Every year, the ACLU of RI lobbies on hundreds of bills during Rhode Island's annual Legislative Session. Below are some of the bills we have tracked and testified on before the General Assembly. For more info on advocating for the issues you care about, check out our Advocacy 101 Guide. To see how your Reps and Senators voted on various bills over the past few years, visit our Legislative Scorecards page.
We joined a number of organizations in supporting legislation which would have limited the ability for carceral facilities in Rhode Island to utilize solitary confinement.
We strongly supported legislation which would have bolstered the right to vote at the ACI by requiring the posting of voting rights information in its facilities and the appointment of a “jail voting...
We initially opposed legislation which sought to implement a strict background check procedure for any individual who teaches or instructs children under the age of eighteen, but it was amended to address...
We supported legislation which would have barred private prisons from operating in the state of Rhode Island entirely and limited the ability for carceral facilities in Rhode Island to cooperate with ICE....
We opposed a provision in a bill addressing disability benefits based on occupationally-related PTSD for first responders, noting that it could allow police officers to recoup disability benefits if they...
We supported a variety of legislation which proposed to decriminalize certain drugs entirely or to change the threshold for which the possession of a certain amount of a controlled substance becomes a crime...