Sherrilyn Ifill

And everything that's happened since has led us to where we are now in both good ways and bad.

The Guardian describes Sherrilyn Ifill as making the case in your documentary that the 14th Amendment is the bedrock of our true multiracial democracy.

Is that why you then see the attacks continue? that we're living through today.

And I'm curious if you see any signs of hope, I guess, that those attacks, that efforts to propagandize around the things enshrined there, that they may lose out at the end of the day.

But nevertheless, it's very well done.

Sherrilyn Ifill is just incredible in this document.

She's in the film.

She is in the film.

Let's get into it.

Today, we are joined by civil rights lawyer, democracy warrior, and dedicated fighter for racial justice and equality, Sherrilyn Ifill.

Sherilyn was the former president and director counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

and the founding director of Howard Law School's 14th Amendment Center for Law and Democracy.

So I'm having her on today to go through some of the top issues that are plaguing our country right now and to get her thoughts on how we feel.

Today, there is so much going on that I think we feel overwhelmed, and I thought we would be served by a grounded and serious opinion of where we really sit.

So without further ado, please welcome my guest, civil rights lawyer, law professor, and endowed chair in civil rights at Howard University, Sherrilyn Ifill.

Welcome, Sherilyn.

Met so many amazing people.

Sherrilyn Ifill, who I would love to have on this show to talk about the 14th Amendment and other things like that.

So then I gotta leave the premiere to go back to the, uh, the Walgreens and get the prescription for Ativan so I have the Ativan because I have to leave the premiere later and go straight to CNN.

Mm-hmm.

You've heard us talk about that many times.

Shout out to my sister Sherrilyn Ifill, professor at Howard, who leads the 14th Amendment Center there.

But yesterday, the conversation came up from these warriors, warrior lawyers, many of whom who have defended political prisoners, some of the most well-known political prisoners, and every political prisoner, in fact, um, talking about the 13th Amendment, which as Ajua said yesterday, uh, Whitley said, uh, Whitley said yesterday, and Daniel and Andy said yesterday, that those amendment, that 13th Amendment did not abolish slavery, it simply changed the context.

And so when you enhance that criminal conviction piece, and by the way, there's no bar in the federal Constitution for everybody voting.

Abrams also said the documentary carries an obligation to remind audiences that the Constitution functions both as a pledge and as a duty, and that the midterm elections represent a starting point for grasping the challenges ahead and the responses available to address them.

Fellow participant Sherrilyn Ifill, whose prior role leading the NAACP Legal Defense Fund shaped her perspective on constitutional rights, told a television news program at the red carpet event that the country had experienced a comparable rupture before, one that claimed roughly 600,000 lives, and that the decisions now facing voters carried comparable weight.

In the film's final moments, Ifill conveys that every person across the country carries a role in determining what comes next, with two attributed remarks, that all people function as founders and framers of their era, and that the present moment calls on each individual to act.

Ahead of the November 3rd midterms, Abrams and Eiffel delivered messages to voters, with one of them characterizing the current political environment as a form of competitive authoritarianism.

[upbeat music] Welcome to the Daily 64th New York Film Festival podcast.

On today's edition, Ava DuVernay, Ambassador Jeff Flake, editor producer Spencer Averick, producers Tammy Garnes and Paul Garnes, and Sherrilyn Ifill, president and director counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, join NYFF programmer Florence Almasy at a press conference to discuss this year's closing night selection, 14th.

DuVernay follows her epical 2016 documentary 13th with a thrillingly expansive sequel of sorts, which passionately and persuasively details how the tenets of the 14th Amendment ratified post-Civil War are now under systematic attack.

The 64th New York Film Festival is presented in partnership with Rolex.

Uh, this is Anna from Decider.

I had a question for Ava about when and why you decided to include the DEI section of the movie, uh, as it doesn't have as, like, maybe obvious connection to the 14th Amendment right away.

Um, well, you know, I talked with Sherrilyn Ifill, the preeminent expert on the 14th Amendment, about this [laughs] um, because it speaks to the Equal Protection Act, uh, p- equal protection section of it.

And so what we were looking in each portion of the amendment was how is this document ricocheting on the current day in our lives in this moment.