Speakers

Mónica Gúzman

Founder & CEO, Reclaim Curiosity
Author, I Never Thought of It That Way
Host, A Braver Way

Mónica Guzmán is author of “I Never Thought of it That Way: How to Have Fearlessly Curious Conversations in Dangerously Divided Times”; founder and CEO of Reclaim Curiosity; advisor and debate chair at Braver Angels; and host of “A Braver Way” podcast. She received an honorary doctorate degree from Wheaton College, and completed study and research fellowships at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard, the Henry M. Jackson Foundation, and the University of Florida. A Mexican immigrant and dual US/Mexico citizen, she lives in Seattle with her husband and two kids and is the proud liberal daughter of conservative parents. Read more about her and her work at reclaimcuriosity.com. 

Bryan Stevenson

Founder & Executive Director, Equal Justice Initiative
Author, Just Mercy

Bryan Stevenson is the founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), a human rights organization in Montgomery, Alabama. Under his leadership, EJI has won major legal challenges addressing excessive sentencing, wrongful convictions, abuse of incarcerated people, and the prosecution of children as adults. He has argued and won multiple cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, including the landmark 2012 decision banning mandatory life-without-parole sentences for children 17 and younger.

Stevenson also led the creation of EJI’s acclaimed Legacy Sites, including the Legacy Museum, the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, Freedom Monument Sculpture Park, and Montgomery Square, which examine the history and ongoing impact of slavery, racial terror, segregation, and mass incarceration.

He is the author of the New York Times bestseller Just Mercy, which was adapted into a major motion picture, and is the subject of the Emmy Award-winning HBO documentary True Justice. Stevenson has received numerous honors, including the MacArthur Foundation “Genius” Prize, the ABA Medal, the National Humanities Medal, and more than 60 honorary doctoral degrees. He is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II

President & Senior Lecturer, Repairers of the Breach
Co-Chair, Poor People’s Campaign
Professor of Public Theology & Public Policy, Yale Divinity School

Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II is President and Senior Lecturer of Repairers of the Breach, Co-Chair of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, and Professor in the Practice of Public Theology and Public Policy at Yale Divinity School, where he is Founding Director of the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy. He is also a Senior Fellow with the Kettering Foundation.

A nationally recognized leader at the intersection of faith, public policy, and grassroots organizing, Bishop Barber is the architect of the Forward Together Moral Movement, which gained national attention through North Carolina’s Moral Monday protests. In 2018, he helped relaunch the Poor People’s Campaign, building on the movement first organized by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and others to confront poverty and injustice in America.

Bishop Barber is the author of five books, including The Third Reconstruction and White Poverty: How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy. His honors include the MacArthur Foundation “Genius” Fellowship, the Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Award, and North Carolina’s highest civilian honor. He has delivered major national and global addresses, including at the 2016 Democratic National Convention and the 2021 Inaugural Prayer Service.