Qualified immunity isn't in the Constitution and it isn't in the law Congress actually passed. Section 1983, the Civil Rights Act of 1871, says plainly that anyone acting under government authority who violates your constitutional rights "shall be liable to the party injured." No exceptions. No good-faith defense. Judges invented qualified immunity out of whole cloth starting in 1967, and it has shielded government officials from accountability ever since, even when a court agrees your rights were violated, if no earlier case happened to describe the exact same misconduct in the exact same way.

That standard protects the officer, not the Constitution. As Senator, Lydia will cosponsor and push to pass the Ending Qualified Immunity Act, restoring Section 1983 to what Congress actually wrote: if a government official violates your constitutional rights, you can hold them accountable in court.

Several states have already banned this defense entirely in their own courts. It is past time the federal government did the same.