Action Report
Featured Cases
Nov 05, 2024
Guerrero Orellana v. Moniz et al.
In September 2025, the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, together with the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, the ACLU of New Hampshire, the ACLU of Maine, the law firm Araujo and Fisher, the law firm Foley Hoag, and the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic, filed a class action lawsuit in federal court to challenge the widespread denial of bond hearings to people detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. As the complaint demonstrates, this denial upends decades of settled law and established practice in immigration proceedings.
The complaint alleges that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice recently and abruptly began to misclassify people arrested by ICE inside the United States. DHS and DOJ started systematically reclassifying these people from the statutory authority of 8 U.S.C. § 1226, which usually allows for the opportunity to request bond during removal proceedings, to the no-bond detention provisions of 8 U.S.C. § 1225, which does not apply to people arrested in the interior of the United States and placed in removal proceedings.
This case is brought on behalf of Jose Arnulfo Guerrero Orellana and a putative class of similarly situated individuals. Mr. Guerrero Orellana has been living in the United States for over a decade. He brings this case to vindicate his own right to a bond hearing — where an immigration judge can determine whether his detention is justified to protect the community or ensure his appearance in court — and that of thousands of other detainees in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Maine, and New Hampshire who will be denied the opportunity to seek release on bond under the new legal ruling adopted by the executive branch. The complaint alleges that the government's new policy violates constitutional and statutory due process rights as well as the Administrative Procedure Act.
Apr 30, 2025
Schiff v. Office of Personnel Management
In March 2025, doctors from Harvard Medical School challenged the removal of their articles from the Patient Safety Network (PSNet), a government-run website for doctors and medical researchers to share information about medical errors, misdiagnoses, and patient outcomes.
The papers were removed as part of a takedown of information that the government contends promotes “gender ideology,” including any articles containing certain prohibited terms, including “LGBTQ” and “trans[gender].”
The articles removed include “Endometriosis: A Common and Commonly Missed and Delayed Diagnosis,” co-authored by plaintiff Dr. Celeste Royce, which included a sentence about diagnosis in transgender and gender-nonconforming people, and “Multiple Missed Opportunities for Suicide Risk Assessment in Emergency and Primary Care Settings,” co-authored by plaintiff Dr. Gordon Schiff, which included a sentence about heightened risk in LGBTQ communities.
The researchers are represented by the Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic at Yale Law School, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the ACLU of Massachusetts.
In January 2025, President Donald Trump signed an executive order that required federal agencies to remove all statements that “promote or otherwise inculcate gender ideology.” The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) subsequently issued guidance directing all agencies to “[t]ake down all outward facing media (websites, social media accounts, etc.) that inculcate or promote gender ideology.” PSNet’s removal of articles based on blacklisted terms followed. PSNet is run by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), a sub-agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
The suit argues that the government violated the First Amendment by imposing a viewpoint-based and unreasonable restriction on the doctors’ participation in a forum the government has opened to private speakers. It also argues that the government violated the Administrative Procedure Act, including by removing articles without a reasoned basis. OPM, AHRQ, and HHS are named in the suit.
The complaint was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts.
Aug 18, 2025
Doe v. Moniz
UPDATE: In what appears to be the first decision to address mandatory detention under the Laken Riley Act, a federal judge in Boston ruled that detaining an individual solely on the basis of his prior arrest violates due process. Mr. Doe received a court-ordered bond hearing and was later released.
In July 2025, the ACLU of Massachusetts, together with the ACLU, law firm Rubin Pomerleau, P.C., and Boston College Law School Immigration Clinic filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging the detention of an 18-year-old under the Laken Riley Act (LRA). The habeas petition alleges “John Doe” was arrested and held without bond based solely on unproven accusations, in violation of his due process rights.
Mr. Doe is a recipient of Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (SIJS), which provides a pathway to Lawful Permanent Resident (LPR) status for young people who are the victims of abuse, abandonment, or neglect. On July 4, Mr. Doe was arrested by local police in Massachusetts based on an allegation of misdemeanor shoplifting. There are no pending charges from this incident, and Mr. Doe has never been convicted of any crime. Nevertheless, ICE arrested Mr. Doe as he walked out of the police station and placed him in civil immigration detention. Mr. Doe has been jailed at the Plymouth County Correctional Facility for over a month without a bond hearing.
Mr. Doe was jailed without any due process under the Laken Riley Act. Enacted in January 2025, the LRA purports to authorize ICE to detain people with no due process based solely on unproven accusations such as arrests or pending charges, including for misdemeanor property crimes like shoplifting.
In the federal case, Mr. Doe argues that the LRA violates his due process rights and also that, as a SIJS recipient, he does not meet the statutory criteria that would make the LRA apply.
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