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For Immediate Release
May, 10 2012, 11:06am EDT
Contact:
Will Matthews, (212) 549-2582 or 2666; media@aclu.org
ACLU Challenges Corrections Corporation of America CEO to Public Debate About Prison Privatization
As Company Gathers Today for Annual Shareholders Meeting, Public Deserves Full and Fair Examination of For-Profit Incarceration
WASHINGTON
The American Civil Liberties Union today challenged the chief executive officer of the nation's largest private prison company to a public debate on the merits of prison privatization.
The challenge, timed with Correction Corporation of America's annual shareholders meeting today in Nashville, Tenn., comes after CCA has repeatedly criticized the views of the ACLU regarding for-profit incarceration.
"We would welcome the opportunity to defend our views on for-profit incarceration in a public debate - one that also gives you a full and fair opportunity to express your views," reads the ACLU's letter, delivered today to CCA's CEO Damon Hininger. "CCA's recent public criticisms of the ACLU and others make clear that you disagree with many of our views on privatized incarceration. Your criticism, however, has taken the form of written statements which, unlike a public debate, do not allow for refutation or further discussion."
Exempted from the Freedom of Information Act, CCA and other private prison companies are shielded from public scrutiny by a veil of secrecy, despite locking up nearly 130,000 prisoners and an additional 15,000 immigration detainees each year while receiving billions of taxpayer dollars.
CCA in recent years has voted down shareholder resolutions demanding accountability in political contributions, and the company's management this year is seeking to kill a shareholder proposal for greater transparency in efforts to curb prison rape.
In March, CCA sent a letter to officials in 48 states announcing what it called a "corrections investment initiative," in which CCA offered to purchase prisons from states so long as they contain at least 1,000 beds and the states agree to pay CCA to operate the prisons for at least 20 years and keep the prisons at least 90 percent full.
A report released by the ACLU last year revealed how private prison companies have capitalized on the nation's addiction to incarceration to achieve gigantic profits. All the while, according to the report, mass incarceration wreaks havoc on communities by unnecessarily depriving individuals of their liberty, draining government resources and bringing little or no benefit to public safety.
The report also found that despite serious questions about the wisdom of privatizing prison systems, some members of the for-profit prison industry use shrewd tactics, including extensive lobbying, lavish campaign contributions and efforts to control information, to garner more and more government contracts and lock up ever-increasing numbers of people.
"We believe that the taxpayers who finance private prisons; the families whose mothers, fathers, sons, and daughters are incarcerated in these facilities; and the communities where for-profit prisons are situated deserve more than sound bites," the ACLU's letter to Hininger reads. "They deserve a full, fair, and public examination of for profit incarceration."
A copy of the ACLU's letter is available online at:
www.aclu.org/prisoners-rights/aclu-letter-corrections-corporation-ameri...
The ACLU's report on prison privatization is available online at:
www.aclu.org/prisoners-rights/banking-bondage-private-prisons-and-mass-...
The American Civil Liberties Union was founded in 1920 and is our nation's guardian of liberty. The ACLU works in the courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to all people in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States.
(212) 549-2666LATEST NEWS
Top DOJ Officials Resign After Being Cut Off From Renee Good Killing Probe
"The Civil Rights Division exists to enforce civil rights laws that protect all Americans," one former DOJ attorney said recently. "It doesn't exist to enact the president's own agenda."
Jan 13, 2026
President Donald Trump's Department of Justice is seeing its latest mass resignation over its handling of the case of Renee Good, who was fatally shot by a federal immigration agent last week in Minneapolis.
Days after Harmeet Dhillon, assistant attorney general for civil rights, announced that the agency's Civil Rights Division would not be investigating the shooting—despite the fact that the office's criminal unit would ordinarily probe any abuse or improper use of force by law enforcement—four top officials in the section have resigned.
As MS NOW reported Monday night, the chief of the criminal unit—listed on the DOJ website as Jim Felte—has resigned, as well as the principal deputy chief, deputy chief, and acting deputy chief. The outlet reported that other decisions by administration officials also contributed to their decision to leave.
The FBI announced late last week that it would be probing US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Jonathan Ross' shooting of Good, who was killed while sitting in her car on a street in Minneapolis where ICE was operating—part of a surge of federal immigration agents who have been sent to the area in recent weeks, with the Trump administration largely targeting Somali people.
Despite video evidence showing that Good's wheels were turned away from Ross, who was one of a number of officers who had approached her car and reportedly given her conflicting orders, the Trump administration is continuing to claim that she purposely tried to drive into the ICE agent and that Ross fired "defensive shots"—something law enforcement agents including ICE officers are trained not to do in situations involving a moving vehicle.
“It is highly unusual for the Civil Rights Division not to be involved from the outset with the FBI and US attorney’s office."
As administration officials have aggressively pushed a narrative painting Good as a "domestic terrorist"—a designation that ordinarily would never be used by the government until a full investigation had been carried out—the FBI has blocked Minnesota authorities from conducting a probe, leading the state and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul to file a lawsuit Monday.
As the Washington Post reported Monday, the DOJ's Civil Rights Division would typically work alongside the FBI "to guide investigatory strategy" on a case like Good's. Prosecutors with the division were involved in trying the officers who killed George Floyd in MInneapolis and Tyre Nichols in Memphis.
“It is highly unusual for the Civil Rights Division not to be involved from the outset with the FBI and US attorney’s office,” Vanita Gupta, who led the division during the Obama administration, told the Post. “I cannot think of another high-profile federal agent shooting case like this when the Civil Rights Division was not involved—its prosecutors have the long-standing expertise in such cases."
Hundreds of attorneys in the Civil Rights Division have resigned since President Donald Trump began his second term a year ago. Stacey Young, a former division attorney who left the DOJ soon after Trump was inaugurated, told NPR that the division is "not an arm of the White House."
"The Civil Rights Division exists to enforce civil rights laws that protect all Americans," Young said. "It doesn't exist to enact the president's own agenda. That's a perversion of the separation of powers and the role of an independent Justice Department."
Dhillon, who has said the division will work to carry out the president's priorities, said last April that she was "fine" with the mass departure of civil rights attorneys.
“The job here is to enforce the federal civil rights laws—not woke ideology," she said.
Dhillon's announcement that the division would not investigate Good's killing suggested that the DOJ views probing improper use of force cases as it has in the past as "woke ideology."
The mass resignation at the Civil Rights Division comes a month after more than 200 former DOJ employees signed an open letter condemning "the near destruction of DOJ’s once-revered crown jewel."
"The administration wants you to believe that career staff who fled the Division 'were actively in resistance mode' and 'decided that they’d rather not do what their job requires them to do,'" said the former employeees. "That could not be further from the truth. We left because this administration turned the Division’s core mission upside down, largely abandoning its duty to protect civil rights."
Now in the wake of Good's killing, said one observer, the division under Dhillon's leadership "refused to probe a murder. The people with consciences walked out."
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Campaigners Push GoFundMe to Remove Fundraisers for ICE Agent Who Killed Renee Good
"Until each and every campaign supporting Jonathan Ross is taken down, GoFundMe will remain complicit in legitimizing ICE's campaign of terror and violence on our communities."
Jan 13, 2026
The popular crowdfunding platform GoFundMe is facing mounting pressure to remove campaigns supporting Jonathan Ross, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who shot and killed Renee Good last week in Minneapolis, sparking nationwide outrage and protests.
One GoFundMe campaign for Ross, a 10-year ICE veteran who has received full backing from the Trump White House, has raised nearly $600,000 as of this writing. The description of the campaign, started by a user named Clyde Emmons, states, "After seeing all the media bs about a domestic terrorist getting go fund me. I feel that the officer that was 1000 percent justified in the shooting deserves to have a go fund me."
Trump administration officials have characterized Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, as a "domestic terrorist" and openly lied about the circumstances of her killing. President Donald Trump falsely claimed that Good "violently, willfully, and viciously ran over" Ross, despite video footage from multiple angles showing no such thing.
The top contributor to the GoFundMe campaign started by Emmons, who called Good a "stupod [sic] bitch who got what she deserved," is Bill Ackman, who gave $10,000. The billionaire hedge fund manager wrote on social media that he "intended to similarly support the GoFundMe for Renee Good’s family" but it was closed by the time he tried to donate.
The advocacy group UltraViolet on Monday launched a petition urging GoFundMe to remove all fundraisers supporting or claiming to support Ross, noting that the platform's policies bar fundraisers in support of individuals accused of violent crimes.
GoFundMe told The Intercept that the company is investigating Emmons' campaign.
"Renee Good was murdered by ICE in cold blood and in plain sight. There can be no equivocation on the gross abuse of force which caused her death, nor can there be any doubt as to the contemptibility of GoFundMe campaigns to support her killer,” Nicole Regalado, vice president of campaigns at UltraViolet, said in a statement. “GoFundMe claims to be committed to helping people, and yet it continues to profit from our pain."
"Until each and every campaign supporting Jonathan Ross is taken down," Regalado added, "GoFundMe will remain complicit in legitimizing ICE's campaign of terror and violence on our communities."
State and federal investigators are currently examining Good's killing, though the FBI has cut Minnesota officials out of the probe, intensifying concerns of a cover-up.
The New York Times reported Tuesday that federal investigators assigned to Good's killing are "looking into her possible connections to activist groups protesting the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement, in addition to the actions of the federal agent who killed her."
"The decision by the FBI and the Justice Department to scrutinize Ms. Good’s activities and her potential connections to local activists is in line with the White House’s strategy of deflecting blame for the shooting away from federal law enforcement and toward opponents they have described as domestic terrorists, often without providing evidence," the Times added.
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Trump Again Threatens to Bomb Iran as Protest Deaths Near 600
"Under the guise of caring about Iranian people, the US is suffocating Iran to justify bombings and regime change," said one peace group.
Jan 12, 2026
The White House on Monday ramped up threats to attack Iran while President Donald Trump announced 25% tariffs on countries doing business with the Islamic Republic, where the death toll from two weeks of protests against economic hardship exacerbated by US sanctions and government repression rose to at least 599 people.
While Trump acknowledged that Iranian leaders want to negotiate with the United States to avoid renewed US attacks on the country like last summer's airstrikes targeting nuclear facilities and scientists, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Monday that the president reserves all options, including military force, amid Tehran's deadly crackdown on protesters.
"Airstrikes would be one of the many, many options that are on the table for the commander-in-chief," Leavitt said. "Diplomacy is always the first option for the president."
In an ominous development, the virtual US Embassy for Iran on Monday advised all Americans to "leave Iran now" and “have a plan for departing Iran that does not rely on US government help.”
In a Monday post on his Truth Social network, Trump said: "Effective immediately, any Country doing business with the Islamic Republic of Iran will pay a Tariff of 25% on any and all business being done with the United States of America. This Order is final and conclusive."
Trump’s escalation of sanctions will make life even harder for millions of Iranians.Under the guise of caring about Iranian people, the US is suffocatating Iran to justify bombings & regime change.
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— CODEPINK (@codepink.bsky.social) January 12, 2026 at 2:38 PM
This followed Friday's threat by Trump that the US is "locked and loaded" for attacks on Iran if the country's security forces keep killing protesters. At least 599 people have been killed during the demonstrations, even as Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi claimed Monday that “the situation has come under total control."
The National Iranian American Council (NIAC) said in a statement Monday that "as Iranian Americans, we are horrified by the images and reports emerging from Iran showing brutal state violence inflicted on civilians to suppress their protests and demands."
"We condemn the Iranian government’s crackdown on peaceful protestors in the strongest possible terms and urge for accountability for what, according to the information we are receiving, appears to have been a massacre," NIAC continued.
“We continue to reject the prospect of the US answering the Iranian government’s brutality with bombing," the group stressed. "Military interventions have not brought democracy, human rights, or prosperity to the targets of prior interventions, including Iraq, Libya, Palestine, and Afghanistan."
"Iran’s long history is riddled with examples of external interventions and military actions that have only robbed Iranians of their agency to decide their future," NIAC added. "The future of Iran must be shaped by Iranians, not by repression, foreign militarism, or those seeking to exploit suffering to justify war. There is no credible case that US military intervention would protect Iranian lives."
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