Washington, D.C., September 25, 2024 — The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law is proud to announce that its President and Executive Director, Damon Hewitt, accepted the Privacy Champion Award on behalf of the Lawyers’ Committee at Electronic Privacy Information Center’s (EPIC) 2024 Champions of Freedom Awards dinner. This recognition highlights the organization’s leadership on digital justice issues at the critical intersection of privacy and civil rights, particularly in protecting Black and Brown communities from data exploitation and algorithmic bias.
EPIC annually recognizes leaders and organizations who make significant contributions to privacy and civil liberties. The Privacy Champion Award acknowledges the Lawyers’ Committee’s commitment to ensuring privacy as a key civil rights issue and building coalitional power across the civil rights, privacy, and consumer protection communities.
During his acceptance speech for the Lawyers’ Committee, Hewitt underscored that privacy rights are integral to civil rights, noting during his remarks the importance of the landmark NAACP v. Alabama (1958) case where white supremacists sought to take membership lists of the NAACP. In that case the Court recognized that the “inviolability of privacy” is “indispensable to preservation of freedom of association.” He said, “For Black people and other communities of color, privacy is critical—it means that who we are cannot be used against us unfairly.” Hewitt also discussed the organization’s Digital Justice Initiative, aimed at addressing issues of privacy, data exploitation, and AI-driven discrimination.
The award comes at a time when the Lawyers’ Committee is working closely with EPIC and other advocates to advance federal privacy legislation. Notably, the Lawyers’ Committee endorsed and has been a driving force behind the recently introduced AI Civil Rights Act, a first-of-its-kind bill designed to regulate artificial intelligence and prevent discriminatory outcomes in crucial sectors such as housing, education, and criminal justice.
In closing, Hewitt remarked, “The tools of the future are locking us into the mistakes of the past, but rooms and partnerships like this one hold the key to unlocking us from that grim fate.” He reaffirmed the organization’s dedication to securing data privacy and online civil rights protections, particularly for communities most often targeted for harm in the digital world.
About the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law: The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization, formed in 1963 at the request of President John F. Kennedy to mobilize the nation’s leading lawyers as agents for change in the Civil Rights Movement. Today, the Lawyers’ Committee uses legal advocacy to achieve racial justice, fighting inside and outside the courts to ensure that Black people and other people of color have the voice, opportunity, and power to make the promises of our democracy real. The Lawyers’ Committee implements its mission and objectives by marshaling the pro bono resources of the bar for litigation, public policy, advocacy and other forms of service by lawyers to the cause of civil rights.
For more information, visit https://www.lawyerscommittee.org/online-civil-rights-act/
