>> Hello.

I'm Dr. Ben Vinson III, the 18th president of Howard University.

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We're proud to share with you some of what makes Howard University so special.

♪♪ >> Yeah.

[ Man speaking indistinctly ] ♪♪ ♪♪ >> Yeah.

[ Man speaking indistinctly ] >> Yeah.

[ Man speaking indistinctly ] ♪♪ >> I'm Noah Harris, and I am a spring 2023 initiate of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Incorporated, Mu Lambda Chapter.

And, in fact, today is actually our one-year Alphaversary.

So shout-out to all of my LBs in the room.

[ Applause ] One year ago today, so I'm very grateful.

And now I have the distinct honor of introducing our moderator and guest speaker for this evening.

So first tonight I want to introduce the moderator as, uh, Brother Justin Hansford.

Justin Hansford is a Howard University School of Law professor and executive director of the Thurgood Marshall Civil Rights Center here at Howard University School of Law.

Professor Hansford was previously a Democracy Project Fellow at Harvard University, a visiting professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center, and associate professor of law at Saint Louis University.

He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from Howard University and a Juris Doctor from Georgetown University School of Law -- well, Georgetown University Law Center.

Professor Hansford also earned a Fulbright Scholarship to study the legal career of Nelson Mandela, and served as a clerk for Judge Damon J. Keith on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.

Most importantly, Brother Hansford is a spring 2021 initiate of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Incorporated, Mu Lambda Chapter.

And now tonight's guest truly, truly needs no introduction.

The Honorable Attorney General Eric Holder is an internationally recognized leader on a broad range of legal issues and a staunch advocate for civil rights.

He served in the Obama administration as the 82nd Attorney General of the United States from February 2009 to April of 2015, and that made him the third longest serving Attorney General and the first African-American Attorney General in the history of our country.

[ Applause ] Under Mr. Holder's leadership, civil rights and, of course, voting rights were at the forefront of everything and being prioritized by the Department of Justice.

Mr. Holder vigorously defended voting rights, including the enforcement of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

He criticized voter ID laws that were politically motivated and meant to suppress minority and youth voters, and he led the Justice Department's efforts to help overturn so many of those laws.

He began his legal career at the Public Integrity Section of the US Department of Justice, and in 1988, President Ronald Reagan appointed him to serve as judge of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia.

In 1993, Mr. Holder stepped down from the bench to accept an appointment from President Clinton to serve as the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia.

He held that position until he became the first African-American Deputy Attorney General in 1997, and then from 2001 until his confirmation as Attorney General, Mr. Holder was a partner at Covington & Burling, where he advised clients on complex investigations and litigation matters.

He returned to that firm in 2015.

Mr. Holder currently serves as the chairman of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee.

His book, which some of you have tonight, "Our Unfinished March: The Violent Past and Imperiled Future of the Vote -- A History, a Crisis, a Plan" is a playbook for how we can save our democracy before it's too late.

To have taken this second act of safeguarding our democracy even after he left office -- after he left office, after he had this historic role, is truly remarkable.

He is our generation's Thurgood Marshall, and he's an inspiration to me and thousands of other young people who are hoping to enter the legal profession, so many of them who are here and studying at the Howard University School of Law.

I don't take it lightly when I say that history... history will look kindly on Eric Holder.

[ Applause ] Without further ado, I would like to welcome a mentor, a living legend, and the first black Attorney General of the United States, Eric Holder, as well as Brother Justin Hansford.

>> Alpha Phi Alpha Chapter -- Mu Lambda Chapter and, you know, the entire campus is just honored to have you here with us.

So thank you for joining us.

>> Good to be here.

>> And, you know, I wanted to just start off with questions about this wonderful book that you've published and specifically about our democracy.

Now, you start off by saying, you know, America is a fragile, fledgling democracy.

Its citizens have only had unfettered access to the ballot since the 1960s, and we still have a long way to go.

So could you take us through some of the stories about how the vote was won first by white men, then by white women, and finally by African-Americans?

>> Sure.

I mean, the book is really kind of divided into three parts -- kind of the the history of the franchise.

You know, how various groups got the vote.

So the history part of it.

Then there's a kind of an analysis of where we stand today and the issues that we're still confronting.

And then there's some specific proposals about things that I think we ought to do to try to improve our democracy.

But the history part, I mean, you know, it's interesting -- We think about -- We think about this in contemporary terms, you know, the struggle for the right to vote.

And we tend to think, "Well, this is African-Americans."

Maybe go back a little further.

It's about women.

The first group of people who sought the right to vote and who were denied it were white men... who didn't have property.

The -- In the early days, all right, vote if you were a white guy, but you had to have a certain amount of property.

Otherwise, you were not eligible to vote.

Now, these white guys said, "Well, wait a minute.

I pay taxes.

I've got to defend the country in the Army, the military, whatever.

And I don't have the right to vote."

And so they organized, um, and actually won for themselves the right to vote.

It was interesting.

Benjamin Franklin, in talking about that property requirement, said, "Well, all right, so you got a guy who can vote because he owns a jackass that's worth $50.

But if the jackass dies, this man can't vote.

So who actually has the right to vote?

The man or the jackass?"

[ Laughter ] Interesting observation.

Um, and so that, I think -- that quest for, um, suffrage was something that lit in other groups of people that same desire.

You know, the Founding Fathers, when they were in the process of deciding who should get the right to vote, uh, I think John Adams was the one who said, "Well, wait a minute.

If we give white men, um, without property the right to vote, other groups are going to ask for the right to vote.

You watch.

Women are going to ask for the right to vote, you know, and, oh, oh."

And that, uh -- That was, like, for him, one of the ultimate, uh, negatives that would flow from, you know, expanding the franchise.

But it did light in other groups of people -- Women first, African-Americans after the Civil War get the right to vote.

It's then essentially taken away until the Voting Rights Act is passed in 1965.

And that's why I say we're still in terms of being a true democracy -- It's really only been since the -- the '60s.

And even then, you know, it's not a democracy without its problems.

We're still fighting a lot -- a lot of battles.

>> Right.

And in your book -- One of the things I love about your book is that it approaches the question looking at the activism and the grassroots movements that brought about suffrage.

And, you know, myself, I work with movement lawyering students.

So students who work with people using social change and grassroots movements to try to create more rights for our democracy.

And I was just wondering -- Your time as an Attorney General, um, how did that impact the way that you saw social change as a possibility in our country?

Do you still, uh, see it more so as something that happens in the courts or through the work of lawyers?

Or do you see grassroots movements as more of a part of the story that people don't think about too often?

>> No, I think that's right.

You know, there's a direct connection between, I think, that which happens in the streets, you know, demonstrations, and then what actually happens in the courts.

>> Right.

>> Um, obviously, we need to have good lawyers, Howard lawyers, um, you know, arguing cases, um, making good legal arguments, but a lot of the fuel for the movement, um, and for the advancements that we make comes from the demonstrations, people who are, you know, bound and determined to make their voices heard.

That raises the consciousness of of people, um, demands change that is answered potentially by people in the legislature or sometimes in the court.

You know, we tend to think of judges as, you know, removed from, um, you know, our society in substantial ways.

And, yeah, they should be insulated so that they're not subject to political pressure.

But the reality is that, um, judges are human beings.

And to the extent that you've got a society demanding certain change, that has some impact, at least some impact on, um, you know, on some -- some judges.

And, you know, with the grassroots movement, um, you then have people who are demanding change.

And then you have good lawyers -- Thurgood Marshall -- coming up with ways in which, um, they try to craft legal arguments to meet those demands.

So I don't think -- You know, you can't think of the changes that we have made, although won in the courts, as strictly a legal movement.

Um, that legal, that's just maybe the tip of the spear, but there's a direct connection between legal action and -- and social activism.

>> Right.

On that question of social activism, you talk about some of the activists that we may not know as much about throughout history who have had an impact on the movement for suffrage, including black women, like Ida B.

Wells, Mary Church Terrell.

I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about their contributions to our right to vote that may not be as well known in the public.

>> Yeah.

You know, we talk about the the women's suffrage movement, um, we usually think about Susan B. Anthony, you know, and, you know, not to in any way diminish that role that she played, and others.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> But we think of, you know, white women out there and fighting for the right to vote.

And the reality is that Ida B.

Wells, Mary Church Terrell, other African-American women were essential parts of that struggle and played key roles in making sure that women got the right to vote.

You know, it was an interesting thing, the women's suffrage movement.

You have these great women doing wonderful things at great risk to themselves, who, as they got closer to getting the right to vote, ultimately decided, "Well, wait a minute.

We need to segregate our movement."

And there's a big parade that happens here in 1913, in Washington, D.C., and a determination made that, right, "Women are going to march down Pennsylvania Avenue demanding the right to vote, but we're going to make this segregated.

We're going to have the white women go first.

They're going to be separated.

Then a group of Quakers or something.

And then we'll have, you know, black women, African-American women after that."

Uh, and Ida B.

Wells said, "No, that's just not going to happen."

And so without telling anybody, she vaults herself to the front of the parade.

And then there are pictures, you know, the next day of this African-American woman, you know, leading -- helping to lead the parade.

But even back then with a movement that in some ways was as pure as it could be -- These are just a group of people, you know, women, wanting to be full participants in the American democracy.

And even then, even then, you know, segregation, which was, you know, rampant in those days, reared its ugly head.

And those people who fought alongside, you know, white women were relegated, or tried to be relegated to the -- you know, to the rear of the effort.

>> Right.

And you also talk about the work of modern-day activists who are continuing that legacy.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> Could you talk about some of the ways that people are making change today in that same tradition?

>> Yeah.

One thing I think that's really important to remember is that a lot of the change that I talk about in the book -- and I think it's true, if you look at other, you know, social movements -- it's always young people.

It's always young people who are at the forefront.

So that -- You know, I'm looking at all of you now.

You all look distressingly young.

You know, I mean, it's... [ Laughter ] I'm old enough now so that I can say this.

You all look like you're in, like, maybe high school or something, but that's more a function -- But you all look wonderful.

You all look wonderful.

Um, but young people should not think that you don't have the capacity to bring about the kinds of changes that we still need.

If you look at the Founding Fathers, they're all young people, except for Benjamin Franklin.

You know, Thomas Jefferson writes the Declaration of Independence when he's in his 30s.

You've got the civil rights movement.

You know, Dr. King, Diane Nash, um, John Lewis -- young people who ripped down a system of American apartheid, you know?

Young people who were responsible for that.

The end of the Vietnam War was brought about by the opposition of young people.

And so I think that you all should be always cognizant of the fact that your involvement in our political system and our desire for social change is something that historically has been important and will be important in the 21st century -- in 21st century, as well.

>> Right.

So let's talk a little bit about some of the Supreme Court case law, in particular Shelby County vs. Holder.

So what is that case?

And I can see by your reaction, you know, you have a lot of stories to tell about that.

And what -- And what was the silent protests that you were involved in as a result of that case?

>> Well, first off, I never call it the Shelby County vs. Holder case.

It is simply the Shelby County case.

I don't want my name associated with that case.

[ Laughter ] It's like, you know -- It would be like Dred Scott vs. Holder.

You wouldn't want your name associated with that case.

So, you know, that's kind of the way I think of that case.

Um, 2013, the Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decision that I think will go down as one of the worst Supreme Court decisions of all time, without getting in too much of the detail, essentially takes away from the Justice Department its preclearance authority -- the ability to look at electoral changes that are proposed in covered jurisdictions and say, "Well, you know, you can't do that because it will disenfranchise, have a negative impact on, dilute the political power of certain groups."

Uh, Supreme Court decides, um, as I said, I think very wrongly, that, uh, the coverage formula is not up to date, essentially takes away from the Justice Department that ability to preclear things.

As a result of that, we have seen thousands, I think, close to 2,000 polling places now that have been closed since the Shelby County case, uh, voter purges, 40% of which happened in communities of color, a whole variety of disenfranchisement that happened as a result of the Shelby County case.

And, you know, what's interesting about that -- It really kind of guts substantial parts of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which is the crown jewel of the civil rights movement.

And it happens after Congress conducts hearings.

You know about this.

You worked on this stuff.

Conducts hearings, um, takes exhibits.

Uh, Congress almost unanimously passes, you know, the legislation.

It's signed by a Republican president, reauthorized for 25 years.

Um, and the court in a very ideological decision, um, as I said, guts the Voting Rights Act.

And it has had a negative impact on our democracy.

Um, not within months, not within weeks, but within days, certain states do a whole variety of things that they would not have been able to do before.

Put into place these unnecessary photo ID laws that have, again, a negative impact on the ability of especially people of color, uh, to vote.

Texas.

Texas is one example.

They say, "All right, you got to have a photo ID in order to vote."

And I'm a person who says, "Yeah, you got to prove that you are who you are when you want to vote.

But we've always said you can do that in a variety of ways."

But they say that you've got to have a state-issued photo ID.

They say if you have the state-issued photo ID that says you're allowed to carry a concealed weapon or a gun, that's fine.

If you have a state-issued photo ID that says you're a student at the University of Texas, that's not adequate.

So you can see they're making a judgment there about who they want to be able to vote, even when they say it's -- you know, it seems to be neutral, you know, on its face.

They're making a judgment as to who these students are likely to vote for, as opposed to who these gun-carrying folks are.

So Shelby County, I think, as I said, is a disastrous, uh, decision.

I think it's one in a series of cases that this court, um, has rendered that has a negative impact on our democracy.

The Rucho case says that you can't bring partisan gerrymandering cases into federal courts.

There's a whole variety of things that this court has done, I think, inconsistent with what a Supreme Court at its best should do.

My silent protest was, every Attorney General argues a case before the Supreme Court.

They always make it the easiest case in the term.

It's the case that you can't possibly lose.

You know, the easiest possible case.

And so, uh, the Solicitor General asked me, "So when are you going to argue a case?"

I said, "Shelby County comes down in 2013."

And I made the determination I wasn't going to appear before the Supreme Court, um, because that would almost make it seem as if it was business as usual.

And I was so offended by that case that I decided that I would not appear before the court.

Um, I never really told anybody about it, other than folks in the Justice Department, who were sworn to secrecy, because I didn't want to make too big a deal because we still had business before the court and whatever.

But I just made the determination that I wasn't going to appear before the court and publicly talked about it for the first time in the book.

>> Mm.

Yeah.

So let's talk a bit more about that voter fraud narrative that, um, has been taking over the country.

According to the Brennan Center, uh, which analyzed over a billion votes, there's a one in a 1.2 million chance of being struck by lightning and a one in 32.2 million chance of committing in-person voter fraud.

>> Right.

>> Yet, still, we see this narrative happening around the country that seems to suggest that voter fraud is an epidemic.

>> Right.

>> And we're seeing responses.

What are some of those things we're seeing happen as a result of this false narrative?

>> Yeah, I mean, think about those numbers.

You're more likely to be hit by lightning than to cast a fraudulent in-person vote.

So this notion of voter fraud -- you know, "Oh, there's voter fraud," all these people who are who are voting who shouldn't be voting -- is nonsense.

It's nonsense.

But it is something that -- You know, if you say something, even something that's false, if you say it enough and you say it over and over again, it seeps into people's consciousness at some level and people start to think, "Oh, yeah, there must be a lot of vote fraud out there," even though the statistics don't bear that out.

But that then leads to, you know, if there's this notion of vote fraud -- leads to a whole range of things that governments can put in place to try to deal with this voter fraud or do things that they know are inconsistent with our democracy, but say it's done in order to prevent voter fraud, which, again, does not exist.

And so things like these unnecessary photo ID laws.

Um, you think about, you know, in Georgia, where they closed a whole bunch of polling places.

Um, I remember when they passed that law that said, "All right, you can't give somebody who's waiting in line food or water."

I'm thinking, "Well, what is that?"

Well, it's pretty interesting if you think about it.

You close polling places.

So there's going to be long lines of people in order, you know, to vote.

George is pretty hot place at times.

Um, you wait in line.

You want something to eat?

You need something to drink?

Can't give that to them.

And so a few people leave the line.

And with our elections as close as they are, if you get 1%, 2%, 3% of the people who are waiting in line to leave the line, you could have an impact on the election.

In the 2020 presidential election in Atlanta in the evening after 5:00, if you were in a white part of Atlanta, it took you six minutes to vote.

If you were in a black part of Atlanta, it took you 52 minutes to vote.

Now, this is the same election, same city, but with those disparate results.

And, again, all around this notion of, um, putting in place measures to prevent voter fraud.

And then, of course, as you know, the former president, as he talked about, well, he was concerned about voter fraud in Detroit, in Philadelphia, you know, in New York, all the places where without saying it, without saying it, he was essentially saying in these cities that are run by or have substantial African-American populations, that's where the voter fraud is happening.

And so, therefore, you do things that make it more difficult for people, um, especially in cities, especially in communities of color -- make it more difficult for folks to vote to prevent nonexistent voter fraud.

>> Right.

Right.

Now, let's talk about gerrymandering and this question of, uh, minority rule.

You wrote that, "We are living through the implementation of a kind of political apartheid, where Republicans are perpetually in control of what does and does not get to become law, even when they win fewer votes than Democrats at every level."

So could you talk about that question?

I know some students may not know the ins and outs of what gerrymandering is, the history behind it.

Maybe you could explain that problem for us.

>> Yeah, we've had gerrymandering in this country for as long as we have been a republic.

Um, Patrick Henry actually gerrymandered -- oh, gerrymandered a seat in Virginia.

I forget.

He either didn't like James Monroe or James Madison, one of the Jameses, but he drew a district, drew the district lines in such a way so that he excluded one of the two Jameses.

So we've had gerrymandering in the country for as long as we have been a nation.

Gerrymandering is really just about drawing the lines for legislative seats in such a way that you almost guarantee that a particular party is going to win.

And if you do a -- If you draw a successful gerrymander, you can virtually guarantee -- It doesn't matter what the people want to do.

Um, the lines are drawn in such a way that you know a Republican is going to win here, a Democrat is going to win here.

And what we have seen -- In 2011, Princeton University did a study and said that what happened in 2011 -- We do the census in the zero years, so it's in 2010.

We do the redistricting in the year after that.

It would be 2011.

In 2011, um, Princeton said it was the worst gerrymandering of the past 50 years.

Republicans had a thing called Project Red Map where they really went to town.

And to be honest, Democrats were asleep at the switch, you know, didn't have the same emphasis on it, didn't have the technological capabilities.

And they put in place gerrymanders that really lasted through the course of the decade.

And so you ended up with, like -- We just undid a gerrymander in Wisconsin where Democrats got, on more than a few cycles, way more votes than Republicans did, but ended up with substantially fewer seats in the Wisconsin state legislature.

And the same thing happened in Congress.

After the gerrymander of 2011, you looked at what happened in the congressional election in 2012 -- Democrats got 1.4 million -- 1.4 million more votes than Republicans, and it ended up with a 33-seat deficit in the United States House of Representatives.

That was a gerrymander.

>> Right.

>> Gerrymandering means that you're not concerned about a general election.

You only concerned about a primary.

And so that drives Republicans further and further to the right, to be fair, some Democrats further and further to the left in the gerrymandered seats, where those exist, and means that people don't cooperate because that's seen as a sign of weakness, inviting a primary challenger, so nothing gets done.

It's all about making sure that you don't get a primary challenger.

You don't work with the opposition.

Um, and it has a negative impact on the ability of government to function.

And so that's why I've been the head of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, to try to undo these -- these gerrymanders.

We brought lawsuits, we put in place independent commissions to draw the lines, a whole variety of things to try to make our system better.

The New York Times says that the redistricting that we just went through was the most fair that we've had in the last 40 years.

>> Okay.

Well, that's good.

I was just going to say -- You know, we've talked about gerrymandering, we've talked about voter suppression.

But in spite of all of these things taking place, I get the idea from the book you still have hope in our democracy, and you believe that there are things that we can do to solve some of these problems and make it easier to vote.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> And I was wondering if you could talk about some of those reforms that you think could make a difference.

>> Sure.

Yeah.

I mean, you know, I'm a pretty optimistic person because I think optimism breeds involvement.

You know, if you're pessimistic, you know, "nothing's going to change," that, I think, tends to lead to people being inactive, uninvolved.

Um, the history of our nation, the history of African-Americans in this nation shows that, um, we have overcome more than any other group in this country.

Um, to not be active, to not be involved, um, I think, dishonors the legacy of people who sacrificed, who committed themselves, who gave their lives so that I would have opportunities, um, you know, that they did not.

Without John Lewis, without Diane Nash, um, without Bayard Rustin, without Martin Luther King, I don't become attorney general.

Barack does not become, you know, president of the United States.

And so we owe to them, um, our involvement, um, as I think all of you owe future generations, you know, your involvement, as well.

Every generation has the responsibility, I think, to defend our democracy.

And every generation has, I think, risen to that challenge -- especially African-Americans, have risen to that challenge.

And we cannot at this point decide that, um, we're going to be uninvolved because the reality is, if we're not involved, that vacuum will be filled by people who are less committed to the things that we think need to -- the solutions that we think need to be put in place to deal with the problems that still exist.

But I do have a list here of specific things that I think we ought to go over.

And I'll go through this list really quickly because I don't want to...

Here we go.

Uh, I'll do this just really fast.

But I always bring this out because I make sure I don't forget them.

But, uh, we need to end gerrymandering.

Um, that's something I think, as I said, has had a negative effect.

Uh, the Senate, you've got to end the filibuster.

This is something that does not exist in the Constitution.

This is just a rule.

You know?

People say you gotta have 60 votes to pass anything in the Senate.

No, you don't.

No, you don't.

That's only because of this rule and the way which Republicans have come to use it in the recent past.

The Founding Fathers looked at the whole question of having supermajorities and made the determination that that would lead to the tyranny of the minority and the experience they had with the Articles of Confederation.

So they said, "No, we'll just have majorities."

So end the filibuster.

Admit Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico as states.

[ Applause ] Supreme Court -- 18-year terms.

You know, people get on the Supreme Court and... [ Applause ] These are unelected positions not subject to recall, and having people with that much power on the court for that long, I think, is just not necessarily a good thing.

And, in fact, I think in those long, long terms, people get a little insulated, out of touch with, you know, where America is, what the needs are.

And so 18-year terms.

Um, I also think that we should try to depressurize the appointment process and do something like this.

You have 18-year terms and say a president will appoint a new justice in the first year of his or her term and in the third year of his or her term, right?

And that should be the way in which the Supreme Court goes -- 18-year terms with appointments first year and third year of every president's term.

So every president would get to appoint two justices.

It would expand the court if you did that in the short term.

But over the long term, that would bring us back to a court of nine justices, but would also mean that we'd have an inflow of new blood on a pretty regular basis.

Um, if every president knows that he or she is going to appoint two justices every term, maybe that makes the confirmation process a little less contentious than it is.

And then just quickly, some voting stuff.

Automatic voting registration, same day registration, make Election Day a national holiday.

I mean, you know... [ Applause ] ...why... You think about -- I mean, I did some research for the book.

I was thinking, "Why do we have a Tuesday -- you know, Tuesday to vote?"

Well, it all has to do with people bringing crops to the markets in the 19th century.

I don't know many of you -- I don't know how many of you still bring crops to markets.

But for those of you who do, don't be offended by what I'm saying.

But most folks don't do that right now.

And so make Election Day a national holiday.

And if you don't want to do that, Election Day ought to be, like, on a Saturday or something like that so people don't have to make the determination that they're going to choose between their jobs, getting to class, whatever, and casting a vote.

End felon disenfranchisement.

This is something that has had... [ Applause ] You know, it is something that is a legacy of the post-Civil War, a way in which Reconstruction was deconstructed.

"All right.

We've got all these newly freed people, men who have the ability to to vote.

Um, hmm.

What are we gonna do about that?

Well, we'll say that if you are a felon, you can't vote."

Which on its face, I don't know if it's a good policy, bad policy.

But, all right, so that's -- "And then what do we do?

Oh, we'll start arresting all these newly freed people, men, and saddle them with felony records, and, therefore, they can't vote."

So it's an ugly legacy and something that I think we need to end.

Cut down on polling distances and times.

We need more polling places.

I mean, again, that's something that comes from the Shelby -- the Shelby County case.

End unnecessary, um, purging that we see around the country, as well.

And then we need a new Voting Rights Act, you know, like the one that, you know, you worked on.

We need -- I was, uh, disappointed that when Democrats had the presidency, the House of Representatives, and the Senate, uh, in the first two years of the Biden presidency, we did not pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act that would have cured a lot of these -- a lot of these issues.

And I was relatively -- relatively quiet in talking to Senators Sinema and Manchin, who did not want to have a carve-out for the filibuster so that we could pass this legislation.

I'll tell you this.

If we win the presidency -- I think we will -- if we hold the House -- if we get the House of Representatives and hold the Senate, and if this is not the first bill that is considered by a new Democratic, um, control of all three components of -- of our government, I'll be far more vocal, um, far more, um, visible in my opposition to -- and calling out people who will not do that which is absolutely -- absolutely necessary.

>> Well, I was going to say -- You're visible right now.

You're doing work with the National Democratic Redistricting Committee.

I was wondering if you could tell us about the work that you're doing with that organization and its mission.

>> Yeah.

NDRC was formed in January of 2017 to deal with the problem of gerrymandering.

We want to try to make the -- try to make the process, the redistricting process that was going to happen in 2021, um, just more fair.

And the theory of the case was that if we make it more fair, Democrats will do just fine.

You know, progressives will do just fine.

We don't need to cheat in order to win.

The reality is that, um, demographics are moving our way.

We've got better candidates, we've got better policies, but we've got to fight through these mechanisms that Republicans have put in place to, as I explained before, guarantee that they would win, you know, certain seats.

In a lot of ways, Republicans have made peace with the notion that in terms of popular support, they're going to be a minority party, and they're okay with that as long as they have majority power.

And that's why I say it's kind of a political apartheid system.

And so what we've done at NDRC is to come up with -- We've looked at our -- We usually have about 12 to 15 target states where the gerrymandering is really bad and try to figure out, "All right, what is it that we can do in a particular state?"

Some states, it means electing state legislators and governors who will do the right thing.

Sometimes it means bringing lawsuits, and we've done that around the country, as well.

Sometimes it means putting in reform measures.

And one of the chief reform measures is to put in place these independent commissions to draw the lines, not have state legislatures do it, you know, because they're thinking about protecting themselves.

Have disinterested people in an independent state -- these state commissions draw the lines.

And so we've been successful in putting those in place in Michigan and in other states around the country.

But this is -- It's an ongoing effort.

Um, we don't have -- It used to be just a one-year process of redistricting, but now we're still going on.

We still -- As I said, we just unwound a gerrymander in Wisconsin, um, I guess a couple or so weeks ago.

We still have lawsuits in Florida and Texas and Georgia and Alabama.

So the work goes on, and I'll be working on this stuff through the course of this decade.

>> All right.

Well, I'm going to take questions after this last question of mine.

I was going to ask you to sum up, if you had to summarize, what you want people to take away from this book in, you know, a short phrase or something like that.

What would you like to have people take away?

>> I would hope that people would take away from this, um, hope, you know, in the sense that things might seem to be difficult and hard, unfair, um, you know, unjust, um, unequal.

And in a lot of places, that is, in fact, the case.

But the reality is, this is not the first time this ever happened in this country.

And it's also not the first time that, uh, African-Americans have been called upon to defend our democracy, to enhance our democracy, to make our democracy better.

And I think our history teaches us that, you know -- that positive change is, in fact, possible, but it's not promised.

You know, it's not promised.

Change only happens as a result of commitment, activism, um, work.

And so, like other generations, I think that we've got to do the work.

You know, Dr. King said that, "the arc of the moral universe is long and it bends towards justice."

Here's the deal -- It doesn't bend on its own.

It only bends when people like us put our hands on that arc and pull it towards justice.

And so my hope would be that, um, armed with knowledge of the history that I have in the book, um, armed with the -- the tradition that is, in some ways, I think unique to our community, that we will again lead this nation, um, put our hands on that arc, pull it towards justice, and ensure that we finally get to the place where, you know, we need to be.

But here's also the deal.

You know, I'm impatient.

And -- When I hear people say, "Well, we've made a lot of progress," I say, "Well, that's good.

But, you know, what does progress mean?"

You know, my father was born in the 1900s.

My mother was born in the 1920s.

I was born in the 1950s.

My kids were born in the 1990s.

And so, yeah, there's been progress.

But when do we get to the end state of equality and justice?

You know?

I mean, how long do we have to wait?

And so don't tell me that I should be satisfied with progress.

Progress is a measure of kind of where you are.

I want to get to the place where we need to be.

And it's been too long.

Uh, you know, Dr. King, often -- one time said that he was impatient.

And I get that now.

You know, I'm in the fourth quarter of my life, hopefully at the beginning of the fourth quarter... [ Laughter ] ...and I'm impatient.

I don't want my kids to fight the battles that I'm fighting or that my father had to fight.

You know, at some point, I want -- You know, I want us to be the democracy that is consistent with the words that we have in our founding documents, and we're not there yet.

I'm hopeful that we will get there, in large part because of young people.

As I go around the country, um, and talk to young people, I'm really kind of -- That's the thing that kind of keeps me optimistic.

Um, young folks are committed.

Um, there is a bad rap on young people being, you know, not politically involved.

This generation not politically involved.

That is not the case at all.

Not the case at all.

These are folks -- you all -- unbelievably attuned to the issues, um, committed to change.

And I think with changing demographics, the ideology, I think, of the nation is changing, I think we can finally get to that place and get beyond just this notion of be satisfied with progress.

Let's get to -- As I said, let's get to those end states.

>> All right.

Well, let's give a round of applause to the Attorney General.

[ Applause ] Thank you so much.

>> This episode of "@Howard" was filmed on the campus of Howard University.

For more, visit whut.org.