ACLU is seeing a Trump-era surge in members and donations

NEW YORK (AP) — The nearly century-old American Civil Liberties Union says it is suddenly awash in donations and new members as it does battle with President Donald Trump over the extent of his constitutional authority, with nearly $80 million in online contributions alone pouring in since the election.

[...] it intends to bring a legal challenge accusing him of violating the Constitution's Emoluments Clause by accepting payments from foreign governments at his hotels and other properties.

The boost to the ACLU's $220 million budget will allow it to spend more on its state operations, which Romero said became critical after some legislatures took Trump's election as a license to promote anti-immigrant, anti-civil rights and anti-abortion legislation.

The 1,150-employee ACLU also plans to hire more lawyers and staff in New York and Washington and spend $13 million more on citizen engagement, including protests and lobbying.

Trump has already demonstrated that he has a thin skin when it comes to anyone challenging his authority or power, but I'm confident that the ACLU will fight to protect American civil liberties.

The ACLU was born in 1920 when a small group of idealists challenged then-Attorney General Mitchell Palmer's order that thousands of people branded foreign anarchists or communists be arrested without warrants.

Soon the organization was defending people's constitutional rights to due process, privacy and freedom of assembly, speech and religion and looking out for society's vulnerable, including minorities, women, gay and transgender people, immigrants, prisoners and the disabled.

[...] it helped persuade the Supreme Court in 2003 to strike down a Texas law outlawing gay sex and forced the government after 9/11 to divulge information about torture and the National Security Agency's surveillance of Americans.