The Vermont Freedom Fund is a statewide, volunteer-run bail fund that pays pretrial bail, immigration bonds, as well as other expenses to get community members released from jail. Our community members lose many days of their life sitting in both Vermont and immigration jails simply because they cannot pay bail. The Vermont Freedom Fund works with those detained and their legal counsel to provide the bail funds they need in order to be released. Cash bail is an abuse of the criminal justice system, criminalizes poverty and has a disproportionate effect on Black people, Indigenous people, people of color, and immigrants. We believe that wealth should not determine who is kept in jail.Our ultimate goal is to eliminate cash bail so that nobody is in jail simply because they don’t have the money to pay bail.  Our near-term goal is to bail out as many people as we can.