Published August 2025
NOTE: This general educational material does not constitute legal advice or encouragement to take action. Contact a local attorney for additional questions.
The Mass Defense Steering Committee (MDSC), with the support of the Director of Mass Defense and in collaboration with on-the-ground partners, has created a Hotline Manual to support organizers running legal hotlines for protests and broader social movements.
This document is written with the worst case scenario in mind: starting a hotline from scratch in an area with little legal support infrastructure, during a sudden upswing in demonstrations, such as we saw following the police murder of George Floyd in 2020. However, many of the recommendations within should be relevant to more established hotlines. The system described in this manual is not necessarily the only one possible, but it is based on existing hotlines with strong track records.
Hotline Manual Appendix
Want to dig deeper? Click below to access the Manual Hotline Appendix, which contains helpful tools and resources to fully operate a legal hotline. This includes recommendations for technology, prioritization of people arrested, hotline scripts, and much more.
