One of the most important provisions of the Affordable Care Act is one that helps ensure people are not discriminated against when they seek medical attention. The Health Care Rights Law (Section 1557 of the ACA) protects us all — especially the LGBTQ community, women, people with disabilities, and people for whom English is not their primary language. And now, the Trump administration wants to weaken those protections.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has proposed a rule that would dismantle the Health Care Rights Law and make it more difficult for all people to receive the health care they need. If this proposal is enacted, the administration would no longer enforce protections against discrimination in health care based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

The proposed rule also threatens people with limited English proficiency and people with disabilities. It would severely limit the ability of those who do not speak English well to defend their health care rights by eliminating language access requirements for taglines and communications for patients. Additionally, the rule explores the potential of changing key accessibility standards, which would severely affect people with disabilities’ access to health care treatments and facilities.

The Trump administration wants to keep people from accessing the health care they need. And let’s be clear: This proposal represents yet another civil rights rollback by the administration and its onslaught on the fundamentals of our democracy.

It’s important to remember that the law has not changed — every person still has the right to receive health care free from discrimination. If enacted, however, the proposed rule would encourage providers to refuse LGBTQ people care on the grounds of religious beliefs. The rule would also cause fear and confusion in a community that already avoids medical treatment for fear of mistreatment. The health care rights law proposed rulemaking affirms that the Trump administration will continue its attempt to undermine the civil and human rights of LGBTQ people by encouraging discrimination against them and perpetuating systemic inequality within the health care system. Additionally, LGBTQ people of color already experience higher rates of discrimination, substandard care, and serious health risks like HIV. This rule would make things disproportionately worse for the most vulnerable members of this community.

The truth is that transgender individuals already face barriers to accessing the health care they need. More than half of all LGBT people as well as people living with HIV reported experiencing discrimination in care. This includes being refused care, experiencing harsh and abusive language, or being seen by a health care professional who refused to touch them, used excessive precautions, or was physically rough or abusive with the patient. In 2015, 23 percent of transgender people did not see a doctor when they needed to because of fear that they would be mistreated. And in 2017, 29 percent of transgender people said that a health care provider refused to see them because of their gender identity or sexual orientation in the past year.

Take for instance the story of Elizabeth Carroll, a transgender woman in Martinsburg, West Virginia. Elizabeth has been denied health care by multiple providers in her area for a surgery that doctors have told her is medically necessary. She explains:

“I can’t even get an appointment. As soon as I mention I am transgender, I almost get an immediate hang up.”

Elizabeth’s story is not unique and unfortunately the transgender community is all too familiar with being denied the care they need. In addition to the negative impact on an individual’s health care, policies and practices like this also impinge the dignity of transgender people. As Elizabeth notes, “all transgender people are human beings and deserve the same rights as all other human beings.” That includes the right to health care that allows transgender people to live free and healthy lives.

The Trump administration has made it clear that the fight for equality is far from over, so we must continue to speak out and make our voices heard on this issue. We have until August 13, 2019 to submit comments opposing the proposed rule and explain how this policy change would harm all people. No one deserves to be denied care because of who they are. Share your story and remind this administration that it’s accountable to all of us.

By Beth Lynk

The late New York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan once said 12 words that should resonate with everyone in a democracy: “Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts.” Facts are the basis of sound decisions. But today, opinions that are far from factual are driving and distorting the debate on the very question of how our government gets its facts every 10 years — the constitutionally mandated census.

The Leadership Conference Education Fund is part of a coalition of nonpartisan, nonprofit organizations that have decades of experience working to ensure a fair and accurate census. No matter who is in the White House or which party controls Congress, we care that policymakers make decisions with accurate, apolitical information. From the allotment of more than $800 billion in federal funding that supports services and resources like community health centers and safe roads, to the apportionment of congressional districts, key decisions affecting all of us depend on a fair and accurate census.

Now some, relying on a series of fictions, are trying to weaponize the census for their own political purposes by including a citizenship question that will suppress the count in 2020. The Leadership Conference Education Fund and many others have protested this decision, but the Trump administration has continued to advocate for the addition of a last-minute citizenship question to the 2020 Census. This may be the issue you haven’t heard about that may determine the outcome of everything you care about.

We only have one chance in a decade to get the census right.

Next week, on Tuesday, April 23, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral argument on whether the addition of a new, untested citizenship question will be on the 2020 Census. To arm all those invested in a healthy democracy with the facts, we’re debunking the falsehoods you can expect to hear from the people behind this disinformation campaign.

First, U.S. Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross pretends that the U.S. Census Bureau, which administers the census and is part of his agency, has always asked for the citizenship status of everyone in the United States. This is false. As scholars of the census have told the Supreme Court in their amicus brief, “never in the census’s 230-year history has the government asked for the citizenship status of everyone in the country…Rather, throughout history, the government has asked only a subset of the population to provide citizenship information.”

That’s because the Census Bureau itself consistently concluded that asking the question of everyone would produce a less reliable and accurate count. The bureau’s own research indicates that the question would prevent 6.5 million people from participating in 2020. And that’s why five former U.S. Census Bureau Directors who served under both Democratic and Republican administrations filed an amicus brief in this case, warning of the danger of including the question on the 2020 Census.

Second, the Trump administration insists that the citizenship question is necessary to ensure enforcement of the Voting Rights Act (VRA). Also, not true. As three federal courts have now found, this rationale is a misleading excuse. There is no factual basis to support the position that collecting citizenship data from the decennial census is needed for VRA enforcement. Nor, until the events triggering this case, had the Justice Department ever asked the Census Bureau to add such a citizenship question. And because census citizenship data would be less accurate and less complete than existing citizenship data, collecting such data would severely undermine VRA enforcement — thereby accomplishing the opposite of Secretary Ross’ stated purpose.

Finally, the administration is trying to claim that what it’s trying to do is noncontroversial — really, business as usual. Are you detecting a pattern? This is most definitely not business as usual. What we now know through the lawsuits seeking to overturn Secretary Ross’ decision is that he actively searched around for an agency to make the request to add the citizenship question. The Department of Justice finally did it (with a shove from then Attorney General Jeff Sessions), despite initial reluctance to make the request and against the advice of senior career experts at the Census Bureau. This was a well-concealed effort by Secretary Ross and his allies, which was only uncovered because of the multiple lawsuits challenging the decision. As one lower court judge noted, “the court can and does infer from the various ways in which Secretary Ross and his aides acted — like people with something to hide — that they did have something to hide.”

And no wonder. As noted above, the Census Bureau long ago concluded that citizenship questions were problematic and posed huge risks to having a fair and accurate census. The opposition to the addition of the citizenship question on the 2020 Census has been overwhelming and has included voices from both parties, as well as states and localities, professional scientific associations and former Census Directors, civil rights and community-based organizations, former Justice Department officials, businesses, the philanthropic community, and more. The public comments that the Commerce Department received regarding Secretary Ross’ decision reflect the broad understanding of the negative impact the citizenship question would have on census accuracy and fairness. In fact, 99.1 percent of the nearly 150,000 comments received opposed the addition of the citizenship question. And three dozen amicus (friend-of-the-court) briefs have been filed with the Supreme Court in support of the citizenship question challenge, which, together, paint a powerful picture of just how deeply the adverse effects of a citizenship question on the 2020 Census would cut.

The census is our nation’s largest, most complex peacetime undertaking and is a cornerstone of our democracy. Secretary Ross, President Trump, and their defenders are betting that by disrupting the census, they can change who counts on the biggest decisions of all. We can’t let this happen. We must all defend the facts in 2019 to safeguard an accurate and inclusive census in 2020.

Beth Lynk is the Census Counts campaign director at The Leadership Conference Education Fund.

By Mike Zubrensky

Dear Senator Graham,

You have just become chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is charged with reviewing judicial nominees for lifetime appointments and key executive branch appointees like the attorney general. The committee has become highly politicized in recent years under the acrimonious chairmanship of Senator Chuck Grassley. You have the power to restore the committee’s spirit of integrity and independence, and you owe it to your country, the Constitution, and the federal judiciary to do so.

You have broader duties than mere allegiance to your political party, and you have demonstrated the ability to work with members across the aisle in the past. As an attorney, you understand the value of depoliticizing the federal bench and of the need for bipartisanship, professional standards, and fair rules in the consideration of judicial nominees. You were one of the few Republican senators to vote to confirm President Obama’s highly qualified Supreme Court nominees Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, and you have been a voice of reason and independence on some significant policy matters.

As chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, you must lead with these qualities in order to honor your oath to protect the Constitution and defend the Senate’s independent constitutional role in vetting judicial nominees. Here are five recommendations for doing so.

1. Restore the Senate’s “blue slip” tradition.

You must restore the traditional role of home-state senators in the judicial confirmation process and the integrity of the blue slip process. Senator Grassley firmly upheld the Senate’s century-old blue slip policy during the Obama presidency, not allowing a single Obama judicial nominee to receive a committee hearing or vote unless both of their home-state senators returned the blue slip signaling support for the nominee. Yet he hypocritically reversed that policy and allowed eight of Trump’s extreme circuit court nominees to receive a hearing and vote despite the objections of one or both home-state senators.

The blue slip practice is one of the critical checks and balances that protects the Senate’s role and maintains equilibrium among the branches of government. Historically, when the Senate majority placed partisan loyalty over the Senate’s institutional duty of independence, the blue slip served as a vital corrective. As former Senator Hatch noted in 2014:

“Weakening or eliminating the blue slip process would sweep aside the last remaining check on the president’s judicial appointment power. Anyone serious about the Senate’s ‘advice and consent’ role knows how disastrous such a move would be.”

This process has never been more important than today, with a sitting president who undermines the legitimacy of judges who disagree with his actions, and who prioritizes personal loyalty over fealty to the law.

2. Respect the role of the American Bar Association (ABA).

You must value the ABA’s independent and nonpartisan role in evaluating judicial nominees. For more than 50 years, the ABA evaluated potential judicial candidates before a nomination was made to weed out those who lack the experience, integrity, or temperament to serve lifetime appointments. President Trump removed the ABA from the pre-nomination process in order to steamroll his nominees through the Senate without adequate vetting. Although the ABA still conducted evaluations after nominations were made, Senator Grassley rushed to schedule hearings for dozens of nominees before their ratings were complete. Six Trump nominees ultimately received the rare and abysmal rating of Not Qualified, the highest number of judicial nominees to earn this dishonorable distinction during the first two years of a presidency.

Senator Graham, you have expressed strong support for the ABA judicial evaluation role in the past. As you stated in your keynote address at the ABA’s annual convention in 2012: “That service you provide the United States Senate is invaluable because in these politically charged times in which we live, you are a filter, sort of a wall, between people who are politically connected and somebody who should be on the bench.” And in a recent tweet, you wrote: “If I am fortunate enough to be selected by my colleagues to serve as Chairman, I will push for the appointment and Senate confirmation of highly qualified (emphasis added) conservative judges to the federal bench.”

As chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, you have the opportunity to put your words into action. You can do so by scheduling no hearings or votes until the ABA rating for a nominee is complete and by refusing to give hearings or votes to any nominee who receives a Not Qualified rating. The federal judiciary deserves judges who can at least attain the minimum qualification standard set by our nation’s largest legal organization.

3. Stop stacked hearings.

Because the Trump administration is inadequately vetting its judicial nominees, it is essential for the Senate Judiciary Committee to carefully scrutinize them. To allow enough time for committee members to review nominees’ extensive records, you must end Senator Grassley’s practice of stuffing multiple circuit court nominees into a single hearing unless the minority party consents to such a hearing. Stacked hearings occurred repeatedly during the first two years of Trump’s presidency. By contrast, during the eight-year Obama presidency, not a single hearing with more than one circuit court nominee took place unless the Republicans agreed. The tradition of having just one circuit court nominee per hearing exists because federal appellate courts are the second highest courts in the land. They make critical decisions involving tens of millions of people. They serve for decades if confirmed and are deserving of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s time, attention, and thorough examination. Stacked hearings undermine that critical function, and you should not permit them.

4. Stop recess hearings.

For the first time in Senate history, Senator Grassley held hearings for judicial nominees during a Senate recess over the minority party’s objection. He held two such hearings in October 2018 despite the absence of every committee Democrat and all but three committee Republicans. He held these hearings so that the two-year effort to pack the courts with President Trump’s judicial extremists would continue unabated. The reputation and integrity of the federal judiciary will suffer as a result of these hyper-partisan actions. You must reverse course and refrain from scheduling any recess hearings, and you should conduct new hearings for those nominees who were given recess hearings last October.

5. Permit full access to nominees’ records.

During the Kavanaugh confirmation process, Senator Grassley circumvented the traditional document production role played by the National Archives and prevented committee members and the public from accessing millions of pages of the nominee’s records from his service in the White House. These vital records on Judge Kavanaugh’s background and beliefs were never made public. This was in stark contrast to the Supreme Court nominations of Elena Kagan and John Roberts, who had also served in White House positions and whose records from that service were virtually all made public.

Senator Grassley also allowed lower court nominees to escape thorough scrutiny of their records. As part of the confirmation process, nominees must submit a questionnaire to the Senate that provides information about a nominee’s background and that requires nominees to provide past speeches and writings “including material published only on the Internet.” Trump judicial nominees have routinely failed to provide all such material, and Senator Grassley let them get away with it. For example, Alabama district court nominee Brett Talley, who became known more for his ghost hunting than legal skills (he was one of the six nominees rated Not Qualified by the ABA), failed to disclose more than 16,000 online posts, including one in which he defended the Ku Klux Klan. Senator Grassley gave Talley a hearing and committee vote, though fortunately he was never given a full Senate vote in light of the bad publicity.

Senator Grassley also permitted nominees such as Talley and Fifth Circuit nominee Don Willett to omit without consequence listing their Twitter messages, despite such writings clearly constituting “material published only on the Internet.” He also failed to allow the Senate Judiciary Committee to fully investigate the activities of some controversial nominees, such as the role played by North Carolina district court nominee Thomas Farr in intimidating Black voters during the 1990 Jesse Helms for Senate campaign. Senator Grassley ran roughshod over committee norms and traditions in order to shield Trump nominees from serious and complete scrutiny. You must put an end to that practice.

Taking these steps will be a critical way to reassert the Senate’s independent advice and consent function and to stop serving as a rubber stamp for President Trump in his bid to pack the courts with ideological extremists. The country, the Constitution, and our judiciary are counting on you.

With fingers crossed,

Mike Zubrensky

Mike Zubrensky is chief counsel at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. During the Obama administration, he served as a deputy assistant attorney general and worked on judicial nominations for the Department of Justice.

Mr. Kemp,

While you may be seeking a higher office in the state of Georgia, you must uphold the obligations you swore to uphold as Secretary of State. Your actions thus far show a stunning lack of leadership and impartiality in your role.

You have made a clear, intentional choice to create barriers for voters of color in Georgia on the eve of a midterm election, in which you are also a candidate and the chief election official. Your office has cancelled more than 1.4 million voter registrations since 2012. You purged more than a half million voters (eight percent of the total registered voters in Georgia) in a single day in July 2017, and you still weren’t through. Just weeks before the November 6 election, your office failed to process more than 53,000 voter registrations. Eighty percent of those suspended registrations belong to Georgians of color.

Perhaps your most flagrant attempt at silencing the Georgian voices of color comes in your attempts to pit people of color and people with disabilities against each other — in the fight for access to the ballot.

In August 2018, Randolph County, GA hatched a plan to close 80 percent of the county’s polling places in rural Georgia on former plantation lands, targeting precincts where up to 99 percent of the electorate are African American. With no real evidence, the Board of Elections blamed the Americans with Disabilities Act for poll closures. While you gave yourself room to publicly wash your hands of the Randolph County plan, a hired consultant, who quoted you during the public unveiling of the plans, was the one who proposed the polling place closures. And Randolph County is only the tip of the iceberg. Georgia has closed 214 voting precincts since 2012. Nearly eight percent of polling places across the state have closed their doors.

Perhaps your most disturbing attempt to intimidate voters of color is the prosecution of Black community leaders for exercising their federal right to assist voters with disabilities cast a ballot. Six years after simply showing a first-time voter how to insert a card into the voting machine at her local polling place, city councilwoman, community leader, and grandmother Olivia Pearson faced felony charges in Coffee County. Prosecutors who could not even allege that Ms. Pearson tried to influence the vote or even help with casting the ballot had her arrested, booked, and publicly confronted with the threat of 15 years of incarceration.

Olivia Pearson is not alone. Debra Dennard of Quitman County was slapped with two felony charges for assisting her father, a partially blind amputee, to fill out his absentee ballot — despite the fact he is guaranteed the right to the assistor of his choice by the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Lula Smart was charged with 32 felonies and the prospect of more than 100 years in prison for carrying sealed absentee ballots to a mailbox. Your office led the charge of armed investigators that stormed Quitman County after 2010, when residents elected a majority Black school board for the first time.

We will not allow you to use people with disabilities as unwitting foot soldiers in your war on African Americans and other minorities in the great state of Georgia. We will not allow you to undermine civil rights protections for voters with disabilities in your quest to build barriers to the minority vote. Voters of color and voters with disabilities remain united. Shame on you, for leveraging the Secretary of State’s office to make it harder for people of color to vote. Mr. Kemp, the eyes of a nation are on you.

In solidarity,

Curt Decker, Executive Director, National Disability Rights Network
LaShawn Warren, Senior Vice President of Campaigns & Programs, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

By Leigh M. Chapman

One of the most critical elections of our lifetimes is one week away. And yes, that election is a midterm election. Next year, Millennials will make up the nation’s largest adult generation, at 73 million strong. Currently, 59 percent of adults who are eligible to vote are Gen Xers, Millennials, or “post-Millennials.”

Forget what anyone else says about Millennials. We have the power.

Yet, despite becoming the largest voting bloc, we have yet to fully realize that power. Turnout among voters aged 18 to 29 in the most recent midterm election in 2014 was 19.9 percent — the lowest in the past 20 years — and young voters cast 21 million fewer ballots than older Americans. However, even with overall low turnout among young voters that year, Black voters aged 18 to 29 had the highest turnout rate among their peers at 24 percent, and exceeded the average turnout rate of their age group by 20 percent.

The 2018 election is our opportunity to harness our power to build the diverse and accountable democracy we want to see. But recent polling indicates that only 26 percent of American adults aged 18 to 29 are “absolutely certain” they will vote in 2018, compared to 74 percent of older voters. This time around, we must show up, speak up, and vote our values on the issues we care so much about — including education, health care, and job security.

Young people have always been at the forefront of civil and human rights movements. Ruby Bridges was just six years old when she integrated an elementary school in New Orleans. John Lewis was 25 when he was beaten as he crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. Dolores Huerta was 25 when she started fighting for economic improvements for the Latinx community in Stockton, California. James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner were in their early 20s when they were murdered while registering Black voters in Mississippi during Freedom Summer.

Politicians are actively trying to silence us by creating barriers and obstacles for young people and people of color to vote. Over the last decade, states across the country pushed strict voter ID laws, purged voters from the rolls, closed polling places, and cut early voting. Recently, Georgia’s Secretary of State and candidate for governor Brian Kemp failed to process more than 53,000 voter registrations due to the state’s exact match law. Seventy percent of these voters are Black, and 72 percent are under 40 years old.

The Leadership Conference Education Fund and the Campaign Legal Center recently launched a voter education campaign including a series of text messages and mailers informing affected Georgia voters that they have the right to vote, and their ballot will count if they bring a photo ID or other documentation to the polls.

We cannot let anyone take our vote away. Young activists are leading voices in movements around gun control, ending domestic and sexual violence, immigration, and racial justice. This is our time. Our vote has the potential to transform our nation in 2018, 2020, and beyond. Our democracy works best when more of us show up and participate.

We have the potential to elect candidates who are as diverse as our fundamental values. On November 6, we could vote a record number of people of color into office and build the kind of representation that we deserve. There are a diverse array of candidates who are running on social justice issues that could determine the direction of our country. But our work and struggle are all for naught if we don’t get out and vote our values.

Too much is at stake this election to let others speak for us any longer. Be louder than ever and vote November 6.

Find your polling place here, and contact these hotlines if you encounter problems leading up to or on Election Day.

The Leadership Conference on Twitter

If you have trouble voting this year, contact a trained volunteer: 📞866-OUR-VOTE - English hotline 📞888-VE-Y-VOTA - Spanish hotline 📞888-API-VOTE - Asian & Pacific languages hotline 📞844-YALLA-US - Arabic language hotline 📱Text OUR VOTE to 97779 - SMS hotline #BeAVoter

Leigh M. Chapman is the director of the voting rights program at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and The Leadership Conference Education Fund.

By Mike Zubrensky

When credible allegations of sexual assault against Brett Kavanaugh became public, many people with knowledge of the FBI background check process, myself included, urged the Trump administration to initiate a supplemental FBI investigation to look into those allegations. But the FBI investigation that was launched last Friday at the behest of Senators Flake and Coons risks being illegitimate. And reports that the FBI has failed to interview key witnesses and is on the verge of completing its investigation strongly suggest that it will be illegitimate.

First, the Trump White House appears to have placed limitations on the scope of the investigation. Over the weekend, NBC reported that the White House had severely restricted the scope of the FBI investigation and The Washington Post reported on Monday: “Coons said he expected a standard FBI investigation would allow agents to reach out to more witnesses that they learn about through the course of their initial interviews, but ‘I came away from our conversation [with White House Counsel Donald McGahn] with the impression that was not the case.’” Senator Coons reiterated his fear in an op-ed earlier today, stating “I remain very concerned that we might not get the prompt but thorough investigation that these serious allegations warrant and that the Senate and the American people deserve.” President Trump has denied establishing restrictions on the FBI investigation, but in light of his record of making false and misleading claims, the Senate cannot take him at his word. As another Republican president famously pronounced: trust but verify.

Although the FBI report itself is confidential and will not be made public, the White House directive to the FBI is not part of the FBI report and should be made public, along with any subsequent directions conveyed by the White House to the FBI, in light of the administration’s contradictory statements. Senator Dianne Feinstein — the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee — has asked the White House for a copy of its written directive to the FBI regarding the scope of this investigation. To date, the White House has not provided that directive.

When I served as a Justice Department official and worked with the White House on the FBI background reports for over 300 judicial nominees, we never placed restrictions on who the FBI could contact in conducting an FBI background investigation. For a supplemental investigation, we would occasionally ask the FBI to talk to certain individuals who we believed had relevant information about the nominee, but we never put restrictions on the ability of the FBI to follow the evidence. If the Trump administration has placed such restrictions on the current Kavanaugh investigation, that would certainly undermine the FBI report’s legitimacy. There is no good reason to hide the directive given to the FBI.

Second, the FBI investigation is limited by its truncated timetable. As former FBI director James Comey wrote in a Sunday op-ed: “If truth were the only goal, there would be no clock.” Although the FBI has 35,000 employees, the vast majority do not work on background checks, and the artificial one-week deadline imposed as part of the Flake-Coons compromise may not constitute an adequate amount of time to thoroughly investigate the allegations of Christine Blasey Ford, Deborah Ramirez, and Julie Swetnick, as well as the numerous individuals who have publicly challenged Kavanaugh’s credibility, including his sworn testimony about drinking. Senate Judiciary Democrats have publicly called for the FBI to interview at least 24 relevant people. No one will have faith that this investigation was legitimate if they are not all interviewed.

For example, one of Kavanaugh’s college friends, Charles Ludington, said on Sunday:

“On many occasions I heard Brett slur his words and saw him staggering from alcohol consumption, not all of which was beer. When Brett got drunk, he was often belligerent and aggressive… I can unequivocally say that in denying the possibility that he ever blacked out from drinking, and in downplaying the degree and frequency of his drinking, Brett has not told the truth.”

In addition to key witnesses like Ludington, the FBI must also confirm whether Kavanaugh truthfully answered the many questions related to alcohol consumption on his past and current SF-86 — a lengthy form that some individuals seeking federal employment must fill out and which is part of the FBI background report.

Third, the FBI investigation should have been conducted before, not after, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing with Kavanaugh and Dr. Blasey Ford, so the committee could have used it as the foundation for their questioning and for selecting additional witnesses. In 1991, in the wake of Anita Hill’s allegations, the FBI conducted a supplemental investigation and then the committee held a hearing with 22 witnesses. Republican claims that Dr. Blasey Ford’s allegation was a “he said, she said” case is a dynamic of their own making. In reality, it’s a “he said, they said” case, given the multiple allegations raised against Kavanaugh. If Chairman Grassley had truly attempted to conduct a search for the truth, he would have called additional witnesses such as Mark Judge, sexual assault experts, the individual who administered the polygraph test that Dr. Blasey Ford passed, and the many people who have come forward with relevant information about the credibility of Kavanaugh and Dr. Blasey Ford. Republicans cannot claim there was no corroboration of her claims when they themselves suppressed corroborative evidence from being heard. And the all-male Republican committee members’ unprecedented and cowardly decision to bring in an outside prosecutor to interrogate Dr. Blasey Ford only served to reinforce the one-sided nature of the hearing.

And finally, Majority Leader McConnell’s announcement yesterday that he intends to have a vote on Kavanaugh this week indicates he may not even wait until the FBI report is completed or reviewed before forcing a vote. This bad-faith maneuver should be troubling to all senators. No vote should be scheduled on Kavanaugh until the FBI report has been produced and until all 100 senators have had a chance to review it.

In my experience vetting hundreds of judicial nominees, there was never an instance in which more than a single hard copy of an FBI report was produced and made available to the Senate. The memorandum of understanding that governs the handling of FBI reports — which Grassley has just made public — precludes any photocopying of FBI reports and any creation of electronic copies, so senators are forced to share the one hard copy. Given the potential consequences of Kavanaugh’s FBI report, all 100 senators should want to review it carefully, and this will take time. They may want to discuss the report with Senate colleagues to help make credibility assessments. Because the FBI report is a confidential document that cannot be made public or discussed with anyone outside the Senate, senators will only have the ability to discuss its specific contents with each other and a handful of authorized staff, unless the witnesses themselves discuss their FBI interviews. McConnell’s decision to force a vote this week on the Kavanaugh nomination will likely deprive all senators of a meaningful opportunity to review and evaluate the FBI report, if it’s even finished by the time of the vote. This rushed process is beneath the world’s greatest deliberative body.

Senator Flake and his Senate colleagues who have not yet decided how to vote on the Kavanaugh nomination should insist that McConnell respect the confirmation process and hold off scheduling any votes until all 100 senators have a chance to review the supplemental FBI report. And they should demand that the FBI take the time it needs to conduct a real and meaningful investigation. Only if the FBI is permitted to conduct such an investigation can it adequately inform a senator’s decision whether Kavanaugh deserves a job promotion to our nation’s highest court. The investigation of Kavanaugh’s alleged sexual misconduct and lying to the Senate is far too serious for a rigged process.

Mike Zubrensky is chief counsel at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. During the Obama administration, he served as a deputy assistant attorney general and worked on judicial nominations for the Department of Justice.

By Mike Zubrensky

For nearly seven years, from August 2010 to January 2017, I served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Policy (OLP). I supervised the vetting of over 300 judicial nominees and worked closely with the FBI as they conducted background investigations and supplemental investigations of these individuals.

Based on my experience, the FBI should be asked to conduct a supplemental investigation into the allegations of sexual assault against Brett Kavanaugh by Christine Blasey Ford. This post seeks to clarify the FBI background process and address the misinformation being spread by Judge Kavanaugh’s defenders.

Fiction

The FBI shouldn’t investigate Judge Kavanaugh based on Dr. Blasey Ford’s allegations because the FBI doesn’t conduct criminal investigations into nominees.

Fact

No one is calling for a federal criminal investigation of Dr. Blasey Ford’s allegations. The FBI’s career professionals conduct standard background investigations for every judicial nominee, and when new information comes to light, the FBI can re-open a background investigation and conduct additional witness interviews. That occurred several times during my tenure at OLP.

And as many have noted, the FBI re-opened its background investigation in 1991 when Anita Hill came forward with allegations of sexual harassment against Clarence Thomas. At the time, Senator Hatch stated:

“When they heard about this the first time, they immediately ordered the FBI investigation, which was the very right thing to do. It was the appropriate thing to do. They did what every other chairman and ranking member have done in the past. And the investigation was done and it was a good investigation.”

Similarly, it would be appropriate for the FBI to investigate Dr. Blasey Ford’s allegations.

Fiction

It is only appropriate for the FBI to investigate allegations that are made confidentially, like Anita Hill’s, because, according to Senator Grassley, the “purpose of the background investigation process is to compile information in a confidential manner” and “Dr. Ford has already made her allegations public.”

Fact

That analysis is flawed. The purpose of a background investigation is for the FBI to ascertain facts and information relevant to the potential nominee’s suitability and trustworthiness for government employment. The memoranda of understanding that govern FBI background investigations do not require that such investigations only address confidential allegations. Although Dr. Blasey Ford’s allegations are now public, there may be witnesses who would speak to the FBI who have not spoken publicly. Some people may be more willing to be candid with the FBI than they would be in other contexts, because they are under oath.

Fiction

An FBI investigation into Dr. Blasey Ford’s allegations wouldn’t be helpful because the FBI doesn’t make judgments about the credibility of the people they interview.

Fact

The FBI doesn’t make credibility determinations, but they have career professionals with the training and investigative experience necessary to ask the right questions and solicit relevant information. Special training is particularly important when interviewing sexual assault survivors and those who may have knowledge about the allegations. Once the FBI completes its investigation, senators can make informed credibility determinations and base their own inquiries on information they received from the FBI.

Fiction

If there are questions or allegations regarding a nominee, it is the role of Senate staff — not the FBI — to follow up and conduct interviews with relevant witnesses.

Fact

In my experience, staff-led investigations only took place when Senate Judiciary Committee staff had questions about minor issues — such as a past drug use discrepancy. Such matters could be resolved with a phone call between the nominee and committee counsels, and these calls always took place on a bipartisan basis with counsels for both the chair and ranking member. For more substantial issues, or where significant new information about the nominee came to light, committee staff would notify OLP as to the additional information it sought, and OLP would ask the FBI to return to the field and conduct additional witness interviews, sometimes including a new interview of the nominee.

Fiction

It is too late in the confirmation process for the FBI to conduct a follow-up investigation here.

Fact

If confirmed, Judge Kavanaugh would serve on the Supreme Court for decades. There is no need to rush the Senate’s consideration, and there is no deadline for when follow-up investigations may occur. I do not consider a nominee’s background investigation to be closed until a nominee is confirmed or withdrawn.

Fiction

The FBI doesn’t need to investigate Dr. Blasey Ford’s allegations because the FBI has conducted multiple investigations of Judge Kavanaugh over the years, and they have never uncovered allegations of sexual misconduct.

Fact

There is no statute of limitations for investigating allegations. Dr. Blasey Ford has reluctantly come forward at this time, and these new allegations must be investigated, even if they weren’t part of Judge Kavanaugh’s previous background reports.

Forging ahead with a hearing next week without allowing the FBI an opportunity to conduct additional interviews and collect evidence would be yet another abuse of power by the Republican majority during the Kavanaugh confirmation process. The Senate must honor survivors of sexual assault by taking their allegations seriously, respectfully, and on a nonpartisan basis. An FBI investigation is an important step in that direction. As Senator Hatch noted in 1991 when the FBI conducted an investigation into Anita Hill’s allegations: “When they heard about this the first time, they immediately ordered the FBI investigation, which was the very right thing to do.” It is the right thing to do today as well.

Mike Zubrensky is chief counsel at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. During the Obama administration, he was Deputy Assistant Attorney General and worked on judicial nominations for the Department of Justice.

By Brent Johnson

On the evening of Friday, September 7, I sat down next to my husband on our couch and opened Twitter on my phone — a familiar, end of the week routine after a long work week. What had been a simple hope of mindlessly scrolling through my feed to catch up on news, or laugh at a funny gif, quickly gave way to an all too familiar feeling for many young Black men just like me.

Numerous posts confronted me with details about a shooting in Dallas, Texas — the city where I was born and raised.

I continued scrolling. “White police officer.” I continued scrolling. “Unarmed Black man.” I continued scrolling. “Shot dead in his own apartment.”

At that moment, the scrolling stopped.

Before digging any deeper into what I knew would be a tragic story, I compulsively felt the need to center and prepare myself for the reality that I may know the young man who was killed. While I would have known by then if he were a family member, the fact that this had, again, happened in Dallas gave me worry.

It turns out that I did not know Botham Shem Jean, but I feel as though I did.

Botham graduated from the same undergraduate institution — Harding University in Arkansas — as my older brother. Botham attended Dallas West Church of Christ, a church whose minister and family were my neighbors for years. Botham led songs during church service on Sundays, just as I had when growing up in the same Dallas neighborhoods. I imagine the touch points and similarities don’t end there. Botham could have been a friend, cousin, brother.

Botham could have been me.

Instead, he now occupies a place on a long list that is filled with the names of unarmed Black boys and men who were killed by police officers.

The reality is that police involved shootings of unarmed Black boys and men have sadly become what feels like a new normal. And while this case is slightly different because the officer had just gotten off of her shift, and was not “on duty,” the fact remains that I, my husband, my brother, and a generation of young Black men like us, have had to learn how to cope with the trauma — yes, it is trauma — produced by these killings, these images, and the exonerations.

Though it has been a week since Botham’s tragic death, many questions remain that simultaneously don’t make any sense and remain unanswered. Yet for me, these questions seem at worst irrelevant and at best small compared to one, simple, universal fact. Twenty-six-year-old Botham Shen Jean was in his home. Minding his business. Unarmed. Living. Existing. But he is no longer alive — taken too soon from his family, friends, and community by a White police officer’s bullet. Just as Michael Brown was. And Tamir Rice. And Walter Scott. And Stephon Clark. And Jordan Edwards. And Laquan McDonald. The list does not end there.

I have cried many tears, and my emotions have ranged from sadness to anger to frustration, and back to sadness again, because of Botham’s death. I have also asked myself many questions, always coming back to one: How can I come to terms with the concept of safe space if, as this case has proven, you cannot even be safe in your own home?

I am still grappling with that question. Because the questions related to the killings of unarmed Black boys and men should not be questions that I have to answer. And young Black men should not have to deal, or be comfortable with, coping with such intense levels of trauma. The burdens of being Black in America are enough.

What brings me a small amount of solace is that I go to work every day at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights — an organization committed to fighting for a wide array of civil and human rights issues, including policing reform.

It is my hope and prayer that I can honor Botham by playing a role in ensuring that there is accountability in our justice system, for that is when we will see an America as good as its ideals.

Brent Johnson is the manager of executive operations at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.

By Ashley Allison

Billed as Unite the Right 2, white supremacists marched in our nation’s capital one month ago to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia.

The turnout? Fewer than 25 people.

Pundits largely painted the day as a loss for the cause of white supremacy. Some pointed to low turnout as evidence of a fractured and dying neo-Nazi movement. But these conclusions don’t take into account the full story. They fail to consider a larger truth about the insidious nature of racism and its roots in our institutions, our politics, and our nation.

This kind of bigotry is hurting people and their families every day. In June, the University of California — San Bernardino’s Center for the Study of Hate & Extremism analyzed hate crime trends in the 10 largest U.S cities in 2017. They found that hate crimes had reached their highest number in a decade.

But the data understate the true volume of violence against communities. Nearly 90 percent of the nation’s approximately 16,000 law enforcement agencies do not submit hate crimes data to the FBI. This means our understanding of the magnitude and nature of the crisis is dangerously limited — even as the crisis worsens.

And with President Trump at the helm of our nation, it is worsening.

Mere yards from where the handful of white supremacists gathered on August 12 sits the White House, stately and manicured on the outside — and roiling with bigotry on the inside.

The president’s derogatory rhetoric against people of color — peddled on Twitter, in public appearances, and elsewhere — has emboldened white nationalists to emerge from the woodwork, armed with their hate and fear. It is no wonder that some of those two-dozen white supremacists marching wore Trump’s red campaign hats.

Beyond feeding his base, Trump’s rhetoric is an extension of a policy agenda that promotes white nationalism and discrimination.

Last summer, around the same time the president equated those who would end racism with neo-Nazis, he announced a ban on transgender people serving in the military. Tossing aside credible research that found little to no impact on unit cohesion, as well as statements of support for transgender troops from high-ranking military officials, the president marched ahead with his discriminatory ban. Thankfully, a federal judge temporarily halted the policy while the court rules on its constitutionality.

The white nationalist agenda is not limited to the White House. It pervades the entire administration. At the Department of Justice, Attorney General Jeff Sessions has turned back the clock on criminal justice reform and channeled new, malicious energy into the discredited war on drugs.

Sessions also positioned the federal government on the wrong side of history in a series of Supreme Court cases last term. Reversing the previous administration’s positions, Sessions put the government’s weight behind the erosion of voting rights and discrimination against voters of color. The department also backed a business owner’s license to discriminate against LGBTQ people and the dismantling of labor unions.

And, in a devastating setback for civil and human rights, the Supreme Court upheld the administration’s Muslim ban, one of many anti-immigrant policies churned out in the Trump era.

Preying on the economic anxieties of Americans and scapegoating immigrants and people of color is the main strategy behind Trump’s machine.

Within days of taking office, the president issued the first iteration of the Muslim ban. Months later, his administration announced an end to the DACA program, threatening to send young Americans to countries they’ve never known nor called home. And in an unconscionable self-made crisis, the administration ripped families apart at the southern border — and shrug as immigrant children experience drugging, sexual assault, and harassment in camps run by for-profit companies.

But the parade of horrors doesn’t end there. Now, the administration is targeting immigrants who have legal status in our country.

The bigotry driving these policies is plain. And the man behind the curtain is Stephen Miller, a white supremacist who serves as a speechwriter and senior advisor to the president.

Under any previous administration in recent memory, Miller’s position in the White House would cause an uproar across the political spectrum. But in this era of unceasing destruction and distraction, Miller is free to implement brutal policies that degrade and terrorize people across America.

There can be no doubt about the motivation behind these heartless policies. It is past time to hold the administration accountable and oust white supremacists from the highest seats of government. That begins with Stephen Miller. As part of The Leadership Conference’s campaign to end hate, we’re asking people to sign a petition to demand the president fire Miller.

Any government that entertains white supremacists and white nationalism is a friend to white supremacy. It is a betrayal of our nation’s highest ideals of justice, inclusion, and fairness.

America, it’s up to us to save our democracy — and save our soul.

Let’s get to work.

Ashley Allison is executive vice president of campaigns & programs at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

By Ashley Allison

Sunday, August 12, will mark the one-year anniversary of the largest white supremacist rally in recent times — a rally organized on the heels of the Charlottesville City Council’s decision to remove the statue of Confederate soldier Robert E. Lee from a bustling public park.

That weekend, America watched as burning torches and venomous, racist chants escalated overnight into physical violence. News from Charlottesville swept the nation: Heather Heyer, a young woman who believed in a better America, was murdered by a white supremacist. Two police officers who were trying to ensure safety lost their lives. DeAndre Harris was brutally beaten in a parking garage because of the color of his skin.

And as news of the tragedy swept the nation, the president of the United States equated those who would end racism with those who promote its poison.

The events of that day stirred the conscience of America and mobilized people to act. But even so, crimes motivated by hate and prejudice are on the rise. In June, a research team analyzed hate crime trends in the 10 largest U.S cities in 2017. They found that hate crimes reached their highest number in a decade after increasing for four straight years.

The data understate the true volume of violence against communities. The Washington Post reported that nearly 90 percent of the nation’s approximately 16,000 law enforcement agencies do not submit hate crimes to the FBI. This means our understanding of the magnitude and nature of the crisis is dangerously limited.

To take on this problematic gap in data, The Leadership Conference Education Fund launched Communities Against Hate with the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and more than 25 national, state, and local partners. As we do this work, we remember that behind every number is a person, a family, and a community — touched and torn apart by hate.

We remember the imam in Texas whose tires were slashed as fire consumed the front door of the mosque where he leads. We remember the Black family whose home in Ohio was spray-painted with racial slurs and swastikas. And we remember the transgender people whose safe haven in Pennsylvania was targeted when an explosive landed on their front porch.

These are just a few of the thousands of stories collected by Communities Against Hate. Together, our coalition is building a place for survivors and witnesses to make their voices heard through our online database and telephone hotline.

As the Trump administration fans the flames of nationalism and prejudice through rhetoric and alarming policies, the hateful forces driving the violence will seek only to strengthen. This weekend, white supremacists plan to march in our nation’s capital. Their vile grab for attention only solidifies our resolve to continue the work of healing, reconciliation, and transformative action.

Zyahna Bryant, a young activist in Charlottesville who called for the removal of Lee’s statue, wrote in her petition: “I believe that we should celebrate the things that have been done in this great city to uplift and bring people together, rather than trying to divide them.”

In that spirit, we ask you to pledge to fight white supremacy and hate in all its forms. Here are five actions you can take right now to defend civil and human rights:

Demand President Trump Fire Stephen Miller. White House Senior Advisor Stephen Miller uses his position to stoke bigotry, hate, and division. Miller was the architect of Trump’s Muslim ban and the monstrous immigration policy that separated children from their families at the U.S.-Mexico border. Sign our petition to demand Miller’s removal from the White House.

Strengthen Data Collection of Hate Incidents and Hate Crimes. Data must drive policy. Call your members of Congress and tell them state and local law enforcement authorities should collect and report hate crimes data to the FBI, disaggregated by race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, and nationality.

Share Your Story Through Communities Against Hate. If you or someone you know has experienced or witnessed a hate incident, please encourage them to share their story with Communities Against Hate or call the hotline (1–844–9-NO-HATE or 1–844–966–4283). They can also access legal resources and social services support.

Vote Your Values. Vote for elected officials who will honor civil and human rights. All of us have the power to speak out against hate and bigotry — and voting can move us toward our highest ideals of justice and fairness. Learn about voting resources in your state and help register others.

Take ’Em All Down. Symbols of hate and oppression appear in our most hallowed places, from schools to parks to capitol buildings. Sign Color of Change’s petition to remove Confederate monuments and symbols and dismantle white supremacy.

These five actions are just the start. We’re in perilous times, but all of us have the power to shape our communities for the better.

Mere months after the City Council’s vote in Charlottesville, Lee’s statue became the center of an American tragedy. It became the site of a grievous clash of our nation’s ideals and lived reality, and of the enduring horrors of our past and the fight for a hopeful future.

We continue that fight one year later. Because for every single hateful voice, thousands more stand on the side of civil and human rights. They stand on the side of love.

For more information, please visit civilrights.org/againsthate.

Ashley Allison is executive vice president of campaigns & programs at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights