Voting rights. Police brutality. Judicial ethics. The legacy of institutional racism. Many of the hot-button topics in debate today are issues Sherrilyn Ifill has taken a lead on as the president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational ...See moreVoting rights. Police brutality. Judicial ethics. The legacy of institutional racism. Many of the hot-button topics in debate today are issues Sherrilyn Ifill has taken a lead on as the president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Her expertise in these areas makes her a go-to commentator on TV and a prominent voice in effecting change. (It's also a family trait: The late journalist Gwen Ifill is her cousin.) After graduating from law school, Ifill was ready for the courts, but they weren't ready for her. "I didn't sound like what they expected. I didn't look the way they expected. So, I'd give the judges a minute... I could see the moment when it clicked and they were now paying attention to me." Ifill sees her role at the NAACP as more than just a paycheck. "I've been given a window into seeing the fault lines, the parts of the democracy that are weak, and my job is to make them stronger." Ifil says she's trying to do what's right, not what's easy. "We are undergoing tremendous change in the country. We have to be real grown-up citizens and figure out what our role will be moving this country forward. That's never fun. The civil rights movement started the same way. The country had to see itself." Written by
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