Zenab Youssef
Celebrating Two Years of the IRA: Our ...

As we commemorate the two-year anniversary of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) today, August 16, there is much to celebrate about this historic legislation. The IRA represents the largest-ever climate investment in our country’s history, creating unprecedented opportunities for clean energy savings.

However, we at L4GG are acutely aware that historically marginalized communities often lack the resources to access the IRA’s historic funding opportunities. In response, we have intensified our efforts over the past two years to ensure that the benefits of the IRA reach those who need them most. See what we’ve been up to!

Celebrating Two Years of the IRA: Our Achievements and Impact
Zenab Youssef
A Law Student's Journey at the Border with ...
A Law Student's Journey at the Border with Project Corazon
L4GG Updates
Zenab Youssef
We Won’t Sit Silently in the Face of ...

Not enough people are talking about the water crisis in Jackson, MS. On Tuesday, the Mississippi governor declared a state of emergency for Jackson’s water system, the city’s largest treatment plant. Most of the city’s 150,000 residents are without running water, having to rely on bottled water for drinking, showering, brushing their teeth, and cooking.

We Won’t Sit Silently in the Face of Environmental Racism - Neither Should You
L4GG Updates
Sterling Howard
What can YOU do to fight for abortion access ...
L4GG Updates
Sterling Howard
L4GG Publishes Joint Report with New Georgia ...

Lawyers for Good Government (L4GG), the nation’s largest community of attorneys committed to human rights and equal justice for all, and New Georgia Project, a nonpartisan, nonprofit voting rights and civic engagement organization in Georgia, today released a report on ‘ballot selfies’, or the practice of taking photos of oneself at the ballot box and/or with their ballots.

A ballot selfie is when a person takes a photo of themselves holding their marked ballot and usually uploads the photo to a social media account to show friends that they voted, and for whom they voted. Ballot selfies are a great way to promote voting and engage with one’s community, yet many states have laws that prohibit them. Advocacy organizations are concerned that laws prohibiting ballot selfies are tools of voter suppression, and another way to criminalize ordinary behavior.

Click here to download “Selfie-Defense Training: Understanding and Reforming Laws that Ban Photographing and Sharing Your Ballot”

The report found that ballot selfies are completely legal in 28 states, and illegal in 13 states. Five states have laws prohibiting ballot selfies at polling locations, but not when casting a mail-in or absentee ballot. Six states have laws governing ballot selfies that are unclear. The report calls for states to update their laws to explicitly allow voters the right to take a ballot selfie, and prevent voter fraud and bribery without curtailing free speech.

L4GG Publishes Joint Report with New Georgia Project on Ballot Selfies

Video Updates

,

Video: How Project Corazon’s volunteer lawyers are making a difference at the border

,

In August 2019, Project Corazon (a Lawyers for Good Government Foundation program) launched a pilot program in Matamoros (Mexico), sending a group of 6 volunteer lawyers to the border to provide pro bono legal services to asylum-seekers stuck in the administration’s “Remain in Mexico” program.

The group was able to serve more than 130 asylum-seekers in a single weekend, providing legal guidance and workshops to families who would otherwise have no access to legal services.

Based on the success of the pilot, Project Corazon is expanding the program. Two weekend workshops will be held in September 2019, and beginning in October 2019, a full-time immigration lawyer with the Lawyers for Good Government Foundation will begin working full-time in Brownsville, Texas (just across the border from Matamoros), scaling the program to include preparation of asylum applications and connecting individual asylum-seekers with pro bono legal counsel.

Please support this important work - we can’t do it without your help. Click here to contribute now.