News & Commentary

The American Civil Liberties Union in Kansas earlier this year challenged rules that ban handheld signs, prohibit unnecessary noise and require the prior approval of activities after Kansas State University students were evicted for staging a protest in March.

Bonds said the ACLU is also concerned that Metsker has “weaponized” the electioneering statute to prevent nonpartisan voter protection workers who are there as watchdogs for voter intimidation, improper provisional ballots, unduly long lines and other election administration issues.

Student plaintiffs from a National School Walkout lawsuit have received their letters of apology from the Shawnee Mission School District.

Kansas can no longer put off care for Medicaid patients with hepatitis C because of a recent legal settlement. But hundreds of the state’s prison inmates not covered by that lawsuit will have to wait another year for the pricey treatment.

As part of compliance with the settlement agreement approved by a federal judge in April, the Shawnee Mission School District has issued letters of apology to students who sued the district last year for violating their 1st Amendment rights during the National School Walkout protests in spring 2018.

The school district said in a statement that the parties have agreed to collaborate on First Amendment training for all district administrators, adopt policy language in the district that clarifies the First Amendment rights of student journalists.

Before Lauren Bonds became legal director of the ACLU of Kansas, then became interim director, before she went to law school and became a civil rights lawyer, she knew what discrimination was like in Hutchinson.

The American Civil Liberties Union is pursuing twice as many lawsuits in Kansas under legal director Lauren Bonds than before she arrived.

“This law requires doctors to work against their own Hippocratic oath, and politicians should not be intruding on the doctor-patient relationship, inserting falsehoods in their crusade to violate women’s agency and reproductive freedoms,” said Letitia Harmon, policy director at the Kansas ACLU.