Campaigns & Initiatives
about Free Speech

President-Elect Trump’s second term agenda is influenced by The Heritage Foundation’s extreme Project 2025 agenda. Read our memos on how to fight back!

In January 2016, the Dakota Access Pipeline was unanimously approved for construction, with the aim of creating a direct route to transport crude oil from the North Dakota Bakken region through South Dakota and Iowa into Illinois. The controversial pipeline could destroy ancestral burial grounds and poison the water supply for a sovereign nation — as well as millions of Americans downstream who rely on the Missouri River. All eyes were on Standing Rock late last year as unwarranted armored vehicles rolled in. Law enforcement used automatic rifles, sound cannons, and concussion grenades against water protectors. An estimated 300 protesters were injured in November when police in riot gear used water cannons for hours in subfreezing weather to disperse them. Personnel and equipment pouring in from over 75 law enforcement agencies from around the country and National Guard troops created a battlefield-like atmosphere at Standing Rock. Escalated police militarization was used to intimidate and silence water protectors’ free speech and their right to protest a pipeline which passes near sovereign territory. Thousands from across the globe have joined in solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe to stop the construction of the Dakota Access pipeline. The protest has brought together 200 or so tribes that have not united for more than 150 years. President Trump took executive action on January 24th 2017 encouraging the Army Corps of Engineers to override environmental review and speed up construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline near the Standing Rock Sioux Indian Reservation. Any day now, law enforcement may try to disperse water protectors with unnecessary and dangerous use of force. With resilience, water protectors have already endured militarized crackdowns, police abuse, and daily intimidation – simply for defending their water rights.

Join us this September to know all your rights this election cycle.

In 2023, more than 100 classroom censorship bills aimed at restricting students and teachers from discussing race, gender, or sexual orientation were introduced in states across the country. Thirty-two bills became law. The year prior, the country saw the highest number of attempted book bans in 20 years with more than 1,000 demands to censor library books and resources, many of which targeted titles by or about Black and LGBTQ people. The ACLU has challenged classroom censorship laws and book bans across the country. Today, we’re expanding on that work by pushing back against attempts to restrict diversity, equity and inclusion programs. We won’t stand for the erasure of marginalized communities in our schools.

For over 100 years, the ACLU has been showing up in the courts, in the streets, and in the halls of power to defend the rights that the Constitution guarantees to everyone. In the past year alone, the ACLU community fought to secure abortion rights in Michigan, defended trans youth from political attacks in Arkansas and Texas, and blocked Florida from censoring lessons about race and gender in college classrooms. With the support of our members, supporters, volunteers, and staff, we will keep showing up whenever civil rights and civil liberties are under attack.