NYU legislation prof Deborah Archer is ACLU’s new board president combat for racial justice envisioned to be a precedence

Civil Rights

Deborah Archer Philip Greenberg

Deborah Archer. Image by Philip Greenberg.

A professor at the New York University University of Regulation with know-how in civil rights has been elected as the nationwide board president of the American Civil Liberties Union.

The new leader is Deborah Archer, the ACLU’s eighth president more than the group’s 101-calendar year existence and the first Black individual in the placement, the Affiliated Push reviews.

The fight towards racial injustice is predicted to be a prime priority underneath Archer’s management, Anthony Romero, the ACLU’s executive director, advised the AP.

“At the best of our agenda is the hard work to redouble this nation’s longstanding but frayed motivation to civil rights and racial justice,” Romero claimed.

Other priorities contain voting legal rights, abortion rights and discontinuation of get-challenging immigration insurance policies.

A Feb. 1 ACLU press release describes Archer as an recognized civil legal rights attorney, scholar and trainer. At the NYU College of Legislation, she is a tenured professor of clinical legislation, director of the civil legal rights clinic, and co-school director of the school’s Centre on Race, Inequality and the Legislation.

“The ACLU has confirmed alone as an a must have voice in the combat for civil rights in the last 4 many years of the Trump period, and we are greater positioned than ever to face the get the job done ahead,” Archer mentioned in the push release.

The AP points out that the ACLU appreciated a resurgence following the election of former President Donald Trump, collecting $175 million in national and neighborhood donations in just 3 months. The ACLU hired more employees users and filed far more than 400 lawsuits and other authorized steps towards the Trump administration.

Romero praised Archer in the push release.

“There is no 1 better outfitted, who ideal personifies or is more capable to helm the long run battles for civil legal rights, civil liberties, and systemic equality than Deborah Archer,” he stated.

Archer is a graduate of Yale Legislation University. She begun her job as a authorized fellow at the ACLU. She was an assistant counsel at the NAACP Authorized Defense and Academic Fund from 1998 to 2000, was an affiliate at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett from 2000 to 2003, and was a professor at the New York Legislation Faculty before signing up for the NYU Faculty of Law in 2018.

Archer has been an ACLU board member considering the fact that 2009 and a standard counsel and member of the board’s govt committee due to the fact 2017 and 2016, respectively.

Archer replaces Susan Herman, a professor at the Brooklyn Legislation School who was board president for 12 many years.