Court Cases

The League of Women Voters, the Rural Coalition/Coalición Rural, the Center for Rural Strategies, the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), and Disability Rights Mississippi (DRMS) filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Supreme Court case Watson v. Republican National Committee, urging the Court to protect states’ long-standing authority to determine how timely mailed absentee ballots are received and counted. The amici are represented by the ACLU and the ACLU of Mississippi. The case centers on Mississippi’s law allowing absentee ballots that are postmarked by Election Day to be counted if they are received within a short window afterward. A ruling by the Fifth Circuit adopted a novel interpretation of federal Election Day statutes that would prohibit states from counting these ballots, even when voters followed all the rules. In their brief, amici argue that federal law does not require ballots to be received on Election Day and has never been interpreted that way in over a century of election administration. Congress has repeatedly recognized states’ flexibility to manage elections, including setting reasonable ballot receipt deadlines—especially to accommodate voters who rely on mail service, such as older voters, voters with disabilities, rural voters, and working families. The brief explains that enforcing a rigid Election Day receipt rule would lead to widespread disenfranchisement and undermine states’ ability to run elections that reflect local realities, including unreliable mail service in rural areas. Amici emphasize that this case is not about changing Election Day, but about whether federal statutes were intended to override state rules governing the counting of ballots that were lawfully cast on time. Amici urge the Supreme Court to reject the Republican National Committee’s attempt to rewrite federal election law and to affirm that states may continue counting timely cast absentee ballots. Doing so would protect voters who followed the rules and ensure that every eligible vote is counted.

The ACLU of MS and partners filed a lawsuit challenging the state's anti-DEI law, HB 1193. Complaint alleges it violate the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution.

The ACLU of Mississippi filed a complaint, seeking damages for the false arrest, illegal search, malicious prosecution, retaliation, and excessive use of force against our client, Attorney Jill Collen Jefferson.

We filed a lawsuit on behalf of Javarius Russell, an officer for the Jackson Public School District who says his constitutional rights were violated by the Lexington Police Department. Russell is just one victim of the department's racially-motivated and discriminatory policing practices.