Chessie Thacher is a senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Northern California, where she devotes her time to First Amendment issues, government transparency, criminal justice reforms, and voting rights litigation.   

Emi MacLean is a senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Northern California where she focuses on criminal justice and immigrant rights litigation. She is counsel for plaintiffs in NTPSA v. Noem and Ramos v. Mayorkas, legal challenges to the termination of Temporary Protected Status; UFW Foundation v. Kern, a legal challenge to Kern County’s misdemeanor plea mill; Stiavetti v. Clendenin, a successful challenge to the State’s systemic prolonged detention of people deemed incompetent to stand trial in California’s jails; and Zepeda Rivas v.