thursday.  One of those bills protects employees from having to forfeit passwords to their social media accounts to their employers. As Allie Bohm, advocacy and policy strategist for our National office, is quoted saying here, "We'd balk if an employer said, 'I want to look at your photo albums once a week or listen in on your dinner party conversation.’…By allowing them to monitor your social-media presence, that's what they might be doing."   In other privacy related news, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to update the main statute protecting online privacy, the Electronic Communication Privacy Act. Read more here.    Two other articles of interest for electronic-privacy minded civil libertarians include this one on how students can protect their privacy and this one  describing how Facebook and data brokers work together to show you targeted ads.

I started writing this blog post yesterday afternoon, while sitting in the Judiciary Committee hearing room at the Maine State Legislature. I was waiting for the third committee work session on our proposed restrictions on the use of surveillance drones, and I had a plan: any time that I am sitting in a committee hearing waiting for my bill, and I take out my laptop to do work, then my bill comes up almost as soon as my laptop turns on. Sure enough. . .  Now it is Friday, and the Judiciary Committee has not yet come to an agreement about the appropriate level of restrictions for drones (maybe next week). I'm still optimistic for the bill's chances, and more than that I'm optimistic about the improvement of privacy protection across the country. Yesterday, while the Maine Legislature Judiciary Committee was discussing drone regulation, the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security and Investigations was discussing electronic record privacy. There seems to be some positive movement in D.C. as well. You can read about the reason for the congressional hearing here, and you can read about my friend Catherine Crump's contribution to that hearing here. For those of you who would like to be a part of the fight for increased privacy protection, the Maine Legislature Judiciary Committee will hold public hearings next Thursday, May 2 on three important bills: LD 1377: An Act To Protect Cellular Telephone Privacy; LD 313: An Act to Create the Maine Online Privacy Protection Act; and LD 1194: An Act to Protect Social Media Privacy in School and the Workplace. The hearings start at 1:00 pm. As for drones, the Judiciary Committee will hold its next work session on the bill on Wednesday, May 1. You can come to the Statehouse to watch the discussion, or you can listen at home through the Judiciary Committee audio feed.

Each Friday, we’ll bring you updates on the latest civil liberties news from Maine and the nation. Immigration Reform The highly anticipated comprehensive immigration reform bill dropped this week. At the ACLU, we celebrate the possibility of a pathway to citizenship for more than 11 million people in this country. As you can read here, eight in 10 Americans support a fair immigration system.  While the bill as drafted contains some concerning provisions (See our blog about the E-verify system), we are, on the whole, excited about the prospect of more people having more rights as citizens. ACLU lawyers are currently digging through more than 800 pages of the proposed bill armed with their civil liberties expertise. The Washington post gave their overview here. Other media can be read here, here, and here.   CISPA The House passed an overreaching "cyber security" bill on Thursday known as CISPA.  CISPA could compromise your electronic privacy by allowing companies to share private information (for a full breakdown of what it says and what it should say, visit our resource CISPA Explained). Fortunately, the president shares some of our concerns and has threatened to veto the bill. Read a New York Times technology article on CISPA here. Forced Blood Tests at the Side of the Road: The Supreme Court ruled in Missouri v. McNeely that the warrantless blood test of a man suspected of drunk driving was an unconstitutional search. ACLU legal director Steve Shapiro, who argued the case in the Court, was quoted here saying, “Today’s decision appropriately recognizes what half the states have already demonstrated -- that maintaining highway safety does not require sacrificing personal privacy” ACLU Sues Flower Shop for Discrimination The ACLU affiliate in Washington state filed a lawsuit on behalf of a gay couple denied service at a flower shop for their upcoming wedding. Read more in this news story.   Texas Execution Texas executed its third death row inmate this year, the eight execution in the country this year. Read more here.

Each Friday, we’ll bring you updates on the latest civil liberties news from Maine and the nation. Immigration Immigration was the hot topic this week for policy makers, civil libertarians, activists, and even Mark Zuckerberg.  The latest news indicates that a bipartisan group of senators aims to unveil an immigration bill as soon as Tuesday. In anticipation of an immigration reform bill, thousands gathered at a rally in Washington D.C. on Wednesday and the ACLU of Maine joined the Maine Immigrants' Rights Coalition for a press conference in Maine as part of a nationwide day of action. As Rachel said in her blog, immigration reform must create a welcoming roadmap to citizenship and protect civil liberties. If you agree, tell your congressional delegation by clicking here.     The Death Penalty in the News 1) The father of an adult with mental illness wrote this opinion piece about using different calculations for punishment of the mentally ill. 2) One of Florida’s longest-serving death row inmates was executed Wednesday. He was sentence in 1981. Read more here. 3) Texas executed an inmate sentenced in 1990. More on that here.   Privacy and the IRS Last year, the ACLU sent a FOIA request to the IRS asking for records regarding whether or not the IRS gets a warrants to read emails, text messages, and other private electronic communication. The documents obtained suggest that the IRS does not have a uniform, nationwide policy of requesting warrants before it reads electronic communication in criminal investigations. Click here for more details.   These documents provide further evidence for the need to update our privacy laws. (For a recent update on potential new privacy laws here in Maine, see yesterday’s blog by Shenna).  

The news is bad, but the fight is not over.  In a very disappointing vote today, the Judiciary Committee voted down probable-cause warrant requirements for cell phone tracking in an 8 to 5 vote.  (You can read more about how intrusive cell phone tracking has become here.)  The good news is that a bi-partisan gang of five legislators stood up for privacy and the Constitution today.  We are grateful to the following leaders for defending our Fourth Amendment freedom from warrantless cell phone tracking: Representative Jennifer DeChant (D-Bath) Representative Stacey Guerin (R-Glenburn) Representative Kim Monaghan Derrig (D-Cape Elizabeth) Representative Representative Matt Moonen (D-Portland) Representative Stephen Moriarty (D-Cumberland) The other good news is that the Judiciary Committee doesn't get the final word on LD 415.  These five leaders have signed on to a "minority report" that endorses LD 415 to require a probable-cause warrant requirement for cell phone tracking.  Now LD 415 goes to the Senate floor for a general vote.  There's a great right/left coalition working on this bill, and I know that most Mainers care deeply about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.  We need your help now more than ever to let your state legislators know that drones and cell phones shouldn't be exempt from the Fourth Amendment requirements of warrants based on probable cause. You can contact your legislator here! And if your legislator happens to be Representative DeChant, Representative Guerin, Representative Monaghan Derrig, Representative Moonen, or Representative Moriarty, give them a big thanks today.  They stood up for the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and voted yes to privacy. As for LD 236, the bill that would require a probable-cause warrant requirement for drone surveillance, it was tabled for two weeks.  We have two weeks to change hearts and minds in the Judiciary Committee to encourage them to support Fourth Amendment protections against massive domestic drone surveillance.  For a full list of Judiciary Committee members, click here. The ACLU of Maine will be working to defend your privacy rights every step of the way.  Despite today's disappointing vote, we're not giving up, and we hope you won't either.

Each Friday, we’ll bring you updates on the latest civil liberties news from Maine and the nation. This week, we bring you highlights from the national ACLU Blog of Rights.What’s Wrong With CISPAWe've written extensively about the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protections Act (CISPA) over the last year, but since the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence is set to mark the bill up next week, and the full House to vote on it the week after that, we're posting in more depth about its shortcomings. Information sharing isn't offensive per se; it's really a question of what can be shared, with whom, and what corporations and government agencies can do with it.VICTORY! Students Triumph over Private Prison Company’s Bid to Name College Football StadiumFor-profit prison company GEO Group announced its decision last night to withdraw the $6 million donation it made to Florida Atlantic University in exchange for naming rights to the school's football stadium. Student groups, faith groups, the ACLU, and other civil rights groups actively campaigned for the university to dissociate from GEO Group.CIA to Promote Head of "Black Site" Where Torture Occurred?According to media reports, the acting director of the CIA's clandestine service has, for the last month, been an official who was "in the chain of command" in the CIA's torture program in the years after 9/11. According to a book by Jose Rodriguez, the former head of the clandestine service, this unnamed official even headed one of the early CIA "black sites"—notorious secret prisons set up overseas to torture detainees. Media reports indicate that the unnamed career officer also reportedly signed off on the destruction of 92 videotapes documenting some of the most brutal mistreatment carried out under the CIA program.