Julie Fernandes is a civil rights lawyer whose career has included senior positions with the federal government and leadership within the non-profit sector. Julie is currently the Associate Director for Democracy at the Rockefeller Family Fund and Managing Director of the Democracy & Power Innovation Fund. Prior to joining RFF Julie was the Advocacy Director for Voting Rights and Democracy at the Open Society Foundations, Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice, and Special Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy in the Clinton Administration. From 2002 to 2008, Julie was Senior Counsel at the Leadership Conference for Civil Rights, where she led federal advocacy efforts on a variety of issues, including the successful campaign to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act in 2006. Ms. Fernandes has testified before Congress and the UN Human Rights Council, was an Adjunct Professor at American University’s Washington College of Law and Columbia Law School, and has authored several research reports, primarily in the areas of voting rights and criminal justice reform. She has also been a guest commentator on MSNBC (All in with Chris Hayes and Hardball), CNN International, and Fox News. Ms. Fernandes received both her J.D. and A.B. degrees from the University of Chicago and clerked for the Honorable Diane P. Wood at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.

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