Latest News - Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts

How to vote for judges this 2026 Primary Election

VoteForJudges.org is your resource for researching judges. We are pleased to announce that VoteForJudges.org is ready and available as a resource for Cook County voters in the 2026 primary election. Early voting is already underway, and with a day left for the primary election, we expect that thi...

What We’re Supporting This Legislative Session—Spring 2026

As the Illinois Legislature settles into its spring session, advocates have begun sharing legislative priorities and asking for individuals and organizations to support pending legislation. Chicago Appleseed is supporting a number of bills, listed below, focused on court transparency, family courts,...

Why do we need court-watchers in Illinois? The answer lies in our open records laws.

Community court-watching is exactly what it sounds like: members of the public taking time out of their days to watch court proceedings. But why? In Chicago Appleseed’s Court Observation & Education Program (COEP), we see court-watching not only as an informative experience for volunteers but...

Undermining Transparency & Accountability, Federal Court Ruling Allows CPD to Disable Body-Worn Cameras after Officer-Involved Shootings

In January of 2024, the Illinois Attorney General moved for judicial resolution in a dispute with the City of Chicago over the Chicago Police Department’s (CPD) body-worn camera policy. Following the cover-up of the CPD’s murder of Laquan McDonald, the federal government implemented a consen...

NEW REPORT—What We Don’t Know About the Courts: The Far-Reaching Consequences of the Judicial Exemption to the FOIA in Illinois

In our newly published report, What We Don’t Know About the Courts: The Far-Reaching Consequences of the Judicial Exemption to the FOIA in Illinois, Chicago Appleseed explains the judicial exemption from Illinois’ Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and this exemption’s broad consequences for data tra...