Legislation

We strongly opposed a bill which would have banned terms like “racial guilt” in the classroom, barred the use of school books that have a "viewpoint," and required school staff to address students by “the pronouns associated with their biological gender.”

We strongly supported a piece of legislation which would have expanded the definition of race under our state anti-discrimination laws to include “traits historically associated with race,” importantly including hair texture and protective hairstyles.

At a meeting of a state legislative commission designed to examine the impact of the criminalization of sex work, we testified in favor of decriminalization of these offenses and provided a number of other policy recommendations on the topic.

We supported this resolution which would have expressed state solidarity in the campaign for D.C. statehood, noting that it is in line with basic tenets of civil rights, equity, and democratic representation.

Noting that “life without parole” sentencing robs incarcerated individuals of any rehabilitative hope, is a type of sentencing with a racially discriminatory impact, and is a wasteful use of public resources, we supported legislation to eliminate this criminal sentence in Rhode Island.

Domestic workers – a demographic of employees largely comprised of lower-income women of color – are inappropriately exempted from the state’s minimum wage laws. We supported the repeal of this exemption.

We strongly supported legislation that eliminates the requirement that an applicant to become a licensed clinical social worker pass a standardized written test to obtain a license.

We opposed legislation which would have inappropriately imposed a broad criminal record check requirement on individuals who seek to be engaged in the business-side of the medical marijuana industry, as well as on patients who may need this medicine to manage a health condition.

Though we support recreational marijuana legalization, we raised a number of concerns about this bill and called for amendments to strengthen the language.