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In the latest front in the nationwide fight against the criminalization of poverty, on October 31, 2019, the ÌÒ×ÓÊÓƵ, ÌÒ×ÓÊÓƵof South Carolina, Terrell Marshall Law Group PLLC, Southern Poverty Law Center, and South Carolina Appleseed Legal Justice Center filed a federal lawsuit challenging South Carolina’s policy of automatically suspending the driver’s licenses of people with unpaid traffic tickets. The South Carolina Department of Motor Vehicles does not ensure that people who cannot pay will not lose their licenses in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment’s promise of due process and equal protection under the law. South Carolina’s wealth-based license suspensions impact more than 190,000 people, funneling those who are unable to pay, particularly poor people of color, deep into cycles of poverty, job loss, traffic violations, and entanglement with the legal system.

The ÌÒ×ÓÊÓƵ, ÌÒ×ÓÊÓƵof South Carolina, and NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund filed a federal lawsuit on April 22, 2020, over South Carolina’s failure to take action to ensure all eligible voters can vote by mail during the COVID-19 pandemic — even for its fast-approaching June 9 statewide primary elections.

In South Carolina’s municipal courts today, defendants are prosecuted, convicted, and jailed without ever having a lawyer appointed to their case or even being advised of their right to counsel. Hundreds of these defendants who were deprived of counsel—including Tina Bairefoot, Dae’Quandrea Nelson, and Nathan Fox—have been and are incarcerated in local jails and state prisons every year. Cities and towns can decide whether they have municipal courts—they are optional—but if they decide to have them they must follow the Constitution, which includes the right to counsel.

In 2011 South Carolina passed SB 20, a law modeled after Arizona’s notorious SB 1070. The law required police to demand papers demonstrating citizenship or immigration status during traffic stops based on reasonable suspicion that a person lacks legal status. It also criminalized South Carolinians for everyday interactions with undocumented individuals, such as driving someone to church, or renting a room to a friend.