Montpelier, Vt.—The ACLU of Vermont is urging Governor Scott to sign the police accountability, racial justice, and criminal law reform legislation now pending before him into law. The Vermont legislature passed several bills at the end of the biennium that would make significant progress in all of these areas and position Vermont among the states taking meaningful steps to address systemic racism and police brutality.
ACLU of Vermont Executive Director James Lyall: “The Vermont legislature has presented Governor Scott with a series of historic bills at a pivotal moment in our history. Taken collectively, these bills— S.24, S.54, S.119, S.124, and S.234—would ban the use of facial recognition software, give Vermont the best use of force standards in the country, continue rolling back the racist war on drugs, and make further progress in addressing systemic racism in Vermont’s criminal legal system.
While considerable work remains to create a more fair and equitable state, the ACLU and our supporters are grateful to the many legislators who worked to advance meaningful reform legislation and we are committed to supporting continued, cross-partisan progress in the next biennium. In the meantime, the ACLU and its supporters are calling on Governor Scott to do the right thing and sign these bills into law.”
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