Former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has been named to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund's national board of directors, the organization announced Thursday.
Holder, who was the first African-American attorney general of the United States, is currently a partner at Covington and Burling law firm in Washington, D.C. As the press release notes, Holder's connection to the LDF goes way back to 1974, when he served as a legal intern during the summer after his first year at Columbia Law School. Just last year, Holder received the organization's highest honor, the Thurgood Marshall Lifetime Achievement Award.
“I’m honored to join the board of this extraordinary organization. It’s been a long journey since I began as an intern at LDF more than 40 years ago,” Holder said, according to the release. “But LDF has remained constant in its excellence, its leadership and its commitment to the principle of equal justice under law.”
“I have been unequivocal in my admiration for Mr. Holder’s leadership. He presided over the restoration of the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice, launched the groundbreaking criminal-justice reforms of President Obama and confronted the challenges in Ferguson, Missouri, with tremendous sensitivity during a volatile time in our nation,” LDF President and Director-Counsel Sherrilyn Ifill said.
Read more at the NAACP LDF.