Court Cases

In early 2026, the Kansas state legislature passed SB 244, a law which prohibits transgender people from using public restrooms on government property that align with their gender identity and establishes a private right of action that allows anyone who suspects someone is transgender and in violation of the law to sue that person for “damages” totaling $1,000. The law also invalidates state-issued driver’s licenses with updated gender markers that reflect the carrier’s gender identity. In February 2026, transgender people across the state received letters from the state Department of Revenue’s Division of Vehicles informing them that their driver’s licenses “will no longer be valid,” effective immediately. SB 244 also prohibits transgender Kansans – or those born in Kansas - from updating the gender marker on state-issued birth certificates and driver’s licenses in the future. The same day SB 244 went into effect, the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Kansas, and Ballard Spahr LLP filed a lawsuit challenging SB 244 in the District Court of Douglas County on behalf of two transgender men who had their driver’s licenses invalidated under the law. The lawsuit charges that SB 244 violates the Kansas Constitution’s protections for personal autonomy, privacy, equality under the law, due process, and freedom of speech. “The invalidation of state-issued IDs threatens to out transgender people against their will every time they apply for a job, rent an apartment, or interact with police,” said Harper Seldin, Senior Staff Attorney for the ACLU’s LGBTQ & HIV Rights Project. “Taken as a whole, SB 244 is a transparent attempt to deny transgender people autonomy over their own identities and push them out of public life altogether.” Click here to learn more about SB 244 and what it means for transgender people. If you or a loved one is impacted by Senate Bill 244 becoming a law, contact us by visiting aclu.org/KS_SB244. We want to hear from you.

On January 30, 2020, the ACLU of Kansas filed a lawsuit challenging the Kansas Highway Patrol’s practice of unconstitutionally targeting motorists with out-of-state plates traveling to and from Colorado and routinely employing a training technique known as the “Kansas Two-Step.” We represent several individuals who were stopped and detained by KHP troopers for traffic infractions, and were then detained for a canine sniff of their vehicle, without adequate reasonable suspicion, in violation of the Fourth Amendment.

On October 30, 2025, the ACLU of Kansas and pro bono counsel Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP filed a class action lawsuit on behalf of four Kansans over the unlimited, harsher punishment of poor defendants. The courts of Johnson County extend people's probation because they are unable to pay their restitution, even if they follow all other requirements. Kansas law allows judges to extend probation on the grounds of outstanding restitution alone even though the State and the courts know that they can collect restitution without extending probation. For years and even decades, people on probation in Kansas who have met all other requirements of their sentences have been unable to civically engage with their community simply because they couldn't afford to pay their restitution. While on probation, people are subject to invasive searches of their person and possessions without a warrant, are required to report on their movements in and out of the state, are not allowed to eat in or visit places that serve alcohol, and have their associations and habits surveilled. People on probation also cannot vote in Kansas until after they have been officially discharged. When probation is extended due to failure to pay, all of the terms of probation are extended—not just the outstanding amount of debt. Some of the clients in this case have had their probation extended for decades longer than the probationary period originally prescribed by the legislature in the criminal statute. In 2022, 12% of the Kansans lived below the poverty line. Amongst Black and Latino Kansans, 20.7% and 20.6 % respectively lived below the poverty line. For Native American Kansans that number was 17.6%. These are the individuals most in need of a government that works for them. However, due to the laws like the Kansas probation extension statute, they are most likely to remain on de facto permanent probation. For more information on this case, view the documents below. Updates will be added periodically.

In January 2025, Kansas Governor Laura Kelly vetoed SB 63, a measure passed by the state legislature that prohibits medical providers in the state of Kansas from providing gender-affirming medical treatments, such as hormone therapies and pubertal suppressants, to transgender youth diagnosed with gender dysphoria. “It is not the job of politicians to stand between a parent and a child who needs medical care of any kind,” said Governor Kelly.

Death qualification is discriminatory. Echoing a long history of racial bias in the criminal legal system, the practice dictates that to serve on a capital jury, a prospective juror must be willing to impose the death penalty. Those who are unwilling cannot serve. Death qualification disproportionately excludes Black people, women, and those of religious faith, who are all groups more likely to oppose the death penalty.

On September 21, 2023, the ACLU of Kansas filed an amicus brief in League of Women Voters of Kansas, Loud Light, Kansas Appleseed Center for Law and Justice, Topeka Independent Living Resource Center, Charley Crabtree, Faye Huelsmann, and Patricia Lewter v. Scott Schwab and Kris Kobach before the Kansas Court of Appeals.

On September 15, 2023, the ACLU of Kansas, ACLU, ACLU of Colorado, ACLU of New Mexico, ACLU of Oklahoma, ACLU of Utah, and ACLU of Wyoming filed an amicus brief in Vote America and Voter Participation Center v. Schwab, Kobach, Howe before the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals.

On August 1, 2023, the ACLU of Kansas filed an amicus brief in State of Kansas v. Kimberley S. Younger before the Kansas Supreme Court. The brief argues that criminal defendants have a right to confront witnesses face-to-face under Section Ten of the Kansas Bill of Rights and that Ms. Younger's interpretation of that right should be endorsed by the Court.

On July 11, 2023, the ACLU of Kansas, the ACLU, and Stinson LLP filed a motion to intervene in a lawsuit between Attorney General Kris Kobach and the Kansas Department of Revenue, on behalf of five transgender Kansans who would be irreparably harmed by an unconstitutional effort by Kobach to ban and reverse changes to the gender markers on their driver’s licenses.