I was raised in a family where we were taught that the best thing you could do with your life was to really kind of push the cause of progress and justice and human rights forward.

In this nation, the greatest of all nations, there are no second-class families. That is our great American conviction.

I train my kids to dream really big and impossible dreams and to pursue them doggedly.

No person can maximize the American Dream on the minimum wage.

Civil marriage, like all civil rights provided by the government, must be provided equally to all Americans.

In the USA, it's harder for a black man with no criminal record to find a job than a white man with a criminal record, which is to say that race is actually a bigger factor than ex-felon status. But if you're both, it's almost impossible to find a job.

We really have to, as a country, recognize that school is where people get their identity not just as a scholar, or a future business person, but as a citizen. And we need to make sure that schools set them up for success as citizens.